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A gang that used "ransomware" to infect and paralyze millions of computers in 30 nations has been broken up, the European police agency said Wednesday.
The gang, pretending to be police, told the computer owners that they had been caught in illegal online activity and had to pay a fine to regain use of their virus-locked computers, Europol announced in Madrid.
"What we saw in this operation was a new type of cybercrime problem, called ransomware, which involves in particular the cybercriminals hijacking the name and logo of a national police," said Rob Wainwright, director of Europol.
Wainwright, a British national, said even his own name and that of Europol was hijacked, as the suspects demanded, "a fine from citizens operating on the Internet. A fine for a fabricated offense, perhaps connected with suspected exchange of child sex abuse images or other such activity."
The gang demanded fines of €100 (about $134), Europol said.
The suspected ringleader of the gang, a Russian man, was arrested in the United Arab Emirates, while 10 suspected aides, including Russians, Ukrainians and Georgians, were arrested on Spain's Costa del Sol, on the Mediterranean coast, said Francisco Martinez, Spain's secretary of state for security.
At least 3% of the victims paid the fine, netting the gang an estimated millions of dollars, Wainwright said.
In Spain alone, investigators believe more than a million dollars in "fines" were paid by computer users, Martinez said.
Investigators had been on the trail of the suspects for about two years. When initially detected, the gang was operating only in six nations and had affected just 20,000 users, authorities said. Since then the scheme had expanded to 30 nations, mostly in Europe.
They managed to stay a step ahead of authorities by constantly changing mutations of the virus and their methods, authorities said. The Russian accused of being the leader of the gang is 27 years old, they said.
"We have identified one of the most dangerous criminal organizations working in this area ... and (are) closing down, therefore, a very important criminal market in this area," Wainwright said.
In Spain, more than 700,000 queries were sent to the government by users seeking advice on how to unblock their computers, Martinez said. | <urn:uuid:caeec622-8788-4c2e-bb0b-0593116dcc1e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.click2houston.com/lifestyle/technology/-Ransomware-scheme-disrupted-Europol-says/-/1736680/18533136/-/4kke60/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977235 | 480 | 1.8125 | 2 |
Yes, it's two and a half hours long and yes, there is much more talk than action in Steven Spielberg's LINCOLN, but it is a beautiful and fascinating film that succeeds masterfully in bringing perhaps our most revered President and his era to life.
LINCOLN is biographical, but it is not a biography. Instead of the story of Lincoln's life, it focuses on the end of it; on his efforts to abolish slavery with the passage of the 13th amendment and to bring an end to the Civil War.
Daniel Day Lewis may at first seem an odd choice to play Lincoln, but it's a brilliant performance and his adoption of a thin, reedy voice is in keeping with descriptions of the way Lincoln actually spoke.
As Lincoln's wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, Sally Field presents us with a truly inspired characterization of the ambitious, clever and perhaps unhinged first lady. When she is on screen, you can't take your eyes off of her.
Tommy Lee Jones plays Republican radical and abolitionist Thaddeus Stevens who must decide if he will compromise his fierce and unwavering stand on the issue even slightly if by doing so it helps realize at least part of his cherished goal of equality for the races. Jones' bombastic and often humorous style fits the part like a glove.
The political machinations of the time are also fascinating to watch, giving us a chance to observe Lincoln as the master politician he was in an era when twisting arms and buying votes could be much more blatant than they are today.
It is also somewhat startling to realize how closely the divisiveness of the battle over the abolition of slavery back then parallels the divisiveness of the pro-life, pro-choice debate in our own time.
The film is not without its flaws, however. While Lincoln was certainly a tall man and perhaps ungainly, there are a couple of moments here where Daniel Day Lewis is so ungainly, comparisons to the lurching of the Frankenstein monster don't seem entirely out of place.
Also, Spielberg's tendency for the corny or overly sentimental (think of the "Tell me I'm a good man" speech from SAVING PRIVATE RYAN) is not ignored here. But luckily for the movie goer, he seems to have taken a page from director Alfred Hitchcock's later-in-life playbook. Hitchcock, the Master of Suspense, had a habit of appearing in his films in small cameos. But, toward the end of his career he got them out of the way right at the beginning of the movie so they wouldn't be a distraction to his story.
Spielberg follows that example with LINCOLN, having what can only be characterized as a bit "too enlightened" and somewhat anachronistic conversation between the President and four Union soldiers. Once he gets that scene out of the way, however, he gets right down to business and never looks back.
Don't be surprised if we hear more of LINCOLN at Oscar time. Four Stars.
by Jonathan Mumm [email protected] | <urn:uuid:b1259f36-7617-4e19-a0be-49b10726ae1f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sacandco.net/news/article/217544/37/Movie-review--Lincoln | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975043 | 637 | 1.6875 | 2 |
Canadians who are stressed about the annual RRSP deadline are not alone according to a new study that found 60 per cent of respondents feel anxious about coming up with the money for their retirement savings.
And almost half of respondents to the survey – 49 per cent – who make an annual RRSP contribution do so in a lump sum, said the Bank of Montreal study released Wednesday.
The uneasiness around the March 1 deadline is understandable when Canadians have to deal with other financial priorities, said Marlena Pospiech, senior manager BMO Wealth Planning Group.
“If they haven’t saved regularly it could be really hard, especially coming out of the holiday season and if they have racked up a lot of debt over that time,” Ms. Pospiech said in an interview from Toronto.
Household debt is a problem and Canadians have been borrowing like never before with help from low interest rates. Statistics Canada recently said the household debt to income ratio is at a record high of 164.6 per cent.
BMO said contributing even a small amount – a few hundred dollars – to an RRSP is better than nothing at all.
“If they don’t have the full amount, that should not stop them from making a contribution,” Ms. Pospiech said.
“Any little bit helps because of the tax-deferred compound growth. It makes their money work a lot harder for them rather than having it just sitting.”
BMO said that the average amount contributed to a Registered Retirement Savings Plan in 2011 was $4,670.
Putting aside just under $400 a month in a continuous savings plan for an RRSP would generate that amount, Ms. Pospiech said.
But when it’s not possible to come up with a lump sum, a RRSP loan is an option and any tax refund would be used to pay off some or all of it, she said.
The BMO study also found that 54 per cent of those surveyed would feel less stressed if they made regular RRSP contributions throughout the year to meet the deadline.
Ms. Pospiech said those who are trying to come up with a lump sum of money should consider taking the time to sit down with a financial professional to talk about setting up a RRSP savings plan.
“By setting it up and forgetting about it and doing it early in the year, then they don’t have to worry about a deadline because it’s taken care of for them.”
The study also found that three quarters of Canadians with a RRSP have already made or plan to make a contribution before the deadline.
Deciding between a tax free savings account or an RRSP is a personal decision, Ms. Pospiech added.
“The RRSP tax deduction is going to be worth a lot more as people get up in their tax bracket levels,” she said.
But a tax free savings account can work for people if they’re in a lower income tax bracket and not looking for a tax deduction, Ms. Pospiech said.
Ideally, Canadians could take advantage of both, Ms. Pospiech said, noting the limit for a tax free savings account has been raised to $5,500 from $5,000.
Ms. Pospiech said any work bonus or inheritance could also be use as a contribution and Canadians should take advantage of any special offers from financial institutions to open a continuous savings RRSP plan.
The online survey was conducted by Pollara between Nov. 23-27 with a random sample of 1,000 adults from a panel of over 250,000 Canadians.
The polling industry’s professional body, the Marketing Research and Intelligence Association, says online surveys cannot be assigned a margin of error because they do not randomly sample the population. | <urn:uuid:2f626e7e-8ca1-450a-8d36-e8889d91d00e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-investor/personal-finance/retirement-rrsps/majority-of-canadians-stress-about-finding-rrsp-cash/article7094231/?cmpid=tgc | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963525 | 802 | 1.820313 | 2 |
By Rajiv Pradhan, past governor of District 3132 and primary project contact for the medical mission to Nigeria
The medical mission to Nigeria was a life-changing experience for the Indian doctors who took part and for the children who underwent polio-corrective surgeries.
The orthopedic surgeons, all with experience in these types of surgeries, came from all corners of India. Many more surgeons and anesthesiologists wanted to join than we had room for on the team.
The Nigerian doctors at both the Federal Medical Centre in Keffi and University of Abuja Teaching Hospital in Gwagwalada came alongside our team and formed a true partnership. They rose early to be ready to start surgery at 8:30 a.m., and continued through to 5:30 p.m., even though their normal ending time was 2 p.m. They even agreed to work on their off day, Saturday, eagerly observing as our team operated.
“Well done, sir,” they would say with a smile to our doctors at the completion of every surgery. That was perhaps not only our greatest reward, but reflected how deeply Nigeria wants to get rid of polio in their country.
The tears of joy, gratitude, and blessings from the parents gave us a daily dose of energy. Traveling an hour and a half each way from out hotel to the hospitals, and then working 8-9 hour days was well worth the price to see the smiles on the faces of the parents.
When I asked the ward nurses to tell the parents of the children how important it was for them to spread the word about immunizations in their community, they readily obliged, and did so diligently.
The support, financially and otherwise, from Nigerian districts 9125, 9110, 9140 led by GD Flex and Project Chair Saliu Ahmad was outstanding. District 3630 in Korea and District 3140 in India also contributed valuable financial support that combined with a Rotary Foundation Matching Grant.
Nigeria’s minister of health, Prof. C.O. Onyebuchi Chukwu, became personally involved in our mission, accepting an invitation to conduct a surgery with our team. “Next year we should be able to stop the spread of wild polio virus,” he told the waiting media, and suggested that the Nigerian doctors might join the Indian team to conduct similar camps in other countries.
We were also grateful for the support of three past RI presidents, Rajendra K. Saboo, who lead the mission and participated with hands-on service, Jonathan Majiyagbe, who joined us in Abuja, and Kalyan Banerjee, who came alongside our team for three days, encouraging us and uplifting our spirits.
The children will require post-operative care. Some will also need callipers to stand up and achieve mobility. For now, the callipers will come from Lagos or Kano. Our mission chair Dr. Deepak Purohit and I, guided by Saboo and fully supported by Nigeria District 9125, are planning to set up a facility for making callipers and prosthetic limbs in Abuja, with training for personnel, to make it a comprehensive center.
For the entire team, the experience was incredible. We saw the triumph of Rotary service extending beyond borders. | <urn:uuid:d1099186-b7a8-4f85-9675-b4101c682fcf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.rotary.org/2012/12/21/pradha/?like=1&source=post_flair&_wpnonce=bcc517a348 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971804 | 678 | 1.523438 | 2 |
US Intervenes to Block Egyptian Arrest of Boutros Ghali
The United States has intervened in an attempt by Egypt to arrest its former Finance Minister, Youssef Boutros-Ghali.
Egypt's transitional government, led by a military council, had filed a request with the UK government through Interpol to arrest Ghali while he was in England. Ghali was sentenced in absentia on charges of corruption by an Egyptian court following the Tahrir Square revolution that toppled the regime of former President Hosni Mubarak.
The US ambassador in London rejected 12 requests from Interpol to arrest the former Egyptian official prior to his flight to the United States, because Ghali is also an American citizen, according to sources quoted by Youm7.
Under British law, Ghali could have been extradited to Egypt due to the UK's treaty with Cairo – had all documentation been complete. However, Egyptian security forces also admitted they had not presented all the documents regarding Ghali's case.
A Christian Arab, Ghali served from July 2004 until Mubarak's regime was toppled in January of this year. The former finance minister earned a PhD at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, also serving as a lecturer and assistance during his time there. He worked as an senior economist with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) until 1986, when he was appointed Economic Advisor to Egypt's prime minister and the governor of the country's central bank.
The nephew of Dr. Boutros Boutros Ghali, former secretary-general of the United Nations, Ghali continued to serve in various foreign policy roles, including as Minister of Foreign Trade, and was instrumental in negotiating the free trade agreement between Egypt and the US. He also headed negotiations that led to the Qualified Industrial Zone (QIZ) agreement between Egypt, the US and Israel in 2004. | <urn:uuid:d6573afd-1705-4c37-a921-5092946722d4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/145905 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.987705 | 374 | 1.710938 | 2 |
With the number of domestic wind turbine manufacturers in China now totalling almost 40, foreign suppliers are facing increasingly tough competition to secure a foothold on the Chinese market. There will be "several years of chaos in China," warns Pan Weiping from the local office of British wind power consultancy Garrad Hassan. Paulo Soares from Indian wind turbine maker Suzlon agrees. "Either we will have a price war, companies will become insolvent or foreigners will just use China as a basis for export for their international business, or maybe all three at the same time," he says. Both Pan and Soares were speaking at the Renewable Energy Finance Forum (REFF) held at the end of March in Beijing by Euromoney Energy Events and the China Renewable Energy Industries Association (CREIA).
The growth in domestic manufacturers in China at the same time as an influx of foreign manufacturers follows the setting of ambitious government wind targets for the country and a policy which sets a 70% local content mandate for wind plant. The targets aim for 5000 MW installed capacity by 2010 and 30,000 MW by 2020. Already the 2010 target looks almost certain to be achieved ahead of time, prompting industry speculation it will be raised, something China's National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) has no intention of doing, CREIA's Li Junfeng told delegates. The target is a minimum expectation, he said. He confirmed the 5000 MW goal could be achieved as early as the end of next year but added: "NDRC thinks the speed of development is a little too fast. The domestic industry is not yet ready."
Most domestic manufacturers are producing technology based on licenses granted by European wind turbine companies, with Goldwind, which secured an early licence with Germany's Repower, the most successful domestic manufacturer to date. Other Chinese engineering companies are committed to independent product development, an approach NDRC encourages. Chinese designed turbines remain at the prototype stage, however.
Quantity and quality
While some delegates at REFF suggested the Chinese rush into turbine manufacturing could come at a price that sees quantity prevail over quality, Pan says it is too early to tell. "Certainly it's too early to comment on any significant problems in the new emerging Chinese manufacturers. We'll see if their turbines run, for example, over several months. We can see the operating data and then we automatically know what kind of problems we have," he said. "The industry bottleneck right now is the supply chain, as well as experienced wind engineers."
Soares said Chinese suppliers are not serious rivals to foreign companies at present -- even though their market share has increased from 20% in 2004 to around 40% in 2006. But that will change with time, he said. "We're not afraid of competition in the future," he said. "We hope there will be good Chinese companies in the coming years, but the learning process is a very important part of company growth." Pan pointed out that the rush to enter wind turbine manufacturing is fuelled by government. "We may see industry consolidation in a few years down the road, but right now there are all sorts of government incentive programs to support local manufacturing industries." He added: "Finally the market will decide who can survive."
Delegates heard that turbines supplied by foreign firms, many of which have set up manufacturing in China to meet the local content mandate, are often up to 15% more expensive than those sold by Chinese firms. But until confidence in the reliability of new domestic machines grows this is not seen as a major obstacle for the market's global leaders such as Suzlon and Vestas.
Some believe the government's pricing policy for wind power leaves profit margins wafer thin, making life particularly hard for overseas manufacturers and project developers. Furthermore, of four large government tenders for wind power purchase contracts, all have gone to large state-owned enterprises at prices which many have argued are too low to be viable. A fifth tender round is due this year, according to NDRC representatives at REFF, but details on specific projects are still pending.
According to Shi Pengfei of the China Wind Energy Association (CWEA), there is no bias against foreign companies. "The Chinese government does not favour large state-owned enterprises against private or foreign contenders, at least not on the levels of policies and the law," he said. The fact that most national wind projects have been awarded to state companies has to do with their anticipation of the government's green energy targets, Shi said. "Although the introduction of the quota remained uncertain, it has had a real impact on the Chinese wind market, with a number of companies heavily investing in renewable energy resources." Shi advised would-be investors to do a good job of surveying the market and potential resources before jumping into the sector.
The easy route
Soares said foreign companies and private developers would be wise not to bank on securing large central state concession projects, but instead to look to provincial markets under the control of local government. "I would not say that foreign developers have no chance," he said. "But I think it would be easier to go on a provincial level and start from there, as opposed to going for the national concession projects. That, we think, is a much more difficult proposition." At present, provincial governments generally offer better power purchase rates than those of concession projects.
In addition, under China's renewable energy law, all renewable energy should benefit from favourable tax treatment, although the specific methods are still to be announced. The country has just passed its new taxation law, but did not include renewable energy in the list of sectors and products eligible for tax breaks. CREIA's Li Junfeng said many companies have complained to the state administration of taxation. Subsequently, the department has promised to correct the mistake by adding renewable energy into upcoming revisions of the law. | <urn:uuid:d1f1041b-6c7f-484a-b723-66307122c581> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.windpowermonthly.com/article/960406/battle-looms-supply-front | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969283 | 1,178 | 1.640625 | 2 |
Please Be Involved, Click here and Join UNITED SIKHS
To receive forthcoming bulletins join our UNITED SIKHS Yahoo group
To donate go to www.unitedsikhs.org/donate
This Community Voice may be read online at: http://www.unitedsikhs.org/PressReleases/COMVCE-30-05-2009-00.htm
Saturday, 30th May 2009
16th Jyeth (Samvat 541 Nanakshahi)
New York, NY, USA: Every 10 years, the United States government is required by the Constitution to conduct a Census count. The importance of the Census count cannot be stressed enough – Census data is used to determine how more than $300 billion per year in federal and state funding is allocated to communities for neighborhood improvements, public health, new hospitals, services for the elderly, roads, schools, education funding, social services, and much more. That's more than $3 trillion over a 10-year period. The Census also determines how many representatives your state will have in Congress. UNITED SIKHS has partnered with the US Census Bureau to ensure Sikhs are counted, so that much needed resources will be available to the Sikh community.
How Can I Participate? Every household in the country will receive a Census questionnaire in 2010. To ensure an accurate and fair count of all populations at all geographic levels in the nation, the Census Bureau needs you or someone in your household to respond to the census questionnaire. By completing your questionnaire you are providing data that will help our nation, your state and your community make major decisions over the next 10 years.
Estimates of the Sikh population as of 2005 came to about 500,000 Sikhs living in the US. This is not an official total, and we will not have an accurate count if Sikhs do not participate, and write in "SIKH" under the "Some Other Race" category. The Sikh population in the US has grown exponentially in the past 10 - 20 years.
Is the Census Safe? Your safety is assured when you participate in the Census. For those Sikhs who are in the United States illegally, this campaign is designated to include you as well. By law the Census Bureau cannot ask you if you are an illegal nor can they provide any information they gather to any other governmental agency for 72 years.
The U.S Census defines who we are as a nation. Achieving a complete and accurate 2010 Census is in our hands. Give American Sikhs a fighting chance. We need your help with this enormous task. UNITED SIKHS and the Census Bureau are doing presentations in your community; contact us at [email protected] if you are interested in setting up a "Be Counted Site" or a "Questionnaire Assistance Center" in partnership with the US Census Bureau.
Spending just a few minutes to fill out your census form will help ensure your community gets its fair share of federal and state funding. Under the question "What Is Person's Race," mark "Some Other Race" and write "SIKH." Help plant the seeds of OUR FUTURE!!!
Census affects your voice in Congress: Mandated by U.S Constitution, the census is used to apportion seats in the U.S House of Representatives and to redistrict state legislatures.
You may read a previous press release on UNITED SIKHS community advocacy and empowerment at: http://unitedsikhs.org/PressReleases/PRSRLS-30-04-2009-00.htm
International Civil and Human Rights Advocacy (ICHRA)
To transform underprivileged and minority communities and individuals into informed and vibrant members of society through civic, educational and personal development programs, by fostering active participation in social and economic activity.
UNITED SIKHS is also an avenue for networking between like-minded organisations to establish and nurture meaningful projects and dialogues - whether social, cultural or political- to promote harmony, understanding and reciprocity in our villages, towns and cities.
UNITED SIKHS is a coalition of organisations and individuals, who share a common vision based on the belief that there is no greater endeavour than to serve, empower and uplift fellow beings. The core of our philosophy is an unwavering commitment to civic service and social progress on behalf of the common good.
Accordingly, UNITED SIKHS has sought to fulfil its mission not only by informing, educating and uplifting fellow beings but also by participating in cross-cultural and political exchanges to ensure that the promises and benefits of democracy are realized by all.
We at UNITED SIKHS believe that the development of enlightened and progressive societies can be made possible by socially conscious groups of people who make a commitment to develop and direct human potential. Our work, efforts and achievements stand as a testament to our faith in this vision. | <urn:uuid:4ec4465d-fb8c-495e-a43c-f59fe764cb7c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.unitedsikhs.org/PressReleases/COMVCE-30-05-2009-00.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.93548 | 1,000 | 1.820313 | 2 |
Crochet Lampshade from The Complete Book of Crochet
I spent the last two weeks of December down in the Los Angeles area with my brother and sister. That was actually longer than I’d planned to stay but the three of us are almost never all together in one place so it was worth it. We did lots of stuff but there was one day that we really just wanted to chill out so we went to the Santa Monica library and spent the day reading. I know just about every crochet book in my own public library so I was curious to see what they had that was different. What I found was that they have several vintage 1970′s crochet books which my library doesn’t carry.
Complete Book of Crochet
One of the books that I found there was The Complete Book Of Crochet published in 1973 by London’s Octopus Books. It’s a fun crochet pattern book with an introduction to how to crochet and then patterns for home decor items as well as gifts, wearables and kids’ stuff.
What I found most interesting about this book, cependant, was not the patterns but rather a section in the intro that tells you how to launder your crochet work as well as how to mount crochet to linen. Although it doesn’t call it “blocking”, the process it describes as a method of blocking crochet which should typically be done after a project is first made and each time that you wash it so that the item retains the shape that you want it to have. There are several sites with good tips on blocking crochet and this certainly isn’t the definitive guide but I thought what this book had to say was helpful and interesting.
How to Block Crochet
The basic steps of blocking offered in this 1973 crochet book include:
- Place a piece of plain white paper on top of a clean, flat board. Use the correct measurements to draw out what the correct shape and size of the item is. A ruler, set square and compasses should be used to get the right shapes and angles.
- Wash the crochet item by hand and leave it damp or half dry.
- Pin your crochet item on to the paper, using the outline that you’ve drawn to make sure that you’re correctly shaping the item. Pin the general shape down first, leaving things like picots and chain spaces alone. Use rustless pins for this process.
- Once you have the general shape down, pin the specific parts of the item. Make sure all picots are pulled out to their full shape, all flowers have their petals pinned in the right place, etc. Pay special attention to make sure that your loops, shells and other shapes are the same size and shape.
- If you are pinning a filet crochet item then make sure that the spaces and blocks are square with even edges. Use a solution of starch in water to stiffen the item if necessary.
Crochet Blocking Resources
- Michaels has a good description of the different types of blocking that crocheters commonly used today depending on the yarn type used in the project.
- Linda Permann has a great basic how to block guide that I think is a must-bookmark.
- Futuregirl has some great posts on her site including celui-ci that shows how to block a scarf with blocking wires.
- Kim Werker offers a great guide on CrochetMe about how to spray block crochet or knit squares. | <urn:uuid:8c8ac677-60a5-4586-aa9f-3153ba06bd63> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.crochetconcupiscence.com/fr/2012/01/1970s-tips-for-crochet-blocking/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958144 | 715 | 1.757813 | 2 |
London Design Student Locks Out Bike Thieves
LONDON, January 26/PRNewswire/ -- A London student has come up with a canny design that could help prevent thousands of bikes being stolen.
Dominic Hargreaves, 23, a student at the UK's top design school, the Royal College of Art, has had three bikes stolen since he moved to the capital last year. And he's not alone: On average a bicycle is stolen every 71 seconds in England.
Looking at this urban problem as a design challenge, the young designer realised that the only way to overcome the problem was to lock the bike somewhere out of the reach of thieves. Dominic's solution? A bike lock located 8 feet above the ground. Well out of reach of bike thieves.
How does it work?
The bike cradle can be fitted to any wall and is attached to an electronic hoist which lowers to the ground when triggered by the owner's remote control. The mechanism can also be programmed to read an oyster card if located at a tube station, or indeed any public location. Once the bike is placed into the cradle and locked in position, the user then activates the hoist to pull the bike up onto the wall. The bike is then safely out of the reach of thieves and their bolt cutters.
Dominic believes the idea would work on domestic dwellings such as houses or blocks of flats as well as public spaces like railway or tube stations, where the bike can be activated by a smart card. With politicians and health professionals alike increasingly trying to encourage more people to 'Get on their Bikes', Hargreaves' invention could be the very thing to make the campaign a success.
The design is one of the winners in the GBP15,000 iQ Design Challenge set by Toyota to Royal College of Art students and alumni to create products that respond to modern urban life, along with a computer aid designed to help "two-finger" typists increase their speed and accuracy, and a quick-release, hygienic ice cube tray that avoids the perennial problem of cubes flying out when the tray is twisted.
For further information or interviews please contact Aine Duffy, RCA Media Relations on +44(0)7736-460575 or e: [email protected]
Source: Royal College of Art For further information or interviews please contact Aine Duffy, RCA Media Relations on +44(0)7736-460575 or e: [email protected] | <urn:uuid:301fde7b-c0c9-4f36-b667-253875ca72a9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bikediva.net/2009/01/lock-out-bicycle-thieves.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957732 | 528 | 1.742188 | 2 |
BITE-BACK - DEFENDING THE HIGH SEAS ON THE HIGH STREET
Bite-Back's Graham Buckingham on why YOUR support really does make a difference
Raising funds for shark and marine conservation isn't the easiest task in the world so it's always exciting when a switched-on dive company recognises the issues facing the oceans and wants to support Bite-Back's work. By combining its passion for scuba diving in the most beautiful locations on the planet with a desire to protect these fragile eco-systems, Dive Worldwide has marked itself out as a leader in the global dive holiday industry.
For that reason, Bite-Back is delighted to be working with Dive Worldwide and its clients to raise awareness and vital funds for its key campaigns through the introduction of a voluntary donation scheme.
All the money raised will allow Bite-Back to keep running its innovative series of campaigns to safeguard threatened marine species - including shark, swordfish, marlin, monkfish, skate and rays - by challenging retailers and restaurants to put conservation before commerce and no longer sell them.
Since 2004, the charity's pioneering programmes have helped prompt the UK's very biggest fish retailers - ASDA, Sainsbury's, Morrisons, Tesco and Waitrose - to end the sale of a number of these key species. As a result it is now no longer possible to buy shark or marlin from any UK supermarket.
And, as part of Bite-Back's ambition to eliminate retail opportunities for any shark products, it is also responsible for ending the sale of shark cartilage capsules in 550 Holland & Barrett health food stores. Without doubt thought, the catalyst for all these victories has been the support of like-minded divers from around the world. Simply by taking part in Bite-Back's online campaigns these divers have helped create a movement that can confidently demand a change in the way retailers buy and sell seafood.
But it's Bite-Back's latest campaign - to end the sale of shark fin soup in Britain - that is most likely to resonate with divers. And this is where new support and funds will be crucial in helping the charity achieve success. Already, the first stage of this new project is underway. Thanks to the help of Bite-Back supporters the charity has identified and exposed more than 80 restaurants in the country currently selling the controversial dish. Sadly, as more reports come in, the list is expected to reach 100.
It's therefore uplifting to know that this campaign has already found support from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Gordon Ramsay, Bear Grylls, Martin Clunes and Monty Halls plus the top London advertising agency, Ogilvy & Mather. Considering this is only one of a number of campaigns due to be launched in 2013, it's going to be an exciting year for Bite-Back.
WIN!! An amazing holiday for two to Fiji. Buy a raffle ticket in support of Bite-Back for your chance to win. The winning ticket will be announced on 1 January 2013.
Visit www.bite-back.com for more details. | <urn:uuid:9125c878-1a11-422a-8446-a3f10d372407> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.diveworldwide.com/information/bite_back.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945464 | 628 | 1.65625 | 2 |
Lytro is planning to release a consumer-oriented light field camera, that allows users to shift the focus in a picture after it's been taken (Photo: Lytro)
For those of us who grew up with film cameras, even the most basic digital cameras can still seem a little bit magical. The ability to instantly see how your shots turned out, then delete the ones you don’t want and manipulate the ones you like, is something we would have killed for. Well, light field cameras could be to today’s digital cameras, what digital was to film. Among other things, they allow users to selectively shift focus between various objects in a picture, after it’s been taken. While the technology has so far been inaccessible to most of us, that is set to change, with the upcoming release of Lytro’s consumer light field camera. | <urn:uuid:f9eb5665-d824-4d15-b35c-704260a38f27> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gizmag.com/lytro-consumer-light-field-camera-shifts-focus/18996/picture/136473/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964766 | 179 | 1.515625 | 2 |
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- "Woo-oop!"
Chuck Talbott's voice reverberates through the woods above his farm as he rides an ATV along a rough path up into the hills. The thunder of three dozen 300- to 350-pound pigs lumbering down a ravine answers his call.
Raised and grazed on pastureland and field crops at Black Oak Holler Farm in Mason County, these specially bred heirloom pigs are released into the woods in autumn, where they gorge on acorns, hickory nuts and wild greens for the last few months of their lives.
Their active life and natural diet produce hams that rival high-end European hams and charcuterie when dry-cured for two years. The acorn and nuts they eat give the meat and fat a nutty flavor.
Talbott and his partner, Nadine Perry, teamed up with ham aficionado and Washington, D.C., investor Nic Heckett to produce Appalachian dry-cured hams under the label Woodlands Pork LLC. Their Mountain Ham won the prestigious American Treasures Award for 2011.
Big-city restaurant chefs, whose diners recognize the difference between a generous platter of country cured ham and a taste of fine ham, will pay the $25 price per pound for Woodlands Pork hams.
"This is not something you dine on, it's something you taste. It's the most flavor you can put in your mouth with the smallest amount of food. It's a very special taste," said Heckett, who places Woodlands Pork in ham tastings, events similar to wine, chocolate and cheese tastings. Some people can guess a ham's origins from its terroir, a term used more often in the wine world in reference to the specific tastes produced by the vineyard's soil and growing conditions.
"The hams have an Appalachian terroir," said Talbott, based on the native soil in which they rut, and water, plants, grains and mast they eat.
Talbott, who is the West Virginia University extension agent for Putnam County, considers the promotion of small-scale
farms and local consumption his ultimate goal. The farm serves as a development and teaching facility for agriculture students. Talbott plans to teach his system to future pig farmers throughout the state, who could fill a unique market niche.
"I was looking for a way small farmers could compete with the big boys," he said. "We can't. We have to do something different."
Restaurants in New York, San Francisco and Cincinnati purchase Woodlands Pork hams. Heckett lists Rouge Tomate, Marlow & Daughters in New York, Bourbon Steak in San Francisco and Local 127 in Cincinnati as customers. The New York restaurants sell the ham for $75 to $80 a pound.
"The difference is that our ham has better taste and color, and is well-marbled. Its fat profile is different. It's deeper tasting because of their diet and the exercise they get," Talbott said. "In Europe, they say American pork is bland."
Heckett agrees with the Europeans. His preference for Italian meats solidified when he visited Tuscany and tasted locally produced hams.
"I went far and wide. In Tuscany, I was exposed to a whole other side of pork," Heckett said. "This was forest-fed pork."
Heckett considered an import business in Italian meats, but expensive USDA requirements for on-site inspectors made the plan impractical.
"When I was back in the United States, I wondered why we couldn't do that here," he said. As he researched the concept of forest-fed pork, he realized the method was nothing new. American pioneers raised pigs in penned pasture, and then released them into the woods to feed on the mast. The practice had continued through the 1940s, when industrial pork production took over.
Talbott's background in swine and cattle farming made him an ideal agricultural partner. Earlier in his career at North Carolina A&T University, Talbott worked with a nomadic tribe's dairy cattle in Africa. They grazed cattle on riverbanks during the dry season and used the manure-enriched soil in the pens for next year's garden.
"Pigs are even better suited for this. They're always turning the soil," he said. "My background is in dairy, but I'll never go back. Pigs are fascinating."
The Black Oak Holler pigs' maternal stock is heirloom pig. The male line comes from Ossabaw boars, wild hogs introduced to America by Spanish explorer Hernando DeSoto in 1539. The pigs have a larger layer of fat, which allows a long curing process, and a more complex, intensely flavored ham.
Talbott's concept for raising pigs in a farm's natural environment creates an efficient organic system. The pigs start in a pen and graze on the grasses. They rut in the ground, turning the earth and mixing in their waste.
They move to the pasture, and the first pen lies fallow for a season while he works old straw and hay into the soil.
Later, Talbott plants a field crop for the pigs to eat and that thrives in the newly enriched dirt. To prove the success of the method, Talbott turned the soil, and revealed rich, black earth that was previously clay soil.
Several times a day, Perry and Talbott check on the pigs, which are separated by age groups in their pastures and pens. | <urn:uuid:7d90afb3-bc3b-4be1-ab01-4c503d673e06> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sundaygazettemail.com/News/201110013091 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966493 | 1,155 | 1.664063 | 2 |
Sunday, November 22 2009 - Research/Evidence
NYC 9/11 Trial Will Shine the Lights on the Roots of Terrorism
Update 11/24/09 - Tom Klammer, host of the weekly program Tell Somebody, aired on Kansas City's Community Radio 90.1FM Tuesday evenings at 6pm Central, sent this:
"Former CIA analyst Ray McGovern returns to Tell Somebody this Tuesday Nov. 24 at 6pm on KKFI: Ray McGovern talks about the decision to try Khalid Sheik Mohammed in civilian federal court in New York and about Obama's Afghan dilemma. Recorded on Sunday, the 46th anniversary of the JFK assassination, the interview includes some timely advice for the President that you'll want to hear."
If you're not in the KC area, listen online here: www.kkfi.org. In fact, listen to KKFI anytime! It's a great, 100,000 watt-strong source for all kinds of diverse, eclectic, truth-telling programming, talk and music from dedicated volunteers - true community radio. In keeping with our longstanding 'admonishment' to readers that we must each "become the media", support truth-telling media and withdraw our support from corporate (and "alternative") sources selling us lies, 911truth.org encourages readers to vigorously support this kind of direct, critical grassroots organizing. Remember, resistance is personal - consider where your media dollars are going right now and whether you might want to redirect them toward the growing number of sources that offer the information you need to make informed, responsible decisions.
By Ray McGovern
November 17, 2009
As Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the other alleged 9/11 conspirators go to trial, the corporate media's embargo on the truth about the Bush years will be under great strain.Media commentary on the upcoming 9/11 trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed has raised concern that state secrets may be divulged, including details about how the Bush administration used torture to extract evidence about al-Qaeda.
"I think that we're going to shine a light on something that a lot of people don't want to look at" is how American Civil Liberties Union attorney Denney LeBoeuf put it, according to The New York Times on Saturday.
No problem, says Attorney General Eric Holder, who claims to have "great confidence" that other evidence -- apart from what may have been gleaned from the 183 times Sheikh Mohammed was waterboarded, for example -- will suffice to convict him.
Maybe so, But what the Fawning Corporate Media (or FCM) have so far neglected is the likelihood that the testimony will be so public that they will have to break their studied silence about why Sheikh Mohammed and his associates say they orchestrated the attacks of 9/11.
For reasons that are painfully obvious, the FCM have done their best to ignore or bury the role that Israel's repression of the Palestinians has played in motivating the 9/11 attacks and other anti-Western terrorism.
It is not like there is no evidence on this key issue. Rather, it appears that the Israel-Palestine connection is pretty much kept off limits for discussion.
Friday, November 20 2009 - 9/11 A/V Galleries
Richard Gage, AIA, Interview on Sydney's WSFM Radio
More great news from The Hard Evidence Tour Down Under
November 19, 2009
Wow!! Finally a proper interview in Sydney! Listen here: http://www.911truth.org/911truthmedia/Audio/Richard_Gage_WSFM_11-2009.mp3
Go to WSFM and vote here on the question of whether "Gage makes sense" www.wsfm.com.au
Please thank them by e-mail asap.....
Email Jonesy - brendanjones [at] wsfm.com.au
This is a testament to the work you're all doing. Thank you all!
Friday, November 20 2009 - Other Important News
Wall Street Economic Death Squad Roundup [Reports & Videos]
See also Wednesday's excellent feature story at Amped Status, "The Critical Unravelling of U.S. Society".
November 10th, 2009
As most of you have noticed, we are primarily focused on covering the economic coup. We strongly feel that the theft of Trillions of taxpayer dollars by a small group of men on Wall Street is the biggest story of our time. We understand that these are very difficult times for most people and there are many pressing and vitally important issues confronting us. However, the theft of Trillions of dollars has to be the lead story every day until there are investigations and prosecutions to resolve it.
Many of the news sites that we link to on a daily basis have been covering this issue. However, these sites are not covering the issue sufficiently. There should be blazing headlines on a daily basis: ECONOMIC COUP IN THE US! TRILLIONS OF TAXPAYER DOLLARS STOLEN!
Think about all the vital issues you care about and then think about the Trillions of dollars that were stolen. How could a small fraction of that money directly affect the issues you care about most? We need to make this connection, and we need to make the theft of Trillions of dollars THE LEAD ISSUE RIGHT NOW!
Friday, November 20 2009 - Other Important News
Judge: Corps' Negligence Caused Katrina Flooding
By Cain Burdeau (AP)
NEW ORLEANS -- A federal judge ruled Wednesday that the Army Corps of Engineers' failure to properly maintain a navigation channel led to massive flooding in Hurricane Katrina.
U.S. District Judge Stanwood Duval sided with five residents and one business who argued the Army Corps' shoddy oversight of the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet led to the flooding of New Orleans' Lower Ninth Ward and neighboring St. Bernard Parish. He said, however, the corps couldn't be held liable for the flooding of eastern New Orleans, where one of the plaintiffs lived.
Duval awarded the plaintiffs $720,000, or about $170,000 each, but the decision could eventually make the government vulnerable to a much larger payout. The ruling should give more than 100,000 other individuals, businesses and government entities a better shot at claiming billions of dollars in damages.
Friday, November 20 2009 - Endorsements & Support
Former NASA Director says World Trade Center Towers Felled by Controlled Demolition
On October 21st at the University of San Diego, Mr. Dwain Deets, former Director of NASA Aerospace Projects, gave a multimedia presentation on behalf of nearly one thousand architects and engineers who cite evidence of explosive demolition in all three World Trade Center skyscrapers on 9/11 and are calling for a new, independent investigation into their destruction. These architects and engineers are listed on their website at ae911Truth.org.
Mr. Deets was an engineering executive with NASA Dryden Flight Research Center
for more than 37 years and formerly served as Director, Research Engineering
Division at Dryden. He received the Presidential Meritorious Rank Award in the
federal government's Senior Executive Service (1988). In 1986, Deets was awarded
the Wright Brothers Lectureship in Aeronautics, a distinguished speaking engagement
sponsored by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA).
Wednesday, November 18 2009 - 9/11 A/V Galleries
The Hard Evidence Down Under Tour Leads to Conversation with Jan Utzon, Sidney Opera House, Architect
Ed. Note: Richard Gage is blogging from the road on his Australasian/Japan tour here and TruthAction.org is posting updates about the tour, including an interview with organizer John Bursill, here (photos of our street action in front of Australia's national ABC here: http://truthaction.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=34771#34771. Janice Matthews of 911truth.org will post a review of the Sydney event within the next few days. (It was WONDERFUL, and Australian 9/11 truth advocates absolutely ROCK!!) Video of the event will be available soon from 911TV.org.
Richard Gage AIA, of Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth, talks to architect Jan Utzon, son of Joern Utzon, the architect of the Sydney Opera House.
Wednesday, November 18 2009 - Legal Response to 9/11
Justice American Style
by Kristen Breitweiser,
9/11 widow and activist
November 16, 2009
Even after witnessing the horrors of 9/11 that included me helplessly watching the murder of my husband on live television, I still believe that we are a civilized nation of laws. And like the Nuremberg trials that brought the murderers of millions to justice, now more than ever, Americans need to trust our own judicial system to fully and openly prosecute the mass murderers of 9/11 while the rest of the world bears witness.
Because while the terrorists were successful in bringing down the Twin Towers and hijacking airplanes on 9/11, our Constitution should never be hijacked or brought down as a result of anything--let alone the potential adversity faced in prosecuting modern day monsters like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
Indeed, in the fight against Islamist extremism, we should never bow to the terrorists by compromising, manipulating, re-writing or flat-out ignoring the core, bedrock principles of our Constitution that speak to the very heart of who we are as a nation--a democracy.
Yet, quite alarmingly, Republicans seem to be exhibiting just this sort of crisis of confidence in our Constitution's ability to prosecute these horrible men. Republicans argue that men like KSM are war criminals who can only be convicted in military commissions where they won't receive the protections of our laws. Republicans seem to lack a certain faith in our Constitution's ability and adaptability in meting out the demands of modern day justice.
Tuesday, November 17 2009 - Other Important News
CIA paid millions of dollars to ISI since 9/11: Report
IANS 16 November 2009
Times of India
LOS ANGELES: The CIA has paid millions of dollars to Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) since 9/11, accounting for as much as one-third of the foreign spy agency's annual budget, says a media report.
The ISI also collected "tens of millions of dollars through a classified CIA programme", which pays for the capture or killing of wanted militants, the Los Angeles Times reported on Monday citing current and former US officials.
Sunday, November 15 2009 - Politics & 9/11
FAA and NORAD Changed Records to Accord with Cheney Lies
Saturday November 14, 2009 7:51 am
A senior counsel for the 9/11 Commission, John Farmer, has written a book exposing the degree to which our response to 9/11 was disorganized and outdated, geared to respond to an attack from Russia rather than from terrorists. Most significantly, Farmer reveals that FAA and NORAD altered their chronologies of the day only after a briefing at the White House.
Tuesday, November 10 2009 - 9/11 Precedents
by Nafeez Mossadeq Ahmed
Islamic fundamentalist militants are the enemies of Israel and Western governments, right? Think again. Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed reports.
Once upon a time, the CIA trained, financed and supported Osama bin Laden and his mujahidin networks in Afghanistan to repel the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. After the end of the Cold War, bin Laden turned against the West and we no longer had any use for him. His persistent terrorist attacks against us for more than a decade, culminating in 9/11, provoked our own response, in the form of the 'War on Terror'. This is the official narrative. And it's false. Not only did Western intelligence services continue to foster Islamist extremist and terrorist groups connected to al-Qaeda after the Cold War; they continued to do so even after 9/11.
The CIA's jihad
The story begins in the summer of 1979, six months before the Soviet invasion, when the CIA had already begun financing elements of an emerging Islamist mujahidin force inside Afghanistan. The idea, according to former US National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski and former CIA Director Robert Gates, was to increase the probability of a Soviet invasion, and entrap 'the Soviets into a Vietnamese quagmire'.1
Osama bin Laden arrived in the country later that year, sent by then-Saudi intelligence chief Prince Turki bin Faisal, where he set up the Maktab al-Khidamat (MAK) which helped finance, recruit and train mujahidin fighters.2 Bin Laden, the MAK, and the Afghan mujahidin in total received about half a billion dollars a year from the CIA, and roughly the same from the Saudis, funnelled through Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence (ISI).3
By around 1988, as Jane’s Defence Weekly reports, 'with US knowledge, Bin Laden created al-Qaeda (The Base): a conglomerate of quasi-independent Islamic terrorist cells spread across at least 26 countries'.4 US and Western intelligence agencies facilitated this process, seeing rightwing Islamist movements as a counterweight to Communist, leftwing and nationalist political trends. They supported the Saudis and other Gulf states, as well as Pakistan, Turkey and Azerbaijan among others, in proliferating Islamist extremist institutions in far-flung countries such as Algeria, Yemen, Indonesia, and the Philippines. Funding for these activities was intertwined with the establishment of organized criminal financial centres in Malaysia, Madagascar, South Africa, Nigeria, Latin America, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Turkestan, and elsewhere.5
Sunday, November 8 2009 - Get Involved
Tickets? The Hard Evidence Down Under Tour 2009 - Uncovering the Truth of the 9/11 Attacks
November 7, 2009
We still have 135 (out of 292) Tickets to sell for Saturday the 14th event and 210 (out of 292) for Sunday the 15th event.
Many of you have not bought tickets to the Sunday Event because you think it probably won't sell out or you didn't know you had to? Please consider the organisers and firm these seats now as payment on the day is a hassle and inconvenient for all concerned!
To buy tickets for "Truth in Action" Sunday the 15th in Sydney here www.stickytickets.com.au/2212/Truth_in_Action.aspx and please remember the steller line up including Luke Rudkowski (Head of WeAreChange NY and founder of WAC), Janice Matthews (Head of 911Truth.org), Cosmos (Head of TruthAction.org), Ken Jenkins (911 Truth's #1 Psychologist), Dr Frank Legge (Co-ed of the Journal of 9/11 Studies) and Hereward Fenton (Australia's top 9/11 Journalist)! Don't miss this event!
Saturday, November 7 2009 - 9/11 A/V Galleries
Eleventh of Every Month - 'Heroes'
This video was released in 2008, but we're reposting because it's such a powerful tribute to everyone who's out there on the 11th of Every Month - Till Justice. This Wednesday is yet another 11th... where will you be?
Saturday, November 7 2009 - Other Important News
Pentagon pursuing new investigation into Bush propaganda program
by Brad Jacobson
Thursday, November 5th, 2009
The Pentagon’s Office of Inspector General is conducting a new investigation into a covert Bush administration Defense Department program that used retired military analysts to produce positive wartime news coverage.
Asked when his office expects to conclude the investigation, Comerford said, “As a matter of policy we do not set deadlines since any number of variables or factors could result in a delay.”
He did confirm that investigators in his office have read Raw Story’s recent articles on the topic.
Last May, the Inspector General’s office rescinded and repudiated a prior internal investigation’s report on the retired military analyst program, which had been issued by the Bush administration, because it “did not meet accepted quality standards for an Inspector General work product.” Yet in recent interviews with Raw Story, Pentagon officials who took part in the program were still defending it by referencing this invalidated report.
Gary Comerford, Inspector General spokesman for the Defense Department, told Raw Story last week that his office is conducting an investigation into the retired military analyst program and confirmed that the investigation began during the summer.
Saturday, November 7 2009 - 9/11 Consequences
The Real Intelligence Failure
By Philip Giraldi
November 4, 2009
Campaign for Liberty
Most Americans believe that we are in a terrible dilemma. An increasing number are uncomfortable with the continuing carnage in Iraq and Afghanistan and fearful of the consequences of yet another Middle East war, this time against Iran, but most also believe that our country is threatened by dark forces that seek to destroy us and that extreme measures are justified. Few realize that fear alone is bringing about our transformation into a country driven by constant warfare to the detriment of our constitutional liberties.
Friday, November 6 2009 - Research/Evidence
Amalgam Virgo: Document Reveals Details of Military Exercise Involving Suicide Pilot Three Months before 9/11
November 4, 2009
History Commons Groups
New details of a NORAD exercise called Amalgam Virgo 01-02 have been found in a document at the National Archives. The exercise involved a suicide pilot attacking a military installation in the US. It was run in early June 2001, just three months before 9/11.
The document was found in the 9/11 Commission’s files at the National Archives by History Commons contributor Erik Larson (a.k.a. Paxvector) and uploaded to the 9/11 Document Archive at Scribd. Some information about the exercise was revealed at the History Commons Groups blog in June, when we publicised a commission document summarising a group of military exercises designed to help the military deal with suicide hijackings. However, the newly-found three-page scenario provides more detail.
|home | about us | contact | research | grassroots | calendar | links | search| | <urn:uuid:cbf6680c-b825-49a7-804d-062fca4e198b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.911truth.org/www.amazon.com/Disconnecting-Dots-How-Allowed-Happen/dp/0984185852/400.shtml?page=46 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938293 | 3,768 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Now, before we get started, I think it's important to examine the stereotypes one might hold about Italian people. As television and the movies have repeatedly told us, Italians are fiery, and passionate, and they talk with their hands a lot, and if they tell you they're in the waste management business, then you're best off being extremely polite to them.
And, as the stereotype goes, when it comes to building cars, Italians like to make ones that are beautiful and fiery and passionate and somewhat . . . um, explodey. And the repair bills? Mamamia! That's a spicy meatball!
However, like most stereotypes, this view is outmoded and outdated. The good people of Italy are the same as you and I, except they live in a country that looks like a boot. They still build feisty supercars, but they also build sensible everyday cars that are good on fuel and reasonably practical.
So it is with this, the convertible version of the Fiat 500: a proper little four-seat, four-cylinder city car. However, whatever you do, don't call it dull.
Opinions may differ on whether or not "retro" design is actually any better than futuristic swoops and shapes. For myself, one need only look at the current Mazda3 to see how ultra-modern over styling can put a funny face on an otherwise excellent car.
With their 500, Fiat got things pretty much pitch-perfect with a zippy pod-like body, friendly looking face up front and a high seating position. With chunky alloy wheels to complete the look, the 500C has all the sporty appeal of the much more expensive Mini Cooper.
To make the tiny 500 into a cabriolet, Fiat has taken a hacksaw to the centre part of the roof and fitted a folding cloth section instead. Doubtless making the car a full convertible would have reduced the body integrity to the point at which both safety and handling would have been compromised.
However, with the roof folded up on the back hatch like a pile of laundry, it has to be said that the 500C looks best top-up. It is possible to retract the roof with the push of a button at up-to highway speeds.
Like the Mini Cooper, the little Fiat's cabin is a blend of the old and the new. The 500 is much less cartoonish than the Mini, with traditionally placed gauges and switchgear. However, depending on the options you choose, it certainly can be a riot of colour.
Up from the standard-looking, easy-to-operate air-conditioning controls, the centre element of the 500C's dash is a broad expanse of shiny, metal-look plastic with large, boiled-sweet buttons. It's actually nicer than it sounds: a modern-design car would be swathed in soft-touch plastics, but this homage to the original 500's cheap metal works well - at least until it starts getting scuffed.
My tester was a Lounge model, meaning leather seating surfaces picked out in bright white and red, as well as a white steering wheel and instrument binnacle. First reaction upon sliding behind the wheel was to goggle at the bright contrasts, but given the 500's cheeky demeanour, having the option to customize with some wild colours seems a perfect fit.
Like the Mini, the 500's instrumentation is a mixed bag. The outer speedometer "chases" the rev counter clockwise around the gauges, which is cute - but a little difficult to read. Thankfully, there's a digital read-out as well.
Like its fixed-roof cousin, the 500C is powered by a 1.4-litre engine that produces 101 horsepower and 98 foot-pounds of torque; approximately the same power levels as a Braun hand-blender. 0100km/h comes in an interval long enough to listen to the collected works of Puccini and then prepare and eat a medium-sized tiramisu.
The electrically assisted steering is somewhat overboosted, giving the driver the sense that the steering wheel is only marginally associated with anything the front wheels might be doing, and the high seating position and soft suspension give a slight feeling of tippiness.
The shifter is also a bit vague: down-shifting from third to second feels like stirring marinara sauce with a wooden spoon.
Pressing the Sport button on the dash helpfully illuminates a small indicator on the digital readout that says, "Sport." That's about it. In theory, there's supposed to be firmed-up steering and a sharpened throttle response, but mostly you just get the light.
The 500C bundles up all these little short-comings and doesn't simply transcend them: they become part of the experience itself. Sbrigati! Veloci! Andiamo!
This tippy little roller skate puts its hands on its hips and simply demands to be driven like a Ferrari; and it is extremely rewarding to do so. It could not be more different than a Mini: there is none of the precision steering or low-slung feel of the Cooper, and you'll have to wait for the Abarth version for any real thrust.
But who cares? Drive like you're pursuing the gold stealing Inglese through the streets of Turin! Urge your steed onward like Tazio Nuvolari! Shake your fist and spit curses at any who might cut you off! The best part?
Even if you're really caning it, you won't be breaking any speed limits.
The 500C is available in two models: the Pop which starts at $17,495, and the tested Lounge, which adds leather, chrome accents, 15-inch alloy wheels and upgraded Bose audio for $20,495. A six-speed automatic transmission will cost you $1,300 - and it does sap a bit of fun out of the car.
Aside from standard features such as Bluetooth, air-conditioning, power locks and windows, USB and iPod connectivity, most of the options for the 500C revolve around colour-coding your car. There are 14 different exterior colour options and five interior combinations: the little Fiat awaits your paintbrush.
Even when driven Con Brio, the 500C returns very good fuel-economy. Official figures are 6.7/5.1 litres/100 kilometres city/highway for the five-speed manual, and 7.4/5.7 l/100 km for the sixspeed automatic. Green light
Great styling; low cost; engaging drive.
Numb steering; limited power; strange instrumentation; some interior cheapness.
The checkered flag
Boutique Euro-chic with a compact car price tag. Not a race car, but drive it like one anyway.
Competitors Mini Cooper convertible ($29,200)
Why pay more? Well, unlike the 500C, the Mini Cooper is actually a proper convertible. What's more, it's also even more of a delight to drive, with a driving position that seems like it was intended for, um, driving (this as opposed to the high-chair feel of the Fiat).
Still, the price gap is not inconsiderable. Factor in the Cooper's Achilles heel - horrible rear blind spots with the top up - and you just might see the Italians catch the plucky Brit this time around.
VW Beetle convertible (price TBA)
It's not even out yet, but you can bet that the 2013 Beetle Convertible is going to be a hot seller, based on the interest the New Beetle is generating. That's the new New Beetle, you understand, not the old New Beetle or the old old Beetle.
Well anyway, VW's newest Beetle is more angular and aggressive than previous models: less retro more modern. A range of engines should be available and by all accounts, the new Beetle convertible is more a baby Porsche than a flower-power throwback.
For the last few decades, Canadians shopping for a sporty Italian car had few choices. Option one, head over to Mr. Ferrari, where a somewhat snooty ...
The Fiat 500 has enjoyed sales success in Canada ever since it was introduced last year. The cute subcompact's Italian styling and practical dimensions...
The first time I drove the Fiat 500, I came away less than enthused. Sure, it was a cute as a button and, if you happened to like attention, it attracted... | <urn:uuid:1455ffb0-ca66-4ae7-9532-b04301ec5539> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.driving.ca/research-car/roadtest/Fiat+500C+real+Italian+zeal/6586540/story.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946605 | 1,765 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Make-up and Late work.
If you are absent it is
responsibility to find out what you missed (check the assignment file box). Homework will be due the day you return to class, unless it is an extended absence due to illness. Tests will be made up the day you return to class
or by arrangement with the teacher. Late work will be accepted for half credit (50%). No late work will be accepted after the 8th week of a 9-week quarter.
Absences will affect your grade. There will be in-class activties that will be difficult to make up.
Arrive to class on time.
Any student not in the room when the bell rings, will be marked tardy. More than 8 tardies may result in removal from the class.
Cell phones are not to be used during class time.
If caught using a cell phone, it will be taken and sent to the office as stated in the student handbook.
Do your own work.
Plagiarism, cheating and copying other students' assignments will not be tolerated. If caught, the student will fail the assignment. Repeated offences will result in consequences stated in the student handbook.
No food or drink.
Only plain water in water bottles will be permitted.
Respect yourself, other students, the teacher and school property. | <urn:uuid:39625deb-949d-424d-989d-e165decd3d36> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.grantspass.k12.or.us/education/staff/staff.php?sectionid=2941 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941081 | 280 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Mitt Romney delivers a foreign policy speech at Virginia Military Institute in Lexington, Va., on Monday. / Charles Dharapak, AP
Mitt Romney today stepped up his criticism of President Obama's foreign policy and his handling of hot spots in the Middle East, as he aimed to show a contrast with his rival on Iran, Libya and Syria.
In a speech at the Virginia Military Institute, Romney cast Obama as weak and responsible for lowering America's standing around the globe. Romney charged that "hope is not a strategy."
"The attacks on America last month should not be seen as random acts," Romney said, in reference to the deadly violence in Libya that killed U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.
"They are expressions of a larger struggle that is playing out across the broader Middle East," he said. "These attacks were the deliberate work of terrorists who use violence to impose their dark ideology on others, especially women and girls, who are fighting to control much of the Middle East today and who seek to wage perpetual war on the West."
Former secretary of State Madeleine Albright, an Obama supporter, criticized Romney after his speech. She said he is "very shallow" in his ideas and espoused a tone more in keeping with the Cold War-era.
Romney was criticized by Democrats for his initial harsh reaction to the attack in Benghazi, before it was known that Stevens and the other Americans were dead. He criticized the Obama administration's slowness to call the Libya attack an act of terrorism.
On Iran, Romney said he wouldn't hesitate to impose new sanctions on that country to thwart its nuclear weapons development and "restore the permanent presence of aircraft carrier task forces" in the eastern Mediterranean and Persian Gulf.
He made clear that he would work with U.S. allies to arm rebels seeking to oust Syrian President Bashir Assad -- something that the Obama administration has not done.
"I will work with our partners to identify and organize those members of the opposition who share our values and ensure they obtain the arms they need," Romney said. "Iran is sending arms to Assad because they know his downfall would be a strategic defeat for them. We should be working no less vigorously ... rather than sitting on the sidelines."
Public opinion polls show Obama has an advantage on foreign affairs, which is not unusual for an incumbent. Obama and Romney will go head-to-head on foreign policy in their last presidential debate on Oct. 22 at Lynn University in Boca Raton, Fla.
Copyright 2013 USATODAY.com
Read the original story: Romney assails Obama on Middle East | <urn:uuid:82e6e589-2423-429f-87da-7574dc042145> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.hometownlife.com/usatoday/article/1619729?odyssey=mod%7Cnewswell%7Ctext%7CMilford%7Cs | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975272 | 537 | 1.726563 | 2 |
Dr Derauf raises several interesting points. First, he questions how the increased proportion of mothers of children receiving GWCC with positive screens for alcohol and other drug abuse might have affected the outcomes of the study, and how these differences were accounted for in the analyses. For the assessments of sense of competence as a parent, social isolation, and social support, we included analyses of change in status for each mother during the study period for each of these measures. This process would tend to minimize the effect of differences at baseline between the 2 study groups. For the functional outcomes such as return to work, return to school, becoming pregnant, and referral to Child Protective Services, we presented analyses without any adjustment for alcohol and other drug abuse. Even when controlling for alcohol and other drug abuse, as well as multiple other maternal baseline characteristics, no significant difference in any outcome was noted between mothers of children receiving GWCC and those of children assigned to the IWCC group. It is possible that unknown confounding was not adequately accounted for; given the multiple outcomes and analyses performed without finding a single significant difference, it seems unlikely that GWCC as conducted in this study had any profound effect on maternal outcomes.
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It is interesting to see how yoga nidra, where we literally do ‘nothing’, can do wonders for the body and mind. I find yoga nidra as restorative as sleep, or even much more than sleep. It offers benefits that go deep down to the subtler levels of our personality. Let’s see how.
Yoga nidra can be better than sleep
Yoga nidra – my first understanding of this word was ‘sleep during yoga’. It was only after Sri Sri Yoga teacher, Dinesh Kashikar explained yoga nidra that I discovered it wasn't yoga sleep. He said when you work with awareness (mind not wandering elsewhere), the work gets done better and faster. So true, I thought. He went on to explain that nidra means a relaxed state of mind but when we add awareness to it, it becomes yoga nidra. As we become aware of different parts of the body, relaxation is much more effective. But when we sleep, everything shuts down, including the awareness, and so relaxation remains incomplete somewhere. I reflected, how I would hit the bed every time I felt tired and worn out, yet feel lethargic and tired in the morning as though I hadn’t slept at all! When I started doing yoga nidra after my morning yoga postures, I felt relaxed like never before. My daily dose of yoga nidra not only charges up my body, but also calms my mind. I work better with a clear and focused mind.
Often emotional and mental patterns would continue from the previous day. But, as I experienced, these patterns erased after a yoga nidra session. It is as if someone pressed the refresh button. Following yoga nidra instructions, you can experience a state of absolute bliss too.
Vinitha Nishit, a DSN Course participant, echoes my thoughts when she shares, “On days I feel low and my mind is clouded with unnecessary negative thoughts, I lie down for a short yoga nidra and the change is very evident. I feel a lot lighter; my cluttered mind clears up. I think positively and the energy to work is tremendous.”
Experience deep relaxation in yoga nidra
Apart from its benefits off the yoga mat, yoga nidra works wonders on the mat too. Sri Sri Ravi Shankar says, “It’s very important to include yoga nidra at the end of any asana sequence as the body and mind needs the time to assimilate the effects of the asanas.” Additionally, lying down in yoga nidra helps cool the body and restores it to normal temperature.
Sometimes after doing certain intense yoga postures, you might experience slight pain in the body because of muscle stretch. According to an article in the New York Times, whenever the body undergoes heavy physical activity, calcium ions leak into the muscle cells, causing the muscles to contract and feel tired. A similar thing happens after an active round of yoga poses. It is then important to lie down in yoga nidra for some time as yoga nidra allows the body to flush out these chemical deposits via the bloodstream and thereby help relax more and more.
Meditation is a ‘wow’ feeling with yoga nidra
As I follow up my yoga posture practice with pranayama and meditation, I realize the important role yoga nidra can play in preparing the body and mind to enter a meditative state. I remember struggling to meditate when I initially started, but yoga nidra made it easier.
As we take our attention to various parts of the body, we activate the nervous system which helps increase relaxation and enhances the meditation process.
The more you practice yoga nidra, the better it gets. You can also enhance your experience with simple yoga nidra tips.
Yoga nidra for me is like a ‘super nap’ that recharges me in no time. It is a complete rejuvenation package – a must to relieve ourselves of daily stress in today’s busy world. | <urn:uuid:fe0d2cee-c3e8-46fb-b6ec-1b47044f0a07> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.artofliving.org/fr-en/yoga/health-and-wellness/yoga-nidra-benefits | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955546 | 854 | 1.601563 | 2 |
The Racing Post
is a British
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
daily horse racing
Horse racing is an equestrian sport that has a long history. Archaeological records indicate that horse racing occurred in ancient Babylon, Syria, and Egypt. Both chariot and mounted horse racing were events in the ancient Greek Olympics by 648 BC...
, greyhound racing
Greyhound racing is the sport of racing greyhounds. The dogs chase a lure on a track until they arrive at the finish line. The one that arrives first is the winner....
and sports betting
Sports betting is the activity of predicting sports results and placing a wager on the outcome.-United States of America:Aside from simple wagers such as betting a friend that one's favorite baseball team will win its division or buying a football "square" for the Super Bowl, sports betting is...
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...
, appearing in print form and online.
From 30 May 2011 - 3 July 2011 it had a circulation of 56,507.
It was founded in April 1986 by Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum
Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum , also Sheikh Mohammed, , is the Prime Minister and Vice President of the United Arab Emirates , and absolute monarch of Dubai.-Personal life and education:...
as a rival to the Sporting Life
The Sporting Life was a British newspaper published between 1859 and 1998 that was best known for its coverage of horse racing. Latterly it has continued as a multi-sports website....
. In 1998 Trinity Mirror
Trinity Mirror plc is a large British newspaper and magazine publisher. It is Britain's biggest newspaper group, publishing 240 regional papers as well as the national Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and People, and the Scottish Sunday Mail and Daily Record. Its headquarters are at Canary Wharf in...
, owners of the rival paper, purchased the licence to use the Racing Post trademark for a pound from Sheikh Mohammed and closed the Sporting Life. In October 2007 Trinity Mirror sold the Racing Post licence for £170m to FL Partners, an Irish private equity firm, who were advised on the venture by former Racing Post editor Alan Byrne. Trinity Mirror were requested by Sheikh Mohammed to give £10 million to four charities for transferring the licence to use the trademark, which the Sheikh continues to own.. The Irish Racing Post was launched in February 2010 and is edited from Dublin.
The Racing Post newspaper is published in full colour every day. It includes information on form of horses in meetings across the country, the going of the courses, age of horses, handicap ratings and other information relevant to the race in question. Tips are also included. The main sections are
(featuring Pricewise, Trading Post and Naps)
(featuring Ireland's Eye)
(including a Sports Crossword)
A website RACINGPOST.com
featuring much of the newspaper content is available. Features such as news, cards, results, Racing Post TV and some tipping information are free to access. Some specialist information including Racing Post Ratings, Topspeed, Spotlights and news archive is behind a subscription paywall
A paywall is an online device which bars internet users from accessing webpage content without paid subscription. There are both "hard" and "soft" paywalls in use. "Hard" paywalls allow minimal to no access of content without subscription, while "soft" paywalls allow more flexibility of what...
- Members' Club
. The website also covers greyhounds, sport and poker.
Each year, the Racing Post Chase
The Racing Post Chase is a Grade 3 National Hunt chase in Great Britain which is open to horses aged five years or older. It is run at Kempton Park over a distance of about 3 miles , and during its running there are eighteen fences to be jumped...
, a Grade 3 National Hunt horse race
National Hunt racing is the official name given to the sport of horse racing in the United Kingdom, France and Ireland in which the horses are required to jump over obstacles called hurdles or fences...
, is held at Kempton Park
Kempton Park Racecourse is a horse racing track in Sunbury-on-Thames, Surrey, England, which is a western suburb of London 16 miles from the city centre. The site is set in of land....
in late February and the Racing Post Trophy
The Racing Post Trophy is a Group 1 flat horse race in Great Britain which is open to two-year-old thoroughbred colts and fillies. It is run at Doncaster over a distance of 1 mile , and it is scheduled to take place each year in late October....
, a Group 1 flat horse race
Flat racing is a form of Thoroughbred horse racing which is run over a level track at a predetermined distance. It differs from steeplechase racing which is run over hurdles...
for 2-year-olds over a mile(1600m), is held at Doncaster
Doncaster Racecourse is a racecourse in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, England. It hosts two of Great Britain's 31 Group 1 flat races, the St Leger Stakes and the Racing Post Trophy.- History :...
in late October.
The Betting Site
, and Soccerbase
websites are also run under the Racing Post | <urn:uuid:353cfdec-c1cc-44d6-a0b1-83c7a9957d47> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/topics/Racing_Post | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955003 | 1,183 | 1.804688 | 2 |
7th International Workshop on Ice Drilling Technology
The first circular is now posted for the 7th International Workshop on Ice Drilling Technology. The workshop will be held at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, USA from 9-13 September 2013.
Following in the footsteps of the six previous ice drilling technology workshops held between 1974 and 2006, the 7th International Workshop on Ice Drilling Technology will take a comprehensive look at the latest technological innovations in ice drilling technology, including ice coring, borehole logging, subglacial sampling, core logging, handling and field logistics. The workshop will promote the exchange of knowledge, ideas, and experience among many countries and individuals who are involved in ice drilling projects. People active in the technical side of ice drilling are especially encouraged to participate, as are technical representatives from nations who have recently begun ice drilling programs for the first time. | <urn:uuid:4bd6aa73-2c9f-46a8-acb3-e8016c0851cc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.arcus.org/events/arctic-calendar/event/19514 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935794 | 176 | 1.8125 | 2 |
We sponsor many TeachMeet style events up and down the UK but there had never been one in our home town of Oxford. Until last week.
One of the organisers, an Oxford teacher called Matt Lovegrove, kindly asked us to sponsor. We didn’t hesitate to sign up and created one of our special Tim & Moby movies to help him promote the event and support those who have never been to a TeachMeet before understand more about its purpose.
We’re based in Oxford and, as this was also Oxfordshire’s first official TeachMeet, I decided to contribute. I gave a 2 min nano-presentation about a personal idea I have been brewing with Doug Belshaw called ” #positiveparent ” which, though not ready for full release, was clear enough to share in an unconference setting. Thanks especially to Nicki Wise and Sheenagh Broadbent who were full of ideas and constructive support for ways forward on this afterwards.
Doug Belshaw, unable to make it from the North East to Oxford, instead created an awesome video for the night called “Models of Learning” which discusses the Puentedura’s SAMR model (Substitution – Augmentation – Modification – Redefinition) and Boyer’s model of scholarship. This fascinating presentation captures why he is one of the most authentic, valuable and challenging voices in my learning network. It’s really worth a watch and I’ve embedded it below:
We’ve posted our pictures from the night on Flickr, you can see a listing and some thoughts from the BrainPOP UK subscription prize winner in Brian Sharland’s “Reflection on TeachMeet Oxon” post and, for those that wished they were there, and you can see a complete recording of the whole night.
We look forward to more local TeachMeets! | <urn:uuid:efa1d119-7557-47d0-bad7-d6abccdc4775> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.brainpop.co.uk/blog/tag/tmoxon/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957131 | 392 | 1.773438 | 2 |
Is there just not enough to go around? Have we reached a point in our national experience that when one group does badly, other groups find that their fate in life takes a definite upturn?
It's not a new question or reality if you look to the internatioanl scene. The fact is American abundance and the loss thereof has contributed to the pain and relief of people from other nations, especially in the so called Third World.
But here at home?
Sure. And, again, not a new phenomenon, just the latest expression of same.
Read for yourself how the current housing crisis among middle class homeowners is affecting our homeless neighbors in a Newsweek story by Matthew Philips, Hope Amid a Downturn.
Tell me what you think.
Announcement from Duke Memorial UMC
2 weeks ago | <urn:uuid:8f435acd-5cce-4494-8bbc-3094b1b923be> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://larryjamesurbandaily.blogspot.com/2008/08/sunday-meditation-hard-connections.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932193 | 167 | 1.664063 | 2 |
Copyright © 1979 by Theosophical University Press. All rights reserved.
The most mystic of discourses inform us, that the wholeness of him (the sun) is in the supermundane orders: for there a solar world and a total light subsist, as the oracles of the Chaldaeans affirm. . . .
Unwearied nature rules over the worlds and works,
That heaven drawing downward might run an eternal course,
And that the other periods of the sun, moon, seasons, night, and day, might be accomplished. — Proclus, Commentary on the "Timaeus" of Plato (Cory, Ancient Fragments, pp. 274-5)
THE SECRET DOCTRINE, volume I, pages 279 and 280:
Whatever may be the destiny of these actual writings in a remote future, we hope to have proven so far the following facts:
(1) The Secret Doctrine teaches no Atheism, except in the Hindu sense of the word nastika, or the rejection of idols, including every anthropomorphic god. In this sense every Occultist is a Nastika.
(2) It admits a Logos or a collective "Creator" of the Universe; a Demi-urgos — in the sense implied when one speaks of an "Architect" as the "Creator" of an edifice, whereas that Architect has never touched one stone of it, but, while furnishing the plan, left all the manual labor to the masons; in our case the plan was furnished by the Ideation of the Universe, and the constructive labour was left to the Hosts of intelligent Powers and Forces. But that Demiurgos is no personal deity, — i.e., an imperfect extra-cosmic- god, — but only the aggregate of the Dhyan-Chohans and the other forces.
As to the latter —
(3) They are dual in their character; being composed of (a) the irrational brute energy, inherent in matter, and (b) the intelligent soul or cosmic consciousness which directs and guides that energy, and which is the Dhyan-Chohanic thought reflecting the Ideation of the Universal mind. This results in a perpetual series of physical manifestations and moral effects on Earth, during manvantaric periods, the whole being subservient to Karma. As that process is not always perfect; and since, however many proofs it may exhibit of a guiding intelligence behind the veil, it still shows gaps and flaws, and even results very often in evident failures — therefore, neither the collective Host (Demiurgos), nor any of the working powers individually, are proper subjects for divine honours or worship. All are entitled to the grateful reverence of Humanity, however, and man ought to be ever striving to help the divine evolution of Ideas, by becoming to the best of his ability a co-worker with nature in the cyclic task. The ever unknowable and incognizable Karana alone, the Causeless Cause of all causes, should have its shrine and altar on the holy and ever untrodden ground of our heart — invisible, intangible, unmentioned, save through "the still small voice" of our spiritual consciousness. Those who worship before it, ought to do so in the silence and the sanctified solitude of their Souls; making their spirit the sole mediator between them and the Universal Spirit, their good actions the only priests, and their sinful intentions the only visible and objective sacrificial victims to the Presence.
We proceed to gather up this evening more of the scattered threads left over from our former studies. First, let us look a little more closely into what is meant by a bodhisattva. It will be remembered that a bodhisattva was spoken of as the personal man relatively perfected; the case where the personal entity had become an impersonal entity, where mortality had put upon itself the vesture of immortality; in other words, a case where the personal man has become an Awakened One or a Buddha short of Buddhahood complete by only one stage; or, to use the Christian (early Christian-Greek) mystical expression, a Christ on earth.
Now a bodhisattva, being such, practically means what we might call the higher manas, the higher self (not the highest self, but the higher self) fully developed and in the full radiance of the dual monad atma-buddhi, and thus forms a fit vehicle, a fit medium, between the divine and the lower selves of man; and thus provides an appropriate channel of communication in cases where an avatara is due for manifestation on earth. There could be no such thing as an avatara among men were it not for this medium supplying the necessary psychospiritual link. Pure spirit, in endeavoring to act upon earth, can have neither effect upon, nor chance of communication with, men, because it is the actual divine essence, so to say, of the kosmos and needs the two spiritual qualities or vehicles buddhi and manas-taijasa in order so to manifest, and the bodhisattva, in supplying the spiritual egoic quality, the intermediate quality, furnishes that necessary medium or vehicle. The bodhisattva, furthermore, who, instead of pursuing its own natural karmic higher course in the nirvanic state, chooses by virtue of the compassion inherent in itself to remain on earth, as a helper of mankind, in that case becomes a nirmanakaya, a fully conscious thinking entity upon this our human plane, minus only the physical body. It is stated in the esoteric philosophy that Gautama the Buddha made that sublime choice, and furnished the intermediate principle for the Hindu avatara, Sankaracharya, of whom we spoke at our last meeting. There is a tradition and a record among us likewise that the same bodhisattva furnished the intermediate principle of the avataric manifestation called Jesus, as also in two other cases which we here leave unnamed, the reason being that each race and each subrace, as well as every smaller racial cycle of importance, as we know, is under the particular guidance of a buddha, or of minor incarnations or overshadowings by him.
Gautama the Buddha was himself an avatara plus, i.e., in a larger sense; that is to say, instead of furnishing an intermediate vehicle from himself, in a minor cycle, he was that intermediate vehicle himself in his psychospiritual totality, inspired by his own divine nature, and with his own physical body as the "temple" thereof, differing in that respect from an avatara per se, in which the intermediate vehicle is furnished by the bodhisattva-nirmanakaya of the buddha under whose governance, or rather overseeing, the particular race in which the avatara appears runs its course as a minor cycle of the greater racial cycle of that buddha himself. An avatara, therefore, requires the bodhisattva of the racial buddha as a vehicle in order to manifest upon earth at the time he is due to appear. A buddha does not, because, although an avatara in the sense of being under the direct and fully actual illumination of his own divine self (which is a superterrestrial bodhisattva, studied at our last meeting), he has karma behind him. It is the direct and actual reincarnation of a divine man, which an avatara is not. An avatara is, in a sense, an illusion or maya, because the intermediate or egoic quality — the offspring metaphysically of karma — is lacking there and has to be furnished by the bodhisattva-quality or vehicle.
An avatara, formally only, stands higher than a bodhisattva, but it is a higher stage merely of form of and in a hierarchy, and not from the evolutionary viewpoint. A buddha becomes such by self-directed evolution, the great truth that Katherine Tingley so often tells us of. An avatara comes by karmic racial necessity at certain epochs in the world's history; a buddha does so likewise, but also by personal choice out of an immense compassion for his inferior fellow beings still involved in the toils of material existence. There is the difference, and a very important one it is to remember for our future studies.
We might say in passing that at about our present period, what is called a Messianic cycle is ending and, naturally, a new one is opening — a Messianic cycle running 2,160 years, in definite, exact figures. These cycles succeed one another continuously. So if we choose to count backwards, we can say, if we like, that the European Messianic cycle which is ending, or out of which we are emerging, is that inaugurated for Europe by Jesus, the Avatara. Interesting thoughts come up in this connection which we may safely leave for consideration at another time.
So much for those threads.
Please remember that evolution comprises two lines of action, as it were, two forces running collaterally, that is to say, the spirit or the developed side of existence on the one hand, and that of the undeveloped side on the other hand: otherwise, darkness and light, or the selfish and the compassionate, which, you will remember, is a subject that we alluded to somewhat in studying the fifth of the seven treasuries of wisdom of the Hierarchy of Compassion which is the unselfish or immortal side of existence.
Now the action and interaction of these two lines of energy supply the motive forces behind evolution, behind progress; and the course which evolution takes really arises in, springs out from, and is inaugurated by, the impulses at the opening of the manvantaric cycle given to the dark or matter-side of existence by the dhyani-chohans, I mean by the higher parts or entities of this Hierarchy of Compassion. It is the keynotes furnished by them, the primal and original impulses depending of course upon destiny (or karma) which give the originating plan and the driving power behind everything that happens in that manvantara throughout its cycle of evolution until its close; and while free will exists in man as soon as he has learned to obey the spiritual statutes of self-consciousness, this free will itself, being a divine energy and in a sense springing itself from the general dhyan-chohanic impulse, can in no circumstances militate against, be contrary to, or adversely affect, the general evolutionary current which bears the manifold hosts of entities in manifestation always towards the ultimate goal, signalized by H. P. Blavatsky in the ancient saying, "The Day Be With Us" — the end of a manvantara or the opening of pralaya.
Thus, then, these two lines of energy are eternally coactive — using the word eternally in the sense of lasting throughout the solar kalpa — on one side, the "dark," undeveloped forces of matter; and, on the other side, the Hierarchy of Compassion with its innumerable units urging the hosts of evolving beings forward in one direction, the whole effort of the Hierarchy of Compassion being to raise other less developed beings or units from the matter-side up into the "light-side." The entities of the Hierarchy of Compassion in past manvantaras were themselves thus so raised by other Hierarchies of Compassion, now by this time far, far ahead of us in evolution; and it is our sublime destiny in the future kalpa ourselves so to guide the entities behind us now, a process called the "Passing on of the Light," as the Greek and Latin poets put it.
Furthermore, as briefly alluded to at our last study, please remember that the ancient initiations, and the Mystery Schools in which those initiations took place, were established solely for the purpose of "forcing" or quickening the evolution of fit and proper candidates. They were established from the same motives of compassion that presided over the acts of the great actors of the primal drama, the opening acts of our manvantara. They copied, as it were in miniature, what took place in those primordial times, and what took place in actual life in the Hierarchy of Compassion on our earth, or that section, rather, of the Hierarchy of Compassion which we call the Great White Lodge.
Let us turn a moment to another collateral and very important matter upon which we have touched but lightly, because the questions involved are so profound that it was impossible in treating of one subject adequately to make the meaning clear without temporarily dropping our main theme. But it is likewise necessary not to go too far ahead and leave these loose threads behind; we must gather them in also and weave them into the fabric, into the picture, which we are endeavoring to make.
We refer more particularly to the role which the sun and the planets of our solar system play in the evolutionary drama. There are great mysteries connected with this, and we are told very plainly that not merely the ultimate word but even specifying explanations in no circumstances are given out except to those who have pledged themselves irretrievably and irrevocably to the Lodge. And even then they are given out only with "mouth to ear," and "at low breath"; and, furthermore, only to those, says H. P. Blavatsky, who have passed successfully their fourth initiation, which consists very largely in the personal and individual experiencing of the teachings given in the three preceding stages — three stages of preliminary teaching and training, leading to actual personal experience thereof in the fourth initiation, in which, we are told, the candidate must leave the body of flesh, yea, even the brain-mind, behind, and become that of which he was taught, because only by being can he know. Nevertheless a great deal has been openly said that is, to the student, very illuminating as regards these subjects.
First, at various times we have spoken of the sun, of our solar orb, as the central locus of our solar system. So it is, not merely physically but also in other ways. The sun, paradoxically but truly, supplies most of our material, vital powers; and it is interesting to note that the nearer the planets are to the sun, as a general rule, the more dense they are. Mark well that Mercury, the planet of bodha or of wisdom, the particular guardian and initiator in the Mysteries, is the nearest to the sun (but one) of our seven planets, i.e., the seven Mystery-planets. Note the words "but one." You will remember that the ancients spoke of seven Mystery-planets: Saturn, Jupiter, Mars — I give them in the old order — Sun, Venus, Mercury, and Moon. This matter we shall develop somewhat in diagrammatic form later this evening if we have the time.
The intra-Mercurial planet, as it is called, according to our teaching became practically invisible to the physical eye during the third root-race, after the fall of man into physical generation. On March 26, 1859, a body was seen crossing the solar disk, making what astronomers call a transit. That body has not been seen again; but there are other reasons which have induced some astronomers to believe that there actually is an intra-Mercurial planet (although they cannot find it again despite the search for it), such as the perturbations of Mercury. An attempt at explanation of these perturbations has been recently made, based on the relativity doctrines of Einstein, and that explanation is now in fashion. Nevertheless, our Teachers say that there is an intra-Mercurial planet; we may call it Vulcan, as the astronomers so called it.
Even if Vulcan became invisible during the third root-race, it could yet become visible in transit, that is, in crossing the sun's disk, as this body was actually in 1859 seen to do, because although invisible to our unaided sight, yet through the lens of a telescope when turned upon the unsurpassed illumination of the sun's disk, its body could probably be seen against the great brilliance of the solar orb. The immensely great illumination provided by the sun would readily throw into shadow, or make appear as a shadow, any body of less brilliance, or any body normally too ethereal to be seen otherwise.
The seventh planet, our teaching is, is a planet which under proper conditions is sometimes seen apparently near the moon. It is said that it has a retrograde motion, and that it is slowly dying. It has reached the end of its cycle. I think it erroneous to say that the moon "hides" it. That may be a good way, perhaps, of expressing a certain appearance, but I think it is a misleading one. Let us keep the facts just as they were given us, that it is sometimes "seen apparently near the moon," that it has a retrograde motion, and that it is slowly dying.
Vulcan is in one mystic sense the highest of the seven sacred planets; perhaps not the least dense, but in one sense the highest psychologically; and we have reason to believe that the other planet sometimes seen apparently near the moon is perhaps the lowest of the seven sacred planets. This does not mean that our teaching limits the number of the planets of the solar system to seven. On the contrary, we are taught that there are many more planets in the solar system than are known to astronomers, some perfectly invisible, because they are on planes both higher and lower than our plane. There are planets in our system higher than ours, higher than any planet visible to us; there are also planets in our system much lower than ours, much lower than any planet visible to us.
These seven especial planets were called sacred for a reason most difficult openly to explain; but we may say this, that the seven planets which we on earth (please note the qualification) call sacred, are those planets (and the earth is not one of them) which are the upadhis — a Sanskrit word meaning "bearers" or "carriers" — (to us) of the seven solar forces. They are all "higher" in that sense, or from that point of view, than is the earth; and they are all intimately connected with this earth, and provide this earth, not with its principles, but with spiritual and intellectual and psychical and astral and vital powers, so to say. These seven sacred planets, moreover, are our "makers," and oversee our destiny.
This is a bit of the genuine ancient astrology. It is not merely to the physical body of the seven planets that we allude; doubtless each physical planet or rather globe has its own astronomical forces, such as gravitation and magnetism, and so forth; but we are here speaking of the inner or occult action of them. Each of the globes of our planetary chain, moreover, each of the seven globes thereof, is under the particular watchfulness or care of one of these seven Mystery-planets. Furthermore, each round is under the particular overseeing of one of these seven sacred planets. Furthermore, each race on any one of the globes is under the particular care and overseeing of one of these seven sacred planets. For these reasons, as well as for others still more important and intimate on account of their strait connection with our planetary chain, were they called the seven sacred planets.
The sun and moon are not two of the seven, although for purposes of esoteric astrology they were substituted for the real two, because one is apparently near the moon, and one is so near the sun. Yet, for all that, the sun and moon are both closely in interaction respectively with those two.
With regard to the sun: What is the sun? Is the sun a physical body only? It is not. It is not really a physical body, for it is not gas, it is not gaseous. It is not solid, nor is it liquid or gaseous. The sun is a reflection. What do we mean when we say a reflection? We do not mean the word in the full, complete, and exclusive sense in which it is commonly employed, as when we speak of the reflection of an image in a mirror. We mean it in this sense, that the true sun is a body — strange as it may seem to our present-day scientists — of energy or force. Modern science is beginning to understand now that force and matter are fundamentally one thing. Some years ago everything in the scientific imagination was matter. Now everything has become force to it. Marvelous, that these scientific gentlemen do not see how easily they change the bases of their thought, and how dogmatic they so often are as regards each new series of bases that they assume! But there the fact is. Science today tells us that matter is simply force, which is true. But it is matter all the same. There is no need of running to one extreme in trying to pull ourselves out of another. No need of incurring the perils of Scylla in trying to evade those of Charybdis. Matter exists, it is; it is the upadhi or carrier of force, and force is also the intrinsic life of matter. Nevertheless matter exists; it is a maya, an illusion indeed, but it exists. Maya does not mean illusion in the exclusive and full sense of nonentity. Not at all. Maya actually implies that something exists to produce it, but that the seer of it does not know what the reality is behind; in other words, our senses do not tell us the truth about the thing behind the manifestation. That is what maya means, not that the thing itself is nonentity. That view is an absurdity.
If you examine photographs of sunspots, if you look at the sun through a good telescope and center your gaze upon a sunspot when it is near a limb of the sun, near an edge, you will see that as the spot crosses the solar disk, it seems to be black. Now why does it appear black? We know that it is not black in color. Our scientists have proved that fact, but the visible disk of the sun is so intensely brilliant that the less brilliance of the part within the spot, though very brilliant itself, seems dark to our eyes.
Suppose that we were to say that the sun we see is simply like the glow around some electrical machines, merely a "reflection" of the electrical current, as it were, a mayavi manifestation on our plane of a force so immense that we can form no proper conception of it. Suppose that we were to think of the sun as occupying no space (or dimension) at all, and that what we see, that immense apparent body of light, were like an electrical spark, apparently a body, apparently occupying space. Suppose that we go a step further and say that the visible sun which we see is matter in its sixth state of ethereality, and that what is behind that tremendously brilliant veil or reflection is an atom, so to say, an infinitesimal part of matter-substance, matter in its seventh state. It is easy to follow this thought. The sun is a mass of force; as even the medieval philosophers might have said: "Brother, when a man tells you that he has seen the sun, laugh at him. He has not. The sun is invisible. The true sun, the origin and center of these high forces, is on higher planes, and we merely see on the sixth subplane of our kosmic plane this intense brilliance covering so vast a space as the apparent sun does."
Furthermore, while the sun gives us our light on earth, it probably does not furnish us with 30 percent of the heat that we have, and then not by direct physical radiation, but in somewhat the same way in which the electric current furnishes us with heat, or in a similar way — in the same way would be, perhaps, too strong a manner of putting the fact. Forces emanate from the solar heart or center and reach the meteoric veils encircling the earth, and arouse electromagnetic currents, producing thus a part of the meteorological phenomena which we experience in storms and fair weather and rain and snow and ice. The earth itself produces probably 70 percent or more of the heat which we know; and such things as storms are caused mostly by electromagnetic action and reaction, if I may use that expression, between the innate prana, or vital forces of the earth, and the meteoric continent which surrounds our globe like a veil. For we are encircled during our manvantara, and every other planet of the solar system is similarly encircled during its manvantara, with a thick veil of meteoric dust, most of it very fine, some of it of more or less large bodies.
Take Venus, for instance, or Mercury. They are surrounded each one with its own veil of meteoric or kosmic dust: each one veils her face, or his face. This meteoric veil acts in one sense as does a cushion, thus forming a protection to its planet. We do not see for that reason the real face of the planet. But Mars has no such veil. Why? Because the vital essence of that planetary chain has left Mars' physical globe for its other globes.
We shall have to reserve until next week the diagram which was to have been shown to you this evening, at which point of study we have now arrived. Let us briefly point out that the diagram in question is taken from the mystical Syrian thought in vogue before the Christian era, and represents the exoteric astrological ideas that the Syrians then had of the relationship of the planes of being, and necessarily therefore of the planets and the mystical positions occupied by each of them in the evolutionary drama. They put it this wise. First and highest was the Milky Way, which to them was the utmost limit of this hierarchy or universe. Then came the Nebulae and Comets, which were represented in the spiritual hierarchy by the Seraphim. The third grade still lower were the Fixed Stars, and they were represented by the Cherubim. Then taking a leap over the immensities of the space of our universe, these old thinkers of Babylonia, Assyria, Media, and doubtless Persia, and of course Phoenicia, and all the other countries of Asia Minor, began the inferior series with the planets of our solar system. First, Saturn, the seat of the Thrones; then Jupiter, the seat of the Dominations; then Mars, the seat of the Virtues; then the Sun, the seat of the Powers; then Venus, the seat of the Principalities; then Mercury, of the Archangels; then the Moon, of the Angels; then our Earth. They also enumerated five elements — an enumeration which is exoteric, but it is the same as the esoteric as far as it goes. Our Earth, as well as interplanetary space, comprises these five elements, and when we say our Earth we mean not merely our physical planetary body of this element upon which we move, but the entire sphere comprehended between the Moon and the Earth. These five elements were named Ether, Fire, Air, Water, gross matter or Earth. Outside of this hierarchy or universe or kosmos they placed the Celestial Waters, even as the first chapter of the Hebrew book of Genesis speaks of the "spirit of the Elohim moving over the waters." "Celestial Waters" was a name frequently given by the ancients to what the Greeks called Chaos, undeveloped matter or, as we today would say, spacial deeps.
Our time of study this evening is drawing to a close. Let us, however, point out the interesting fact that this same series of the planets shows us clearly that the ancients must have understood perfectly well the mechanism of the framework of the visible solar system, and that, if their thought was geocentric, making the earth the center of the kosmos, it was a natural thought; and that as man is instinctively anthropocentric, he cannot naturally think from another standpoint. So, naturally, the ancient astrologers and astronomers, with their feet on earth, calculated from the earth, and saw from the earth, and placed man, looking up towards the spheres of the solar system, on earth as the center of observation even as we do today, not meaning at all that they knew nothing of the heliocentric system, which we know they did know.
What can this mean? This cannot mean anything but one thing, and that is, that these planets were so placed on account of and because of the relative time occupied by each in making the circuit of its orbit, to wit: Saturn, about thirty years; Jupiter, the next "lowest," practically twelve; Mars, the next lowest, practically two; the Sun (or the Mystery-planet, the Sun supplying its place), one year; Venus, the next one, seven months; Mercury, three months; the Moon, one month. We would like to point out also that the days of our own common week are based upon this series, and then we shall close for this evening.
Why, in putting the planets in the order Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sun, Venus, Mercury, Moon, did they not make their week of seven days follow that order? Because, dividing the day and night into 24 hours, each day, beginning at sunrise, opens with its first hour under the governance of some particular planet. If you calculate through the 24 hours, beginning with Saturn (there being seven sacred planets), during the 24 hours they go into 24 three times, with three over. Three times seven is 21 hours, with three over: 22, 23, 24, the 25th hour being the first hour of the next day. Three times seven running through the 24 hours, we find that if the first hour began with Saturn as presiding planet, the 8th hour would also be under Saturn, the 15th would be under Saturn, the 22nd would be under Saturn, the 23rd then would be under Jupiter, the 24th under Mars, and the 25th hour, the first of the next day, would be Sun or Sunday. By taking this list and counting each fourth, beginning with the one just ended, as the first (or adding three more to the hour just ended), gives you the days of the week. Thus: Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sun, SUNDAY; Sun, Venus, Mercury, Moon, MONDAY; Moon, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, TUESDAY (Mars' day); Mars, Sun, Venus, Mercury, WEDNESDAY, being the Anglo-Saxon Woden, corresponding to the Latin and Greek terms; Mercury, Moon, Saturn, Jupiter, THURSDAY (Thor's day); Jupiter, Mars, Sun, Venus, FRIDAY; Venus, Mercury, Moon, Saturn, SATURDAY, again beginning the second or following week.
So the order and names of the days of our week are ultimately based upon a very interesting and occult reason — ancient astrology explained and given to the world only in the Mysteries as we know them. The order and names of the days of the week were the same in India and in Northern Europe, and in some parts of Asia, a matter which has never yet been satisfactorily explained by our calendarists and astronomers. The reason is found in the fundamentally identical astrological system common to the entire ancient world.
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Serving others is an integral part of education. There are many ways that you can committ yourself to service at St. Joe's.
Each week, students volunteer at area food pantries. Over semester break in January, students help to feed people at a homeless shelter in Portland or build a house in Guatemala; in March they volunteer in five states during an alternative spring break called Workfest. However you want to get involved, there's a way.
To promote consciousness about the need for shelter, students camp out in cardboard boxes overnight in front of Alfond Hall to promote the student Habitat for Humanity chapter. Campus Ministry members bring hot chocolate and their support to the encampment. During Hunger & Homelessness Awareness Week, students serve breakfast and lunch at local food pantries.
Reaching out beyond our campus boundaries speaks to the mission of Catherine McAuley, founder of the Sisters of Mercy who opened her heart with compassion and mercy to those with physical, psychological and spiritual need. The Mercy tradition is alive and well here as we seek to provide acts of charity and kindness, advocacy for justice and stewardship - both on and off campus.
St. Joe's is part of the annual Midnight Run, a consortium of churches, colleges and civic groups that distribute food, clothes and other necessities to homeless people in New York City. The dining staff here make sandwiches, the Sisters of Mercy donate clothes from their second-hand shop in Portland, Campus Ministry pours shampoo into little bottles.
“The most rewarding experience was just being able to work and play with all the kids of the village. When working on the construction team on the hottest day of the week, it was seeing the kids’ big, smiling faces that made it all worth it. Knowing that we were there making a difference for them made every moment worthwhile.”
“I participated in the service trip to New York City, called Midnight Run. The day before the trip we sorted through all the donated clothes and made bag lunches. The next day we drove to New York City and distributed the clothes and food to people in need.”
“Some of my favorite and most rewarding times here at Saint Joseph's College has been during Habitat for Humanity NY and Kentucky service opportunities.” | <urn:uuid:63c49b26-7542-472f-bac0-ffd3b6336d7b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sjcme.edu/admissions/service | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962518 | 463 | 1.78125 | 2 |
Shipping and Handling: $40.55
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The study of whole body vibration (WBV) technology, as applied to fitness and sports training began with the Soviet Space Program. The Russians discovered that cosmonauts removed from the effects of gravity developed significant bone and muscle loss during space travel.
In an effort to stop this loss and wasting, the Russian scientists experimented with vibration induced muscle activation. Profound improvements in muscle and bone strength were obtained by using vibrating platforms to artificially super compensate for the future loss of gravity. As a result of this effect, Veteran Russian cosmonaut Valery Polyakov, a medical doctor, set the current world record for the longest continuous spaceflight when he spent about 438 days aboard Russia's Mir space station between 1994 and 1995. Comparatively, American astronauts Carl Walz and Dan Bursch training on conventional fitness equipment, were forced to cease their mission after just 196 days due to bone and muscle degeneration. Not until the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989, did WBV technology find its way into other countries. WBV technology is finally being embraced by NASA, Professional Sports Teams, along with many allied health, medical and fitness experts throughout the United States. Hundreds of thousands of people throughout Europe have been using this technology with incredible success for over a decade!
KEITH R. DeORIO, M.D., D.Hom. (Med) Dr. DeOrio is an internationally known expert in integrative medicine. He is a graduate of the University of California/Irvines College of Medicine. Upon graduation he completed an internship at the Kaiser Fontana, Ca. Family Practice Residency Program. He attended the UCLA Medical Acupuncture Program and is a member of the American Academy of Medical Acupuncture. Dr. DeOrio received a degree from the British Institute of Homeopathy and trained in Homeopathic with Robin Murphy, N.D at the Hahnemann Academy of North America. He is a specialist in nutritional and preventative medicine and recently published a book outlining four important nutritional paradigms of the 20th century titled The New Millennium Diet Revolution. Dr. DeOrio created a complete line of nutritional and homeopathic formulations designed to rapidly heal many of our present day, difficult-to treat conditions. He is proficient in prolo and neural therapy, which is used to treat musculoskeletal and pain conditions that do not respond to traditional therapies. The DeOrio Wellness Medical Center was featured in Alternative Medicine Magazines Ideal Clinic Section. He is featured as a guest expert on television and radio as well as print media. Dr. DeOrio hosted his own national radio show called Natural Health and Healing. His most recent interview was for a segment on the Discovery Channels Inquiring Minds documentary in which he presented a cured case of Lupus verified by laboratory testing and validated by third party medical experts. Dr. DeOrio treats patients from all over the world and is known for his ability to care for and understand illnesses that have no apparent or known cause. He is appreciated for his warm nature, intuitive ability, vast knowledge of many healing systems of medicine, and his ability to integrate various treatments in a way that quickly brings vitality back to the patients life.
Ratings & Reviews
(average rating based on 20 reviews)
of respondents would recommend this to a friend.
Reviewed by 20 customers
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( 9 of 10 customers found this review helpful)
The Greatest Workout Ever!
from Stratford, Ontario
I was using one of these machines at a gym for a month and really found it was fun and you got great toning results. I decided to buy my own and am very happy that I did. I use it for 20 minutes every morning. It sure beats driving to the gym and back. It's soothing and I really enjoy my routine. I really missed it when I went on holidays for 2 weeks. I found it easy to set up. Just make sure you tighten the screws at the very bottom because with the vibration of the machine they were coming loose until I tightened them well.
Bottom Line Yes, I would recommend this to a friend
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( 4 of 4 customers found this review helpful)
This jury is still deliberating
By Abbies Mom
from Hamilton (Ontario)
I purchased this in the early spring and have been faithfully using it almost every day for at least 10 minutes a day. I injured my knee about a year and a half ago and I have a little bit of pain in the area ever since. But by using Body Vibe 2000 I don't have much pain at all. I stopped using it during a weeks holidays this summer and definitely felt the difference. I also feel a slight improvement in my energy levels. I also bought this for Kegel excercises and I have found a slight improvement with it. On the downside there were no instructions on how to put it together and there was also no instructions on how to use the keypad. You had to read through the whole booklet to piece it together and even the terminology they used in the DVD was not what was written on the keypad. It would have been nice to have a quick reference guide for the keypad and have the instructions match the writing on the keypad. Overall I think I am more toned but because I bought it mainly for the weight loss benefits and that hasn't happened at all I am only giving it three stars. I would recommend it depending on what the person wanted to achieve but I wouldn't be enthusiastic about it.
( 7 of 8 customers found this review helpful)
My body is sensitive to the vibration and I have difficulty concentrating on movement, even when I go very slowly. The vibration also makes me feel pressured. Even on a rug it is noisy and that is a concern.I enjoy listening to the Mind Vibe CD, although while I'm on the machine it feels like there is too much to concentrate on.I would recommend this to certain people, it's not for everyone.
( 3 of 4 customers found this review helpful)
****LOVE, LOVE THIS BODY VIBE*!!!!!!***
from Thunder Bay, Ontario-Canada----
*****I have used my new Body Vibe Personal 1000 for several days now and I truly enjoy the work out**!!! This vibe is exactly what I have been wanting for a long time. When the price is right, we receive great value for our money &this is it. Standing on the unit with the different speed levels is perfect for my legs and feet. Afterwards, I like the sensation and the return of circulation..I plan to use this unit everyday, and I will be happy. Great to see all the routines and positions on the chart. I LIKE THIS VERY VERY MUCH..!!!!*Thank you--TO BETTER HEALTH FOLKS..!!!****
( 7 of 7 customers found this review helpful)
good, but not enough info
I got this product when it was a showstopper. Assembly took awhile as I found instructions a little unclear. In the original presentation, I don't recall seeing or hearing any type of specific comment about who should not use the machine. Once I started reading thru the huge manual, I discovered that someone like me (I have a condition which causes me to have periodic problems with vertigo) should probably not be using it. I had already started trying it out before reading the manual completely (lesson learned the hard way...read the whole manual!), and had noticed when I tried to go for more than a minute at a time that I was having some problems with this. It's amazing technology, does not take up much space, and does give your body a thorough 'wake up'...can feel everything inside from head to toe vibrating. I wish I had done, like a previous reviewer did, and gone to the bodyvibe website to check for who should not use the machine. There is a very specific list in the manual, apparently also available at their website, and it is not as simple as the presenter on TV appears to indicate (ie, if you have a really severe condition, maybe check with your doctor). My condition is not technically 'severe', but this machine was not for me. I had to send it back.I would recommend this to a friend only if they had first checked the bodyvibe website to be sure it was going to be OK for them to use. Presenters on TV don't always have time to list every detail about a product, but it would be more responsible to refer viewers to the website for more info. about this sort of thing...or better yet, include this on the tsc website.
( 5 of 5 customers found this review helpful)
I got this machine the last time it was a show stopper, and putting it together was not the easiest but I managed. I actually got results using this machine and my father used it for a week and the numbness in his feet subsided! I was skeptical, but now I am a beleiver!
( 2 of 2 customers found this review helpful)
Glad I bought this
I had some problems with my purchase and the company was excellent in resolving my issue. I am a big fan of doing whatever we can to keep healthy. I have many machines that end up in the storage shed but this one is going to be a keeper. Thanks Adele for all your help.
( 14 of 14 customers found this review helpful)
No How To CD's with my machine
from Brampton, Ontario
I ordered my machine when it was the Showstopper the last time and it came within a week or so. My husband put it together and hopped on. It was apparent right from the start, we would not be able to use this machine in our living room. I was sitting on the couch while he was on the machine and I was getting a workout too. Everything in the room was vibrating. We moved it to the family room in the basement, cement floor covered with carpet and nothing vibrated but the machine and my husband. I am terribly disappointed that the men and women workout DVD was not in the box. I phoned customer service, whom I might add, were not very accommodating or helpful and they were to get back to me, four days ago and I have heard nothing. She sounded like she would rather be anywhere else then addressing my question. I do not know if anyone from TSC reads these reviews here or on FB, but I am guessing the answer is no. When I shop on [@]and leave a comment anywere, someone always respons to my private email addressing each concern. Not so here. But I leave them anyway. It would be wonderful if they could hire someone to just read reviews, FB comments or phone calls and address them. Hopefully I will get my instructional DVD's or at least hear from someone about why I didn't get them. Having said all of that, I will try to do my best without them and then perhaps I will recommend friends try this machine. It's not much good if you don't know how to use it properly to get the most benefit.
Bottom Line No, I would not recommend this to a friend
SIMPLY LOVE MY BODY VIBE EXERCISER
I have had this machine now for few days and am already getting addicted to it. I can't wait to get on it. This is one of the best investment I have ever made in my life. For the last few months I had suffered from insomnia but lately have noticed that I fall asleep very easily.Thank you Dr. DeOrio, listening to you about the benefits of owning the machine convinced me to purchase it and have not regretted purchasing this wonderful machine. As a matter of fact, I would purchase this machine over and over again.
( 15 of 16 customers found this review helpful)
Be wary of company
By Exercise Diva
I received the vibe last week and finally assembled it two days ago only to learn that I was sent a faulty handle bar/control panel. It's upside down. I even went over to my mother's to take hers apart to ensure that I wasn't doing something wrong. Now TSC is sold out and have told me to take it up with the company or return it to TSC. They have provided me with the number for Body Vibe which, interestingly, does not answer their phone nor do they even have a voice mail. I would be very worried about any sort of warranty with this company. Good luck with yours. | <urn:uuid:7167cbc0-b87c-47a9-812b-8927b5f517cb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.theshoppingchannel.com/Body-Vibe/Bestsellers/Body-Vibe-Personal-1000-Model-with-DVD-amp-Poster/pages/productdetails?nav=R:504365,N:100074-2037553-129128 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96356 | 3,675 | 1.539063 | 2 |
What to Look For In a Houston Hygienist?
One of the best ways to ensure optimal dental health is through a regular routine for oral hygiene. This means that flossing and brushing should occur a few times each day and that at least one “official” cleaning occurs once each year with a skilled and trained dental hygienist. If you are someone who is unhappy with their current dentist in Houston or who is simply trying to get on track with proper dental care, you will want to be very selective about your dental hygienist.
The hygienists at midtown dentistry – your dentist in Houston, will bring specialized skills and knowledge to your treatment. For example, they are up to date on all of the latest equipment and materials used in their trade. They are very communicative with the patient too. This means that anyone looking for a good dentist in Houston will want to ensure that their hygienists follow the same attentive and interactive policies as the doctors.
Consider Midtown Dentistry, we place an emphasis on the quality of communication between our office and you. There is always going to be an exchange of information that allows the dental professional to make the best treatment plans for the individual patient. The same can be said about the hygienists in the office.
When looking for a hygienist it is always going to be essential to consider this type of open-minded and active communication because it is going to be necessary if dental problems are to be addressed properly. For instance, someone heading to their dentist in Houston may be experiencing some earaches, but feel that this is unrelated to any sort of dental problem. A good hygienist will scrutinize the teeth for signs of things like grinding and bruxism, and this might connect something like a chronic ear ache with the need for night guards or therapies to end the destructive grinding habit.
It is also important to work only with a hygienist who is willing to “coach” the patient on the proper behaviors too. For example, a good practitioner will show a patient the proper way to brush or floss, will discuss the need for antibacterial rinses, and will generally work with a patient to develop a routine for the best dental health possible. This includes recommending specific treatments from the dentist if necessary.
What is Fluoride Treatment?
Fluoride treatment is a very effective way of helping to prevent tooth decay. It is a mineral that is found naturally in food and water supplies, and the benefits are well known as it was originally added to the public water supply 60 years ago in carefully controlled amounts. There are two ways of obtaining fluoride:
Systemic fluoride is the fluoride found in food and water and helps to strengthen teeth that are already erupted, and those which are still developing. It can also be taken as a supplement and in gel form and is often prescribed by a doctor or dentist. It’s very important not to ingest too much fluoride while teeth are still developing as this may cause a condition called fluorosis. Fluorosis is visible as white flecks on the teeth, and children between the ages of one and four are most vulnerable to developing fluorosis while those aged eight and over are at much lower risk.
A topical application of fluoride can help teeth that are already erupted by penetrating the outer surface of tooth enamel and increasing resistance to decay. Fluoride is found in toothpaste, mouthwashes and gels, and it’s quite possible that your dentist or hygienist may recommend a professional fluoride treatment during dental checkups. This might take the form of a specialized mouthwash, or a gel that can be applied into a dental tray which is then inserted into the mouth and left for a short period of time.
Flossing the Right Way, Every Day
Flossing is a vital part of your daily oral hygiene routine, and although it may be tempting to skip it there are several good reasons why you shouldn’t, and your teeth will thank you by sticking around for longer.
Simply put, flossing is essential because it helps to remove food debris that can get caught between teeth. Mouths are full of bacteria called Streptococcus mutans which love to feed off the food particles left in your mouth, and in doing so they form a film over the teeth which is called plaque.
Acid is formed as a byproduct of this process and this attacks teeth causing them to de-mineralize, leaving them more susceptible to decay. | <urn:uuid:d204610a-9c37-41d9-99e7-df2b524afa52> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://midtowndentistry.com/services/dental-hygienist-cleaning/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963859 | 934 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Bahrain’s #BloodyF1 Racing
While Bahrain’s government concentrated last weekend exclusively on organizing the Formula 1 GP, those who for over a year have been the victims of a repression shrouded in silence, took advantage of this event to attract the world’s attention to their cause. The winds of the Arab Spring had reached Manama on February 4th 2011, when protesters decided to take to the streets demanding political reform and the departure of the Al-Khalifas, the Sunni royal family that rules the country where there is a Shiite majority. The harshest repression began on March 14th when the government allowed troops into the country sent by the Cooperation Council for the Arab States in the Gulf. One thousand soldiers sent by Saudi King Abdallah arrived in Bahrain with a specific mandate; stop the protests and save King Hamad.
In order not to attract excessive attention to the uprising the 2011 Grand Prix was cancelled and, in spite of the rising number of deaths, (according to protesters more than ninety), events in Manama remained went totally unnoticed both in the West and in some of the Arab world. It was not only the petro-monarchs in the Gulf who turned a blind eye, but also the United States, which has the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet headquartered in Bahrain as a deterrent to Iranian expansion in the region.
“Last year the local authorities had decided to avoid holding the Formula 1 race at the track in Bahrain for political and security reasons. But the uprising that began at the time has ever stopped. It is simply the media that has not reported events. There are interests at stake that must be defended and concentration was all on reporting exclusively what was taking place in Libya and in Syria” explains local activist Nazeeha Saeed, who is also a correspondent for France 24 and Radio Monte Carlo Duwaliya. Last May Nazeeha experienced violence inflicted by the police. She was arrested and tortured by security forces because of her stories about anti-regime protests.
The uprising does not appear to be about to stop, and yet this year the royal family announced reforms. What impact has this had?
The regime’s reforms are cosmetic, not real. Some changes have been made to the constitution, but not on issues considered important by the opposition. The government has also admitted having used violence to repress protests, and yet there has been no change in its attitude. The royal family did say they would consult with American and British advisors to reform the manner in which the police is organised, but security forces have not stopped the cruelty inflicted on protesters. Political prisoners remain in prison and doctors continue to be put on trial and charged with having helped or treated activists.
Visiting the racetrack on the eve of the Grand Prix, Crown Prince Salman al-Khalifa said that there is a great difference between protesters and those who caused problems before and after the race. Do you agree?
For over a year activists have been engaged in a peaceful uprising and many of them continue to march unarmed. In spite of this there are some, exasperated by the regime’s daily repression, who have started to throw fire bombs in response to the attacks by the police every night on their villages. The revolutionary front, however, remains united and presents the same demands.
In the weeks leading up to the Grand Prix, the internet returned to be the means used to attract international attention. The hashtag #BloodyF1 moved from one social network to another, not only in the Middle East but all over the world. What message did it send?
In Bahrain too the new media are important for spreading subversive messages and are indispensible for organising protest events. By labelling messages #BloodyF1, activists intended to provide clear information. The scheduled Formula 1 race would be bloodstained by the police force’s repression of protests. On the eve of the race yet another martyr was killed, 37-year old Saleh, who fell into the hands of the police. By organising the Formula 1 race, the regime was attempting to recover its image and tell the whole world that everything is fine in Bahrain. The royal family want to prove that last year’s problems that prevented the race from being held are now over, but that is not true.
While the race was being held and activists protested, aid organizations launched appeals to save Abdulhadi al-Khawaja, the founder of the Gulf Center of Human Rights, who has become one of the uprising’s most well-known faces. Sentenced to life in prison for plotting against the monarchy, Abdulhadi has been on a hunger strike for the past two months that may well result in his death. After several demonstrations, Abdulhadi’s case is now being re-examined, but it is still unclear whether or not there is a possibility that he will be released. How are people reacting to all this?
For years Abdulhadi has been an activist known all over the world for his commitment to human rights. After years in exile he took part in the protests against the regime, loudly asking for democratic change, and like many other activists, Abdulhadi was arrested for having expressed his opinions. Even United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon has asked for him to be transferred to Denmark for medical reasons, and yet the local authorities have prevented this. We are all extremely concerned about what may happen to him and his family. Should Abdullahadi die there would be a very powerful reaction by the people. Violence would increase and the number of those killed could soar. | <urn:uuid:f119664d-3c2e-48f7-a89c-51749741c638> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.resetdoc.org/story/00000021950/translate/English | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9786 | 1,145 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Speak to one ofour advisors
Natives of the Worcester region for 150 years, the Lategan family have a prodigious knowledge of South African wines. Today sixth generation winemaker De Wet Lategan is in charge of the cellar, crafting wines from the ripe fruit of vines planted by his grandfather.
Former Cape Winemaker of the Year, De Wet has won more than 100 awards for his wines in the last decade alone - including a host of medals for his bestselling White River Chenin Blanc ... a favourite among Laithwaites Wine customers.
De Wet Lategan showed his promise early on, winning South Africa's prestigious Young Winemaker of the Year accolade. More recently, he was named Winemaker of the Year on his home patch, seeing off 29 other contenders for the title.
But then winemaking is in the Lategan's blood. The family established Bergsig Estate in 1843 when Willem Lategan first planted vines on his farm in the Breede River Valley, on the other side of the du Toitskloof mountains from Paarl and Stellenbosch.
And what a terrific location it's proved to be! The estate is sited where the Breede River Valley narrows, creating a natural funnelling effect. This provides cooling breezes in Summer and sufficient rainfall to virtually eliminate the need for extra irrigation. When irrigation is required, the estate can use water from one of the four rivers which flow through the property.
De Wet uses these natural gifts well. With a degree in Oenology and Viticulture from the University of Stellenbosch, De Wet has the technical expertise to ensure that the wines are well made, under the best cellar conditions. However, his winemaking philosophy is to work as naturally and simply as possible, to capture the unique terroir of the vineyards in his wines. | <urn:uuid:3e604333-ca14-4ff0-9e28-5a409107c869> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.laithwaites.co.uk/DWBase/jsp/discoverwine/index.jsp?redirect=winemaker&categoryId=cat674425 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95754 | 380 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Recently I received the following two images of a carpet swatch from Dave Morrison whose father George was assistant to the Vice President, Operations & Industrial Relations of the Alexander Smith & Sons Carpet Company in Yonkers, NY. The cutting came from a carpet tread upon by King George VI and Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain during their New York City reception of June 10, 1939. These images were sent to me because photographs of the Alexander Smith carpet mills in Yonkers appear on my website. The carpet sample reminded of another connection between the British monarchy and Hudson Valley Ruins, one that was mentioned in the Hudson Valley Ruins book.
Not only is this a fantastic souvenir (I like it more as an artifact of Yonkers than for its association with royalty ) but look at that awesome font for “Alexander Smith.”
The Alexander Smith Carpet Mill in Yonkers.
The mill is not a ruin nor abandoned, but it is always something of a miracle when a defunct factory like this holds on for so long in various reincarnations.
The other connection between the King and Queen’s 1939 visit to New York and one of our Hudson Valley Ruins occurred at the Hudson River home of President Roosevelt. In our book, we told that “Forst frankfurters were famously served to King George VI and Queen Elizabeth during their visit to the Roosevelt estate at Hyde Park.” (The Forst company was a long-standing Hudson Valley concern located across and up the river at Kingston.) That such “good old-fashioned American” picnic food was served to the royal couple was something of a big deal then, and was widely covered in the press.
Springwood, the home of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Hyde Park, NY.
A month after the royal-presidential picnic, the Kingston Daily Freeman reported that Eleanor Roosevelt, at the urging of Kingston Mayor Heiselman, served Forst Formost dogs to the King and Queen. ” ‘We have now proved to our satisfaction that they are excellent, for everybody seemed to enjoy them,’ wrote Mrs. Roosevelt in a newspaper article following the picnic.”
It’s a nice little story that helped put a Hudson Valley company in the international spotlight (the New York Times reiterated the Forst connection in a 1965 article). Well, imagine our surprise when Tom Rinaldi and I stopped in at Nathan’s in Yonkers, NY, and read on their placemat that the Roosevelts served Nathan’s hot dogs to the King and Queen. Nathan’s tells their version of the story on their website too.
So, what is it then? Did/does Nathan’s produce their own meat, or do they buy from butchers and slaughterhouses such as the Forst company and then slap the Nathan’s name on the packages? Or did the international Nathan’s corporation just simply make up their version of the story entirely, at the expense of a defunct family-run business that almost no person alive today outside of Kingston, NY, has ever heard of? I emailed Nathan’s and, not surprisingly, I did not receive a reply in response to my query for documentation to their claim of having served the King and Queen.
Charles Forst in the Post-Standard, 1986.
Jacob Forst founded the Forst Meat Packing Company in Rondout in 1873. The Forst plant, located between Abeel Street and West Strand, included cattle pens, a slaughterhouse, packing building, a warehouse, and a garage. By the 1980s, the Forst company was almost entirely a mail-order business. Meats were shipped worldwide. The company was out of business not much later.
The abandoned Forst meat-packing buildings were demolished in late 2005. A plan, strongly supported by Kingston Mayor James Sottile, to build a hotel at the site never materialized and the site remains vacant.
(UPDATE JULY 31, 2012:
I inquired with and received email from National Parks Service staff at the Roosevelt estate in Hyde Park. The email states: ‘The hot dogs served at Top Cottage were actually Swift brand. Harry Johannesen’s mother Nellie was a cook for Eleanor Roosevelt and she later owned a tea room by Eleanor Roosevelt’s home Val-Kill. She was the one who purchased the hot dogs for the royal picnic and Harry told us many years ago it was Swift brand. One of our staff recently found an article at the FDR Library that confirms what Harry told us.’ ” A 2009 New York Times article also mentions the Swift brand.
Still, the earliest documentation that I have seen claims the Forst brand as the choice of fare for the royal picnic. I look forward to seeing any earlier sources to the contrary.)
In addition to the Forst meat-processing factory, at least one other Hudson Valley Ruin is directly connected to the Hyde Park estate. Roosevelt’s elevator (shown in the following two images) was manufactured by Poughkeepsie’s Sedgwick Machine Works.
The Sedgwick Machine Company, manufacturers of elevators, was at a Hudson River-front site in Poughkeepsie by the time a 1937 Sanborn Insurance Company map documented the factory buildings. Previously, the Phoenix Horse Shoe Company, manufacturers of horse shoes and toe and heel calks, operated rolling mills, a punch room, a cooper shop and a storehouse here at least through 1913.
The Sedgwick factory was partly burned in 2002 and mostly demolished in early 2005. Presently it’s brick tower still stands. Here are some photographs that I took in 2004 of the now-demolished buildings (low quality reproductions of medium-format slides photographed above a light-box.). | <urn:uuid:5fc4d6e7-7c54-428b-9301-3f0d7742f7f2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.hudsonvalleyruins.org/rob/?p=1031 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964825 | 1,191 | 1.617188 | 2 |
Los Angeles both confirms and dismantles all of its stereotypes. Yes, it's a sprawling metropolis with eternally congested freeways. But it also contains some of the most ethnically diverse and unique neighborhoods in the United States. It might be filled to the brim with the glamour of chic Hollywood name brands, yet it's also home to renowned art galleries and architectural masterpieces. The world's visual entertainment empire, L.A. offers tourists behind-the-scenes ... continue»
See all Top Things to Do in Los Angeles»
See the Best Hotels in Los Angeles»
The best times to visit Los Angeles are from March to May and from September to November, when the air is more breathable and the crowds are less oppressive. Average temperatures during these times remain in the 60s or 70s, which makes walking around and visiting outdoor attractions much more comfortable. During the summer, average high temperatures hover in the mid-70s; the heat coupled with heavy smog levels often drive visitors and residents alike to the already crowded oceanside neighborhoods. If you're looking for deals, consider a winter trip. Just make sure to pack an umbrella, since you're bound to encounter some rainfall in January and February.Best Times to Visit Los Angeles»
Los Angeles Neighborhoods
Los Angeles neighborhoods are some of the most distinct and diverse in the entire country. Citizens of around 140 different countries—who speak more than 224 different languages—live in the city, which creates a network of ethnically diverse towns and neighborhoods.
Accessible via the Los Angeles exit from the Pasadena Freeway (SR-110), Santa Monica Freeway (I-10) or the Santa Ana Freeway (I-5 and U.S. 101).
L.A.'s downtown used to be a boring business district often plagued by homelessness and crime. But it has recently received a makeover and attracts those seeking expensive cuisine and fun nights on the town. One of its most impressive sites is the Walt Disney Concert Hall on South Grand Avenue, which was designed by famous architect Frank Gehry and is renowned for its contemporary architecture and stellar performances.
Accessible via U.S. 101 to Hollywood Blvd. or Gower St.
Of course, L.A.'s most popular neighborhoods are those associated with movies, glitz, and glamour. The famous Hollywood neighborhood—located northwest of Downtown—is a must-see for any star-gazer and is still home to some of the largest film production companies. For a scenic drive through the area and a great view of Los Angeles, you can drive along Mulholland Drive.
Stroll along the iconic Hollywood Walk of Fame—located along Hollywood Boulevard and Vine Street—and see the names of the 2,000 entertainment icons (fictional stars, too) that have earned a spot along the walk. On the walk is another legendary Hollywood locale: Grauman's Chinese Theatre. The theater's famous Chinese exterior and lush interior are some of the most renowned emblems of the Los Angeles film culture.
Accessible via U.S. 101 to Santa Monica Blvd. or Melrose Ave.
Sitting snug between Hollywood and Beverly Hills is West Hollywood, the epicenter of L.A.'s LGBT community. According to Frommer's, "You'll know you've arrived when you see the risqué billboards." West Hollywood features plenty of restaurants and nightlife spots, and hotels here are much more affordable than those found in nearby Beverly Hills. This trendy neighborhood is home to the liveliest stretches of Santa Monica Boulevard as well as the Sunset Strip, one of the most iconic and entertaining thoroughfares in all of Hollywood. The Strip is also a great locale for celebrity-spotting, and for seeing the image-obsessed commercialism that predominates much of the city.
Beverly Hills and Bel Air
Accessible via U.S. 101 to Santa Monica Blvd.
West of Hollywood is where the Fresh Prince made his name and many celebs make their beds. These über-chic, ultra-posh, and overly pricy neighborhoods in West L.A. are home to such stars as Jack Nicholson, Madonna, Pamela Anderson, and George Clooney. However, there's not much to do here aside from looking at the facades of celebrity homes and spending money. When it comes to shopping, it doesn't get much better than the designer boutique-lined Rodeo Drive.
The nearby Brentwood area is also home to the famous Getty Center, a 24-acre art museum renowned for its American and European art, sprawling grounds, and provocative architecture.
Accessible via I-405 to Santa Monica Blvd.
Nestled between Beverly Hills and West Hollywood, this tiny neighborhood houses some of L.A.'s most prominent entertainment centers, including 20th Century Fox Studios and the Shubert Theatre. Here, you'll also find the Westside Pavilion, a massive open-air shopping center.
Accessible via I-405 to Santa Monica Blvd.
Once the city's favorite nightlife haunts, Westwood lost its appeal several years ago due to overcrowding. However, it is once again on the rise because of its thriving culinary scene and abundance of cinemas, making it the best place for dinner and a movie. This neighborhood sits west of Beverly Hills, and is also home to the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA).
Accessible via I-10
If you're not in Los Angeles for Hollywood, you're probably here for the beach. And when it comes to exploring the coast, most people head to Santa Monica. With 72 miles of shoreline, the area has more than enough sun and sand to offer. L.A.'s coast is arguably the most popular part of the city thanks to fewer bouts of smog and a more happy-go-lucky atmosphere.
This "working-class" neighborhood has a little something for everyone. The Santa Monica Pier—complete with games, food and rides—is popular with the young and young-at-heart. And if you can feel your wallet burning a hole in your pocket, this neighborhood overflows with prime shopping streets.
Accessible via I-10 to Nelson Way / Pacific Ave.
Sitting South of Santa Monica, this formerly run-down neighborhood is now one of L.A.'s most famous attractions. Inland, a series of canals and foot bridges wind around the trendy eateries and unique boutiques of Abbot Kinney Boulevard. Along the shore, stereotypical Venice Beach thrives, with scantily clad bathers occupying the boardwalk and tie-dye t-shirt vendors' calls echoing in the air. This is the place to have your fortune told, to find the perfect vintage tee, and even star-gaze; such celebrities as Nicolas Cage and Julia Roberts have set up camp here.
Accessible via the Pacific Coast Highway (Highway 1)
This exclusive neighborhood sits at the northern edge of L.A.'s waterfront. Its prime real estate and posh atmosphere have attracted such celebs as Mel Gibson and Cher. Beaches here are technically public, but they are shielded by private communities. Because of its stellar waves, Malibu is where the die-hard surfers head for the best ride.
San Fernando Valley
Accessible via I-405, I-5, or I-210.
To see where all the movie magic is made, head north to L.A.'s San Fernando Valley and the neighboring towns of Studio City and Universal City. North Hollywood—or "NoHo"—is a thriving spot for independent theaters and small boutique shops. The adjacent Studio City is perhaps best known as a production site for CBS Studio Center, and Universal City is home to Universal Studios and Universal Studios Hollywood Theme Park.
Zuma Beach County Park
Accessible via Pacific Coast Highway (Rt. 1), a mile beyond Kanan Dume Rd.
Zuma is the county's largest beach park. Although it's around an hour away from Los Angeles proper along the Pacific Coast Highway, it's worth the trip for its clean water and gorgeous views. Bordered by sandstone cliffs, this beach is particularly popular with the surfing crowd.
The main tourist points in LA remain relatively safe, but a bit of caution can go a long way in this huge and sometimes dangerous city. In L.A. especially, credit cards are accepted almost anywhere, so don't carry around large sums of cash. Pickpocketing and petty theft are also common, so be sure to safeguard all belongings. Homelessness also remains a problem, but it generally poses little risk to your health or safety.
Also, you should avoid people who approach you on the street saying they're from a production studio or scouting agency. If someone does approach you, ask for their business card and check their credentials before you pursue anything.
The best way to get around Los Angeles is by car. Los Angeles is spread out over about 500 square miles, and while there is a public transportation system, it severely lacking compared to those found in other big cities. You can rent a car from one of the approximately 40 rental agencies housed within the Los Angeles International Airport (LAX), which is located about 20 miles southwest of the downtown area. Another option is to take a taxi, but that can be expensive, with a rate of about $60 to get from LAX to downtown. The light-rail and bus systems also serve the airport, but be prepared for a slow ride.Getting Around Los Angeles» | <urn:uuid:9e3986be-bb6e-4fe4-a2b4-dc6109973c2f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://travel.usnews.com/Los_Angeles_CA/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950043 | 1,957 | 1.617188 | 2 |
U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
Meeting of February 15, 2012 - Unlawful Discrimination Against Pregnant Workers and Workers with Caregiving Responsibilities
Good morning. My name is Melvina Ford, and I am the Senior Policy Advisor to the Wage and Hour Administrator at the U.S. Department of Labor. The Wage and Hour Division is responsible for enforcing some of our nation’s most comprehensive federal labor laws on topics, including, but not limited to, the minimum wage, overtime pay, recordkeeping, migrant workers, worker protections in certain temporary worker programs, and the prevailing wages for government service and construction contracts.
I would like to thank Chair Berrien and the Commission for inviting me to speak with you today. The Secretary of Labor came to the Department with a vision of Good Jobs for Everyone. That vision includes improving workplace flexibility policies and promoting equal opportunity and economic security for the most vulnerable workers among us. The Secretary has a long history of advocating for such policies, and her commitment shows both in the Wage and Hour Division’s renewed focus on the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) and our undertaking of enforcement of the new nursing mothers break time law.
The U.S. Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division (WHD), administers and enforces the FMLA for all private, state and local government employees, and some federal employees. See 29 C.F.R. § 825.100 et seq. Most federal and certain congressional employees are also covered by the law and are subject to the jurisdiction of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management or the Congress.
Coverage: FMLA applies to employers who employ 50 or more employees in 20 or more workweeks in the current or preceding calendar year, including joint employers and successors of covered employers. See 29 C.F.R. § 825.104, 825.105.
Leave Entitlement: Under FMLA, eligible employees are entitled to take up to 12 workweeks of unpaid, job-protected leave in a 12-month period for specified family and medical reasons, including pregnancy, childbirth, or the adoption or placement of a child; to care for a spouse, son, daughter, or parent with a serious health condition; to take medical leave when the employee is unable to work because of a serious health condition; or for any “qualifying exigency” arising out of the fact that a covered military member is on covered active duty, or has been notified of an impending call or order to covered active duty. Id. at § 825.200.
The FMLA also allows eligible employees to take up to 26 workweeks of job-protected leave in a “single 12-month period” to care for a covered servicemember with a serious injury or illness. See U.S. Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division Fact Sheet #28A: The Family and Medical Leave Act Military Family Leave Entitlements (Revised February 2010).
Job Restoration & Maintenance of Health Insurance Coverage: While on FMLA leave, the employer is required to maintain group health insurance coverage for the employee. And the employee is entitled to be restored to the same or equivalent job upon his or her return from leave. Id. at § 825.211- 825.215.
Notice to Take Leave & Medical Certification: To assert FMLA leave, generally an employee is required to provide 30-days advance notice, if the leave is foreseeable, and, if not, then notice must be provided as soon as practicable under the facts and circumstances. And the employer may require medical certification in support of FMLA leave for a serious health condition affecting the employee or a covered family member, or to care for a covered servicemember with a serious injury or illness. Id. at § 825.302 - 825.310.
Unlawful Acts: It is unlawful for any employer to interfere with, restrain, or deny the exercise, or attempted exercise, of any right provided by the FMLA. The prohibition against interference includes discriminating or retaliating against an employee or prospective employee for exercising FMLA rights. It is also unlawful for an employer to discharge or discriminate against any individual for opposing any practice, or because of involvement in any proceeding, related to the FMLA. Id. at § 825.220.
Filing a Complaint & Remedies: WHD investigates complaints of FMLA, and if violations cannot be satisfactorily resolved, the U.S. Department of Labor may bring action in court to compel compliance. Id. at § 825.401.
Individuals may also be able to bring a private civil action against an employer for violations. In a successful action, an employer may be liable to the affected employee for damages equal to the amount of wages, salary, employment benefits or other compensation denied or lost to the employee by reason of the violation. In a case where no wages or benefits have been denied or lost to the employee, the employer could be liable for any actual monetary loss incurred by the employee because of the violation. This includes out of pocket expenses such as the cost of providing care to a family member. An additional amount equaling these sums may also be awarded as liquidated damages. Other remedies include job reinstatement and promotion. Employees may also recover attorney’s fees and costs. Certain limitations apply for suits filed by state employees.
An employee is not required to file a complaint with WHD prior to bringing such action. The filing of a complaint with WHD does not stop the running of the two-year statute of limitations (three years in the case of a willful violation).
WHD has over 50 District Offices and a little more than 1000 investigators located throughout the country. All investigators are trained to conduct investigations under all the laws WHD enforces, including the FMLA.
In addition, each District Office has at least one “technician” who is trained in answering telephone inquiries about the FMLA and who, in some instances, may attempt an early resolution of some FMLA complaints.
For FY 2011, WHD received over 2,200 FMLA complaints alleging FMLA violations and resolved over 2,100 complaints. The resolved complaints included more than 850 cases involving terminations, more than 500 allegations of refusal to grant leave, more than 200 allegations of refusal to reinstate to equivalent position, more than 500 cases involving allegations of discrimination (or retaliation) for exercising FMLA rights, and approximately 40 cases alleging the failure to maintain health benefits. In addition, in the more than 2,000 cases resolved, WHD found violations in approximately 40% of the cases, impacting approximately 900 workers directly.
In comparison, the Department’s FMLA survey in 2000 showed that over 80 million employees in the U.S. work in covered establishments and meet the eligibility criteria of the FMLA. Thus, the disparity between the number of cases WHD has the capacity to resolve and the number of workers impacted by FMLA compliance is too large and the Department will never be in a position to hire enough investigators to reach a critical mass of these workers.
WHD is now considering ways to impact compliance with FMLA on a larger scale to ensure that more workers can effectively balance the needs of their families, their health and their jobs.
FMLA Strategic Enforcement Roundtable: In July 2011, WHD hosted a roundtable discussion for the Department of Labor focused on the strategic enforcement of FMLA. Your Chair, Jacqueline Berrien, spoke at the roundtable, Commissioner Lipnic attended, and other members of the EEOC staff helped to plan and participated in that roundtable because of your special role in protecting and promoting equality and economic security for working families.
At the roundtable, participants indicated that they were already seeing a dramatic rise in FMLA claims due in large part to women’s increasing involvement in the labor force and, in particular, their increased contribution to family income, along with an upward trend of working elder caregivers. The participants also indicated that they were finding the most violations in whole sale and retail industries and companies with a workforce made of more than ¾’s of hourly paid workers. Participants also expressed particular concern with the ability of low-wage and vulnerable workers to access FMLA leave, and indicated a need to increase employee awareness of FMLA rights generally, how to access FMLA leave, and the protection from retaliation provided under FMLA.
Enhanced Capacity: Over the last two years, WHD has focused on increasing the capacity of our investigators to do effective investigations in all of the laws we enforce, including FMLA – equipping our investigators with blackberries and laptops to encourage more on-site investigations and adding significant language capacity. In addition, to enhance our FMLA capacity for enforcement, we produced two new videos to train our field staff on effective techniques for complaint intake and investigation procedures.
Strategic Enforcement & Litigation: WHD is currently exploring strategies to maintain employer compliance, which means keeping an investigated employer in compliance in the future, and strategies to sustain compliance, which means getting beyond an investigated employer and leveraging resources outside of WHD to deter other employers from violating the law.
One of the goals of enhanced FMLA enforcement is to be more strategic in the development of cases to litigate, such as cases that involve systemic policy issues or ones that involve issues about which we believe the Department’s voice should be heard.
The Department already has an active amicus program and has participated as amicus in several important cases over the life of FMLA. For example, the Solicitor recently argued for a mixed motive analysis of FMLA retaliation cases in Breeden v. Novartis Pharmaceutical Corporation in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. We hope to expand our participation in this area and believe that in appropriate cases amicus participation can present a unique opportunity for collaboration between federal agencies.
Know Your Rights & Compliance Assistance: WHD is in the process of updating the Department’s FMLA e-laws system to reflect current FMLA regulations. The new system is currently in the testing phase. In addition, we are working to produce a guide to advise employees about their basic rights and protections under the FMLA.
Moreover, WHD field staff at the Regional and District office levels regularly participate in outreach to employees and employers at events designed to educate the public about the FMLA, typically conducting more than 20 FMLA outreach and stakeholder events a year.
Finally, we are currently exploring the use of social media tools, such as YouTube and blogs, to make sure that in the future we continue to share information where workers will actually see and hear it.
Policy: In 2010, the Department clarified the definition of what it means to be a "son or daughter" under the FMLA, ensuring that employees have the same rights to FMLA leave to care for a child they provide day-to-day care for without a legal or biological relationship as does a biological or adoptive parent. As a result, an employee who will co-parent a same-sex partner’s biological child may take leave for the birth of the child and for bonding. Additionally, an employee may now take leave to care for his grandmother with a serious health condition, if she parented him, and a daughter of a same-sex partnership may take leave to care for her non-adoptive or non-biological parent.
On January 30, 2012, the Department announced that it intends to publish a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to implement and interpret recent statutory amendments that expand the military family leave provisions in the FMLA and incorporate special eligibility provisions for airline flight crew employees. Finally, the Department will soon begin collecting data with two new FMLA surveys to better understand the need for and the experience with FMLA from both the employee and employer perspectives. The study will help the Department by providing information on current workplace policies and practices related to FMLA. In addition, for first time, as a part of the American Time Use Survey, Bureau of Labor Statistics will gather data on a wide diversity of workers’ access to and use of leave beyond the FMLA in order the better understand how workers are balancing their work/life needs. We hope the information generated from these efforts will better inform our outreach efforts, publications, interpretative guidance and enforcement policies and shape future regulatory priorities based on sound data so that the FMLA is better and more effectively utilized.
For nursing mothers, our WHD is enforcing the new "break time" law. The law ensures that women who choose to breastfeed their infants have the ability — and privacy — to express milk for their child after they return to work.
The Affordable Care Act, P.L. 111-148 § 4207, amended section 7 of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), 29 U.S.C. § 207(r), to require employers to provide nursing mothers with reasonable break time and a private space for expressing breast milk while at work. The new law reflects the reality that in today’s workforce, many women are combining caregiving responsibilities with work. The nursing mothers law will enable many of these women to continue breastfeeding their child after they return to work by ensuring that they have break time and a space for expressing milk while at work.
The nursing mother break time requirement became part of the FLSA when the Affordable Care Act was signed into law in March 2010. The WHD has been providing compliance assistance and enforcing the law since that time.
In December of last year, the WHD published a Request for Information (RFI) in the Federal Register and had a comment period of 60 days in which over 1850 nursing mothers, and employee and employer representatives submitted comments in response to the questions posed in the RFI. See Reasonable Break Time for Nursing Mothers, 75 Fed. Reg. 80073 (Dec. 21, 2010), found at http://webapps.dol.gov/FederalRegister/PdfDisplay.aspx?DocId=24540. The RFI provided the Department’s preliminary interpretations of the law and sought public comment on a number of issues. WHD consulted with public health officials at CDC and the Health Resources and Services Administration in developing the RFI.
The break time for nursing mothers provision was added to the FLSA, therefore it applies only to employers who are covered by the FLSA. Over 7million employers in the U.S. are covered by the FLSA. See Comprehensive FLSA Presentation, http://www.dol.gov/whd/flsa/comprehensive.ppt#262,5,Coverage, accessed July 20, 2011. Because of the way the law was drafted, it applies only to workers who are not exempt from section 7 of the FLSA, which includes overtime pay requirements. See Reasonable Break Time for Nursing Mothers, 75 Fed. Reg. 80073, 80074. Nonetheless, the Department hopes that employers will provide this right to all workers, regardless of status under the FLSA.
In fact, some employers are already required to provide nursing mothers breaks under state laws. Over 20 states have passed laws related to workplace lactation. See National Conference of State Legislatures, State Breastfeeding Laws, http://www.ncsl.org/default.aspx?tabid=14389, accessed July 20, 2011. To the extent that state laws provide greater protections to nursing mothers than the federal law (for example, requiring break time for all workers regardless of FLSA status, requiring paid break time, etc.), they are not preempted by the federal law. See 29 U.S.C. § 207(r)(4).
Covered employers are required to provide a reasonable amount of break time to express milk as frequently as needed by the nursing mother for up to one year after the birth of her child. Id. at § 207(r)(1).While the law states that the break time does not have to be paid, id. at § 207(r)(2), the Department has clarified that if the employer already provides paid break times, an employee who uses that break time to express milk must be compensated for that time in the same way that other employees are compensated for the break time. See WHD Fact Sheet #73: Break Time for Nursing Mothers under the FLSA, http://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/whdfs73.htm. The RFI lists the various factors employers should consider when determining what constitutes a reasonable time: see Reasonable Break Time for Nursing Mothers, 75 Fed. Reg. 80073, 80075.
Employers are also required to provide a space for the nursing mother to use to express milk. The law specifies that the space cannot be a bathroom. The space must be “shielded from view” and “free from intrusion” by others, in other words, a private space that could be used by the nursing mother to express milk. See 29 U.S.C. 207(r)(1)(b). As long as the space meets these requirements, employers may temporarily create or make available a space for use by the nursing mother. See supra note 11. Some of the space issues WHD sought input on in the RFI included: see Reasonable Break Time for Nursing Mothers, 75 Fed. Reg. 80073, 80076.
At this time, the Department does not intend to issue regulations, in part because we recognize that due to the wide variety of work settings, work schedules, and the individual needs of nursing mothers, regulations may not be the most effective way to issue initial guidance to employers and employees.
The Department recognizes that there are many different kinds of work settings and work schedules and that the individual needs of a nursing mother will vary. For example, many of the nonexempt workers covered by this provision work in retail settings, restaurants, factories, or other environments where unused space may not be readily available. For these reasons, the Department expects that employers may need to be creative and consult with employees in order to meet their obligations under the law. It is unlikely that there will be a single approach that works for all employers or nursing mothers.
The Department has been consulting with other federal agencies such as HHS, CDC, EEOC, as well as non-governmental organizations with expertise in workplace lactation issues, about how best to help employers and employees develop solutions that comply with the law.
The law provides an “undue hardship exemption” for employers with fewer than 50 employees who can demonstrate that compliance would pose significant difficulty or expense when considered in relation to the size, financial resources, nature, or structure of the employer’s business. See 29 U.S.C. § 207(r)(3). This is not an automatic exemption for small employers. The way the law is drafted, employers would have to demonstrate that they meet the undue hardship factors as outlined in the statute (listed above). Also, the Department has explained that for purposes of determining whether an employer has 50 or fewer employees, all employees will be counted, regardless of work site. See supra note 11. The RFI provides a more detailed discussion of this provision. See Reasonable Break Time for Nursing Mothers, 75 Fed. Reg. 80073, 80077-78.
The WHD is charged with administering and enforcing the FLSA, which now includes the nursing mothers break time requirement. See generally Reasonable Break Time for Nursing Mothers, 75 Fed. Reg. 80073, 80078. The enforcement of the FLSA is carried out by WHD investigators stationed around the country. These investigators respond to complaints and gather information from the employer and employee to determine compliance with the law.
The law does not specify any penalty if an employer is found to have violated the break time for nursing mothers requirement. Although the FLSA provides a private right of action to employees to recover unpaid wages, in most instances there will not be any unpaid wages associated with an employer’s failure to provide breaks to a nursing mother. If an employer refuses to comply with the law, the Department could seek injunctive relief in federal court.
If a nursing mother has been discharged or discriminated against because she filed a complaint regarding her break time rights, she could file a retaliation complaint with the Department or file a private cause of action seeking remedies such as reinstatement and lost wages.
WHD received more than 1,800 comments on the RFI. We have finished our preliminary review of the comments and are considering what further guidance to issue. Our preliminary analysis is that almost all of the comments were affirmatively in favor of the law. Many of the comments came from current or former nursing mothers who described their experiences and needs while pumping at work.
For the most part, the comments submitted appear to echo the Department’s own assessment of the factors that are important to enable a nursing mother to effectively take breaks to express milk while at work.
In our initial comment review, it appears that some employer representatives were concerned about the notice requirement, and encouraged the Department to require nursing mothers to give advance notice to their employers if they intend to pump at work so that the employer can make arrangements to accommodate them. Some employers were also concerned about identifying appropriate space for use by nursing mothers.
Our initial comment review also indicated that, as expected, the employers who are most challenged by the break time requirement are those with mobile workers or workers in non-office settings, e.g., restaurants, retail, delivery drivers, kiosks and small vendors.
These policies, which are designed to ensure workplace flexibility to balance the demands of work and family life, are critical to achieving the vision of Good Jobs for Everyone. As such, we thank the EEOC for taking the time to address these important issues. | <urn:uuid:c30c03e0-a74b-4af0-ab88-57ac59e27a3d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www1.eeoc.gov/eeoc/meetings/2-15-12/ford.cfm?renderforprint=1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952686 | 4,465 | 1.578125 | 2 |
You could say that Phyllis and Hamer Shafer cast a long shadow across our campus—and it's getting longer.
The couple's foundation has given $1 million to improve our immersive learning experiences. Ball State President Jo Ann M. Gora said the Shafers' gift will "provide a bridge that connects bright, curious students with life-changing experiences."
"Hamer and I have supported the university for many years," said Phyllis Shafer, a 1947 Ball State graduate. "Ball State has been an important part of our lives and the success of our business and the Muncie community; our gifts and our service are ways that we show our appreciation."
Our strategic plan calls for each undergraduate student to have an immersive learning experience, in which interdisciplinary groups of students work with a faculty mentor. Students drive the learning process as they examine a real-world problem and determine a real-world solution. Immersive learning projects take student-faculty teams to communities throughout the state of Indiana and sometimes overseas.
The $1 million donation is the latest in the Shafers' long history of giving to Ball State. The most visible symbol of their generosity is Shafer Tower, built in 2001.
The tallest structure in Delaware County, Indiana, Shafer Tower rises 150 feet above McKinley Avenue at the north end of campus. Every 15 minutes, bells covering four octaves ring out across campus from the carillon tower.
The Shafers owned Muncie Power Products for many years before their retirement. They were inducted into the university's Miller College of Business Hall of Fame in 1987. | <urn:uuid:e648419f-f5f2-4c94-bb5b-d276906a5684> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://cms.bsu.edu/features/global/giving/castingalongshadowoncampus | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948502 | 333 | 1.539063 | 2 |
Light rain began to fall around noon, just as about 200 to 250 supporters of the governor’s “Choose Respect” campaign against domestic and sexual violence in Alaska gathered at the steps on the state Capitol, preparing to march downtown.
Rep. Reggie Joule, D-Kotzebue, took it as a sign.
“We have a day like today in Juneau in Southeast (with) the strongest of the Southeast winds, the Taku,” Joule told the crowd. “While it makes us shiver, it’s here to help us carry this message all across Alaska.”
Juneau’s “Choose Respect” march was one of nearly 100 that took place across the state on Thursday. And the message was loud and clear.
“Right now we stand arm and arm with Alaskans in 100 communities who are marching from Metlakatla to Barrow and from our urban hubs to our smallest communities,” said Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell, who kicked off the rally in Juneau. “We’re covering the state with a very powerful message: one assault is too many. One rape is too many. Our children, women, men deserve safety. We want all people to thrive in Alaska. We want Alaska to lead, but we should not lead in the statistics, the grim statistics of sexual violence, of sexual assault, of domestic violence and hurting our children. We’ve got to turn that around.”
Before the crowd began the march down Main Street to Marine Park, Rep. Anna Fairclough, R-Eagle River, shared some of those grim numbers with the crowd during her turn at the microphone. She said women in Alaska are 2 1/2 times more likely to be raped during their lifetime and children six times more likely to experience child abuse than in other states across the nation.
“We have to stop that number,” she said, adding that the rally is not a celebration. “It’s a call to action,” she said.
Ending the epidemic of domestic violence and sexual assault in Alaska has been one of Gov. Sean Parnell’s most outspoken initiatives since taking office. The Choose Respect campaign is aimed at reducing those numbers of violence incidents, but also breaking the practice of remaining silent on the issue.
“As a society — as Alaskans — we must change our practice of preserving silence,” the governor, who attended a Choose Respect”rally in Fairbanks on Thursday, wrote on the Choose Respect website. “And, we must promote a culture of respect that will not tolerate this conduct.”
Treadwell reiterated that point, saying that it’s time to shine a lot on what has been “too long ignored.”
“Each of us can lend our courage to victims and survivors by taking a visible and vocal stand for what we want as a social norm: respect for all,” he said, adding, “Together today, by coming together here and by marching down the hill, we’re calling on all Alaskans to change our social norms and to return to our values of choosing respect.”
The Juneau rally was cosponsored by AWARE, short for Aiding Women in Abuse and Rape Emergencies. Atia Nasiah, the AWARE prevention manager, said the march sends a powerful message, especially to victims and survivors.
“It’s a community-wide issue that takes a community-wide response, and it will never be solved by an individual,” she said. “So for Juneau to come together in this way is so meaningful for victims who have experienced sexual assault or domestic violence, very meaningful.”
Thunder Mountain High School coach John Blasco, also a guest speaker, urged sports coaches across the state to join him and his athletes in signing the state pledge to fight against domestic violence and sexual assault and to implement the “Coaching Boys into Men” program in their schools or organizations. That program educates young athletes on respect for themselves and women and girls during the sports season.
Blasco said the 2010 TMHS basketball team was the first sports program in the state to implement that program, and two other teams recently joined — the Juneau-Douglas High School boys basketball team and the TMHS boys soccer team.
“As coaches, we have special relationships with our players,” Blasco said. “We can positively impact how they behave on and off the court, and as mentors, we have the ability to reach out to these young athletes and positively encourage them to have respectful lifestyles and expectations. So today I ask that the men of Alaska stand up and lead our young men by example. Show them how to live a violence-free life, and a respectful life.”
• Contact reporter Emily Russo Miller at 523-2263 or at [email protected]. | <urn:uuid:b2111be5-cac6-4549-b2fc-f30c8f123294> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://juneauempire.com/local/2012-03-30/rally-respect | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964309 | 1,053 | 1.632813 | 2 |
"The annual net employment change in California due to relocation -- a loss of about 9,000 jobs -- represents only 0.05% of California’s 18 million jobs."
And with that, new data today from the Public Policy Institute of California again calls into question political claims that a mass exodus of businesses from the Golden State is underway, a claim we examined last week as part of our coverage of the race for governor.
The new look at whether businesses are moving jobs out of state, and how many are doing so, will no doubt fail to end the heated debate about the issue. Even so, today's PPIC report fails to find much hard evidence for a growing trend.
And in what may be one of the more intriguing findings, analyst Jed Kolko says the data shows that several other states across the nation have a much larger percentage of job loss that can be attributed to companies moving out of state. Tops on the list: the District of Columbia, where 6.9% of jobs from 1992-2006 were lost due to an exodus, followed by Delaware (4.5%) and New Jersey (3.9%). Compare that to California's record over the same 14 year period: 1.7%.
Last week, we reported that one of the more frequent anecdotes offered by Republican nominee Meg Whitman appeared to miss the mark. That's the case of aerospace giant Northrop Grumman, which decided earlier this year to relocate his corporate HQ -- and about 350 jobs -- to northern Virginia, while still keeping some 30,000 jobs here in California (that's about one quarter of their global workforce).
Whitman continues to mention the company by name on the campaign trail, doing so again two days ago at a stop here in Sacramento. "You watched Northrop Grumman move its corporate headquarters to northern Virginia," she said. (Note: this time, she clarified that it was the company's HQ that left, and not -- as she's done in the past -- that the entire company left.)
"Jobs are leaving for neighboring states," she said. "I want to be the governor that stops that exodus."
And yet, based on the PPIC report, such comments are reflective of anecdotal evidence, not substantive research. Here's the report's conclusion on the real factor(s) behind job creation and loss in California:
Most job gains are due to the births and expansions of locally owned businesses; most job losses are due to the contractions and deaths of locally owned businesses. Businesses headquartered outside a county contribute much less to local employment fluctuations. The homegrown shares of job gains and losses are even higher in smaller cities and towns and in rural areas. Among the non-metropolitan counties in California, 79% of job gains and 74% of job losses are homegrown. Thus, although luring businesses from elsewhere or convincing them to open or expand locally is a common economic development strategy, and preventing businesses from leaving the state is a political refrain, most job gains and losses are homegrown.
Don't expect such research to squelch the issue on the campaign trail, or among those who steadfastly insist that the anecdotes point to a trend not yet seen by researchers. And as mentioned last week here on the blog, one wonders whether Whitman's criticism of business climate issues since, oh say late 2003, won't start to eventually rankle the guy whose corner office she hopes to occupy come January. | <urn:uuid:b6578587-7495-429f-aa81-dcf9e7852531> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.kqed.org/capitalnotes/2010/09/22/our-business-exodus-report-gets-new-data/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970363 | 697 | 1.671875 | 2 |
When Robert Menendez arrived in the U.S. Senate in 2006, he was a relative pauper in a chamber often called a millionaires’ club. The New Jersey Democrat ranked 97th out of 100 senators in terms of his personal wealth, according to financial records filed that year and compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics.
So Menendez’s decision last month to use his personal funds to reimburse a prominent political contributor $58,500 for two flights to the Dominican Republic came at a major cost. The repayment amounts to between 32 percent and 87 percent of the assets Menendez reported holding in bank accounts and stock, according to his latest financial-disclosure form, which was filed last year.
Menendez repaid Florida eye doctor and political donor Salomon Melgen only after his free flights aboard Melgen’s plane became public and the subject of a Senate ethics complaint. A local New Jersey Republican group filed a complaint last November, alleging the senator had broken Senate rules by “repeatedly flying on a private jet to the Dominican Republic, and other locations.” Menendez reimbursed Melgen the $58,500 two months later, on Jan. 4, according to his office.
Posted: February 6th, 2013 | Author: Art Gallagher | Filed under: Bob Menendez | Tags: Bob Menendez, Bob Menendez scandals, Menendez sex scandal, Senator Robert Menendez sex scandal | 7 Comments »
Government watchdogs are dubious. They say Menendez’s financial situation adds fuel to questions about his motives and whether the free flights he accepted were a simple oversight.
“For a senator that’s not a Rockefeller, that’s real money,” said Meredith McGehee, policy director for the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center. “It kind of makes you wonder.… If he knew in advance that the trips were going to cost him $60,000, would he have done it?”
In the years after the Jack Abramoff scandal, which involved trips abroad for politicians, McGehee said it “stretches credibility” that Menendez was unaware he was receiving a gift while boarding a private flight to a Caribbean island. “You’re about to walk on a private plane, and you’re a public official—and that doesn’t occur to you?” she said.
Melanie Sloan, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, another watchdog group, was even less charitable.
“He waited until he was caught to pay them back,” she said. “If you rob a bank—and you’re caught—you don’t say, ‘Take the money back and forget about it.’ ” | <urn:uuid:00e915e4-38d1-4213-9b42-f24f99064012> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.moremonmouthmusings.net/2013/02/06/menendez-spent-between-32-and-87-of-his-net-worth-on-private-flights-to-dr/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964445 | 575 | 1.59375 | 2 |
The Shadow of the Wind
by Carlos Ruiz Zafón, translated by Lucia Graves
416pp, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, £12.99
In an age of unrelenting austerity, any touch of luxury can stir the soul; a brandname has a poetry all its own. And when a society is, like Franco's Spain, imprisoned in stultifying economic and imaginative autarchy, any hint of imported glamour represents an escape. Hence the care invested by a character in The Shadow of the Wind in his choice of taxi for a trip across town: "He wanted to get into a Studebaker at the very least."
The 1940s Barcelona of Carlos Ruiz Zafón's new novel is by no means the trendy tourist destination of today; rather, it's a city shut down for the duration in death and fear. Its buildings pockmarked by gunfire or abandoned by bankrupt dynasties, it is a place in material and metaphorical ruins. Survivors of civil war, its people hang on grimly, with no apparent expectation of better times. Stalked by secret police, with only a kitsch and collaborationist Catholicism for spiritual comfort, they lead lives of unrelieved monotony and hardship. Yet such people will snatch at scraps - and, as Zafón shows, find real sustenance in a city streetscape whose every corner tells a story. Many of its secrets may be sinister, but we have a sense too of a realm of mystery the regime can't reach, a place in which a taxi ride can become a romantic quest.
Narrator Daniel Sempere is seeking some conclusion to the story of 30s novelist Julián Carax, a "remarkably unsuccessful" writer whose book The Shadow of the Wind has taken a hold over his life. The son of a secondhand bookseller, Daniel found this volume in the city's "Cemetery of Forgotten Books", a labyrinthine library in the oldest part of town in which the works of authors immortal yet unread are assembled in their thousands. It seemed to call to him from the shelf, and when he read it, it took possession of him; yet this novel has a history as well as a plot. It is not merely neglected, it turns out: a menacing and faceless figure has been implacably hunting down every available copy and burning it - that individual, it becomes clear, is now hunting Daniel too.
His situation, Daniel sees, bears uncanny resemblances to that of the protagonist in The Shadow of the Wind, but it's to Carax's biography that he'll have to turn if he's to find his pursuer's motive. The more he finds out about his subject, the more he learns of lives affected (or more often afflicted) by their contact with the writer, burned by the artist's all-consuming egotism. Just to make things more complicated - and a great deal darker - Daniel finds his researches have attracted the interest of the thuggish and vindictive city police chief, Ignacio Fumero.
Novels constructed like Russian dolls, stories within stories, with terraced layers of surveillance and interpretation embedded in texts which advertise their own artificiality: this is the standard stuff of doctrinaire postmodernism. That this elaborate nest of narratives stacks together so neatly is impressive; that the cogs which drive the action whir quite so swiftly and smoothly is little short of miraculous. Zafón's real virtues are more old-fashioned ones, though: what makes this novel so irresistibly readable is the emotional energy generated by the ups and downs of a big and varied cast of memorable characters. Daniel's ingenuous ardour makes him the perfect narrator for a journey of discovery; his friend Fermín is an engagingly eccentric guide to the secret history of his beloved Barcelona. The ancestral tribulations of Carax's adoptive Aldaya family are genuinely heartrending, for all their gothic extrava gance; the menace of Fumero transcends his unmistakable aura of grand guignol.
In short, all the characters live. Literary ingenuity isn't something Zafón wants to indulge in for its own sake; neither are his efforts geared towards some wholesale deconstruction of "reality". The undoubted flaws in The Shadow of the Wind do, ironically, stem from an overvaluing of words at the expense of things. A trivial yet revealing mannerism is the frequency with which a character reads some book or other deep into the night, enthralled, only for the sun to come up on cue as the last page is reached: the whole universe, it seems, is at the service of the act of reading.
More problematic is a tendency to daub on description without too much thought for either precision or consistency. Scarcely have we been told that the early-morning city is awakening "like a watercolour slowly coming to life" than we're being conducted via "a vault of blue haze" and then a narrow alley that is "more of a scar than a street" to "what seemed the carcass of a palace". From painting through architecture to anatomy in a matter of moments: so rich a metaphor mix may be heady stuff line by line, but its effect is fairly quickly to befuddle the reader. The habit of allusiveness also inclines Zafón towards indulgence in his attitude to cliché: there are too many enigmatic smiles and impenetrable gazes here by half.
Overall, however, he does not come across as a writer wrapped up in literary theory: his conviction of the importance of literature in real life comes shining through. If the career of Julián Carax illustrates the destructive effects of the artistic personality, his story exemplifies, too, the liberating power of the imagination. Walk down any street in Zafón's Barcelona and you'll glimpse the shades of the past and the secrets of the present, inscribed alike in the city's material fabric and the lives of its citizens. Exuberant, larger than life in their tragedies as in their joys and desires, they are irrepressible: no dictatorship can keep them down.
Michael Kerrigan's Voices from the Trail: The Lewis and Clark Expedition is published by Saraband this autumn. | <urn:uuid:d1340be2-0125-45e4-b6d9-e14e08c449d2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2004/jun/26/featuresreviews.guardianreview25 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962753 | 1,282 | 1.632813 | 2 |
Film, like the railways, is one of those industries that a few years ago nobody would have predicted would get a new lease of life, and how! through technological evolution.
Up to digital, film had reached the limits of what it was capable. The movie 2001: A Space Odyssey still seems quite effective today, but the end of film effects are limited and seem like something out of the ark.
I was talking to a young person recently about how wonderful it was when self-recording was first available. We could record a TV programme or film on TV and watch it again and again at our leisure. A revolution! To pause live recordings and replay while recording something seemed like complete fantasy. | <urn:uuid:fc3aa62c-a45d-4970-8520-32d11f4d9298> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.mailbigfile.com/hot-topics/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.980077 | 142 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Chico High School Cheerleaders 'Bullied' for Causing Football Penalty
A sportsmanship penalty given to the Chico High School football team during the Almond Bowl has reportedly led to some bullying and harassment of cheerleaders by football players.
During the Almond Bowl game between Chico High School and Pleasant Valley High School, referees determined that the Chico High School cheerleaders remained on the field too long between quarters, and gave the team a 10-yard penalty.
According to administrators, the cheerleaders were allowed a minute on the field between the first and second quarters of the game to cheer, and once the minute was up, they needed to get off the field.
But Teresa Tindill, one of the Chico High's cheearleading coaches, disputes that assertion, telling KRCR News Channel 7 the team was told when they were supposed to perform, but not for how long. She says the squad was surprised when they were ordered off the field, and were not sure what was happening.
It was in the ensuing confusion that controversy arose. The parent of two Chico High School cheerleaders issued a public statement in the Chico Enterprise-Record that the Chico High School Football Coach Jason Alvistur screamed expletives at the girls.
The parent, Amy Harris-Meyer, also mentioned that several football players attempted to spit on the cheerleaders as they left the field.
Chico High School Principal Jim Hanlon said that the accusations Harris-Mayer made were untrue, but he said that there had been bullying going on following the game.
Hanlon said that the football coach had used no profanity and that the players did not spit at the girls but he did have to invite a hand full of players into his office along with their parents.
Hanlon also said that one football player had been suspended because of the bullying and harassment.
You can read Amy Harris-Mayer's letter below:
In response to Chico High School Principal Jim Hanlon's letter, "Cheerleaders not to blame for penalty," what Hanlon failed to address or take responsibility for is the poor conduct of his varsity football coach and the deplorable behavior of a few players. That's what he should be embarrassed about, not the resulting penalty flag due to his staff's lack of communication.
Hanlon has totally missed the point and seems to be ignoring the real issue — bullying.
As a parent of two Chico High School cheerleaders, I've seen firsthand how devastated and embarrassed the girls were when Chico High School varsity football coach Jason Alvistur screamed "get the (expletive) off the field" at the girls. His lack of leadership and professionalism sparked a barrage of insults to be hurled at the girls from players on his team. Players called them "stupid (expletive)" and tried to spit on them as they left the field. I'd like Hanlon to be "ultimately responsibility" for that "embarrassing situation."
Furthermore, I'm disappointed that Hanlon chose to make a public statement via a letter to the editor before he addressed the issue with the many parents who have asked to meet with him both personally and privately to discuss the matter.
— Amy Harris-Mayer, Chico
Copyright 2013 by KRCRTV.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. | <urn:uuid:22029d13-a254-4459-83f2-061ffe3946e2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.krcrtv.com/news/local/Chico-High-School-Cheerleaders-Bullied-for-Causing-Football-Penalty/-/14322302/17555838/-/view/print/-/9u35p7/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.983402 | 699 | 1.632813 | 2 |
How Do I Use Florida Weave?
Florida Weave is without a doubt the best support method I've found for tomatoes (and a couple of other things). If you do a search, you'll find some descriptions out there, but few of them go into enough detail to do more then confuse. I hope this description is a little more thorough.
The basic idea is to make a row of tomatoes, held upright between lines of heavy twine. It's what a lot of commercial growers use, because it's fast, easy to set up and maintain, and very effective. And once you have the basic idea, it's easy even for a novice.
What you'll need is several sturdy stakes and a large ball of durable twine. I use the fenceposts commonly used for standard yard fencing, called T-posts (their cross-section gives them the name), available at any hardware store for a dollar and a half apiece; as for how many, take the number of plants in the row, divide the number in half, and add one. So for six plants, you'll need half of six (3) plus one (4) posts.
A. Space the tomatoes as you normally would; I use three feet apart, but I've known people to do it as close as 18 inches in excellent soil. Drive one stake for every two tomatoes, with stakes on the end. Angle the end stakes outward to take the weight.
B. Using heavy twine, tie a line about 8-10" above ground level on an end stake. Run the line on one side of the next two tomato plants (the front side), then to the back side of the post; take a turn around the post, and run on the front side of the next two plants. Pull it as tight as you can.
C. When you get to the end, return the opposite way: the back side of the plants, the front side of the posts. This pulls each line in toward the center, sandwiching the plants; if you don't "weave" it this way, the plants will tend to lean out more.
Run lines every 8-10" high as the plants grow, and tuck new vines in every few days. No pruning is necessary, though I tend to prune shoots below the first line of twine to keep things a little neater around ground level. As the season progresses, the twine will stretch a little, so be prepared to take up the slack in some way -- many people take a small stick and "tourniquet" the line to keep it taut.
Even if you fall behind a bit (who doesn't?) all is not lost. If the plants have grown a foot above the last line, add another line and wrestle all the growth into the top line, then start tucking farther down. The vines don't have to be inside every line, just enough of them to keep the plant from flopping around. As time goes on, you may very well run out of pole, too; just let them fold over somewhere past the top, then begin tucking them into the weave wherever they come down. You'll have a wall of foliage by season's end, but that was sort of the idea.
I haven't come upon a real deal-breaker with this method yet. It's cheap, as you can recycle posts (you can even find used ones sometimes, and save having to buy them) and all you need every season is twine; it's easy to store, since you can compost the twine and stack the posts. The plants grow up off the ground and fruit is easy to find and pick, but there's enough foliage to prevent sunscald. The most irritating thing is keeping the lines taut, but even that gets more routine with practice, and it's an occasional task, not constant.
All in all, I prefer it to the common alternatives of staking or using cages made of concrete reinforcing wire. If you have any questions, drop me a line. | <urn:uuid:0d572c67-0ad4-4f79-9a41-3125f15fc5eb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.foogod.com/~torquill/barefoot/weave.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966178 | 830 | 1.726563 | 2 |
Oberlin College Hate ‘Incidents’ Force Closure
Hate incidents at Oberlin College caused all classes to be canceled on Monday. A “Day of Solidarity” was held in lieu of academic courses. The latest in a series of disturbing occurrences occurred early Monday morning, prompting the decision for an emergency closure of the Ohio college.
An individual wearing a hood and a robe showed up near Oberlin College’s Afrikan Heritage House, sparking fear on the campus. Hate incidents began last month and included vandalism on the campus, the New York Times notes.
Both security officers and local law enforcement agents are currently investigating the Oberlin College hate incidents. A statement about the class cancellations from Oberlin College President Marvin Krislov reads:
“The sighting of the person on Monday, in addition to the series of other hate-related incidents on campus, has precipitated out decision to suspend formal classes and all non-essential activities for today and gather for a series of discussions on the challenging issues that have faced our community in recent weeks.”
In February, multiple anti-gay and racist message were found around the Ohio college campus. The Oberlin College hate incidents reportedly fly in sharp contrast with the traditional “liberal political leanings” of the school.
College spokesman Scott Vargo had this to say about the hate crimes on campus:
“I’m not sure why anyone is doing it, but those actions have made people uneasy and say we need to come together to discuss this.”
Vargo also noted that the sighting of a person in a hooded costume was reported by a student, according to CBS News. The description of the costume the person was allegedly wearing sounds a lot like a KKK outfit. The report given to the school claimed the person seen near the Afrikan Heritage House was adorned in a white hood and a white robe.
The college town is located approximately 30 miles southwest of Cleveland. The school has a student body of about 2,800 students. A guide to colleges publication typically cites Oberlin as one of the most “gay-friendly” and activist fueled campuses in America.
Oberlin College is regarded as one of the first universities in the United States to teach both men and women together. The school was founded in 1833. The northern Ohio campus was reportedly a significant stop on the underground railroad before the start of the Civil War. Abolitionists reportedly congregated in the area to help runaway slaves escape to freedom in Canada.
What do you think about the Oberlin College hate incidents? | <urn:uuid:734abe76-2e87-46b8-9973-0029fe7eb00c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.inquisitr.com/555722/oberlin-college-hate-incidents-force-closure/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96893 | 531 | 1.796875 | 2 |
Credit Report Scams
In addition to being concerned about identity theft and protecting your personal and financial information, it is also important for consumers to be wary of potential credit report scams. Scammers will often claim that they can remove outdated or inaccurate information in order to "fix" your bad credit reports. In some instances they will claim to be able to "erase" the information.
Should I pay someone to "fix" or "erase" my bad credit report?
How long does information stay on my credit report? What can be removed?
What should consumers do to protect themselves?
What are the three major credit bureaus that offer free credit reports?
Only by contacting these credit bureaus or www.annualcreditreport.com, the official site, can you obtain your free credit report. Other websites may claim to provide a free credit report or credit score, but be alert to the ploy requiring enrollment in a credit monitoring program. Remember, the Federal Trade Commission definesfree as without obligation. Be alert and read all of the terms and conditions.
Does viewing my credit report or credit score lower it?
According to www.myFICO.com, the Fair Isaac Corporation website, when a consumer obtains a credit report from an authorized credit report organization (Experian, Equifax, Trans Union, www.annualcreditreport.com, www.myFICO.com ) the consumer's credit score will not be affected.
Any permissible purpose inquiry by a business, or obtaining demographic "header" section information, or an inquiry by the consumer, does not affect the credit report. When a business updates the credit report with the on-time or delinquent credit history, that new information changes the report and can change the score to a higher or lower score to reflect the positive or negative status.
FICO, using internal codes, realizes when a consumer is shopping for credit, looking to purchase a car, or making inquiries on mortgage lender rates. If a consumer does this form of shopping with a 30 day window, the FICO model treats it as one inquiry rather than several requests for several mortgage loans, and subsequently it does not affect the credit for multiple taps.
What are the components that make up a credit score?
The credit score called a FICO score stands for Fair Isaac and Company. The company calculates the proprietary score based on credit history and issues the credit score to potential creditors, employers, insurance companies, etc.
Each element is weighed on a 100% total. Payment history accounts for 35% of the score. Credit utilization, (or how much of the available credit has been used or are resources "maxed out?") is 30% of the total. The length of your credit history (years or months) is given 15%, and what type of recent credit you have obtained is given 10%. Finally, the mix of credit (mortgage, car loan, student loans, quantity of credit cards, or store cards) is weighed at 10%. FICO owns a proprietary scoring system using these percentages and ranking the results between 850 and less than 600.
A FICO score between 760 and 850 is considered Excellent; a score from 700 and 759 is Good; while Fair is 620 to 699, and Poor is less than 620. Other companies use a similar model but FICO is most common.
How can I improve my credit score?
The credit score is derived from the information contained in the credit report by Trans Union, Equifax, or Experian. Excessive inquiries to obtain additional credit cards or store cards can lower the score. Additionally, credit account delinquencies impede your profile. Delinquencies can turn into defaults which may be submitted to a collection agency or to a small claims court. These can lower your credit score. | <urn:uuid:c9f3f8a3-3208-46b1-8465-8b11bf2e4a7c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.attorneygeneral.gov/consumers.aspx?id=2110 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933483 | 772 | 1.796875 | 2 |
Obama Echoes Carter Speech: America’s Soft
September 30, 2011 by Sam Rolley
Many people have compared the Barack Obama Presidency to that of President Jimmy Carter over the past few years; Obama has now made a statement that seems to echo Carter.
Obama said to a Florida television station, “This is a great, great country that had gotten a little soft and we didn’t have that same competitive edge that we needed over the last couple of decades.”
Obama’s solution to American “softness” is to “get back on track” by passing his $447 billion jobs bill immediately. While he was critical in his speech, the President did compliment America’s youths and said that the country will recover from economic troubles with the help of education and innovative thinking with the help of the government.
According to The Daily Caller, Obama’s speech echoes the sentiment of a Carter speech given in July 1979 that declared, “…in a nation that was proud of hard work, strong families, close-knit communities and our faith in God, too many of us now tend to worship self-indulgence and consumption.” The speech, though never including the term, became known by many Americans as the “malaise speech.” Carter’s solution to “get back on track” during a time when the country was plagued by rising energy costs and massive inflation was to find a solution to the energy crises through new sources of fuel. | <urn:uuid:6e9d80ed-44fc-4d6c-a414-970904137879> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://personalliberty.com/2011/09/30/obama-echoes-carter-speech-americas-soft/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981429 | 315 | 1.695313 | 2 |
Leicester - An Exciting, Diverse, and Welcoming City
Leicester has all the excitement and activities of a large city, but still keeps a friendly and welcoming atmosphere. The city is one of the most vibrant and diverse in the UK with a varied city life to explore and enjoy.
Leicester is located right at the heart of the UK - making travel to other parts of the country easy. There are direct rail links to London, Birmingham, Nottingham, Sheffield, and Cambridge. East Midlands International Airport is only a short distance away and there are bus and train connections from the airport to Leicester city centre.
Culture and the Arts
Leicester has undergone a cultural renaissance in the last ten years.
The opening of the state-of-the-art Curve theatre has brought national theatre productions and other performances to the city as well as providing a new home for local and regional performance groups. Nearby Phoenix Square is a base for alternative arts including cinema and new media performances.
Leicester hosts a number of festivals, including the annual Diwali celebrations which attract over 35,000 people and are the largest outside India.
Shopping and Entertainment
Leicester city centre has everything for the dedicated shopper from large department stores to independent boutiques.
Highcross shopping centre features a huge range of stores, cafes, restaurants, and a twelve-screen cinema. Fosse Park has many larger retail outlet stores while for bargains and fresh produce, Leicester market is one of the UK's largest.
Further afield Belgrave Road is at the heart of Leicester's south Asian community and is known for its Asian jewellers and stylish curry houses.
Parks and Open Spaces
Despite its size, Leicester is a remarkably green city.
There are a huge number of parks and open spaces throughout the city and these are popular throughout the year with walkers, joggers, and families. The surrounding countryside is also within easy reach with local sights including Foxton Locks and Rutland Water.
For those looking for some serenity, the University Botanic Gardens are a green oasis close to the main student village.
One of the UK's Most Historic Cities
Leicester has been an important urban centre since Roman times.
The Jewry Wall Museum is built around the remains of the Roman bath house while nearby you will find the city's cathedral and the Guildhall which dates back to the 1300s and is one of the country's best preserved timber-framed halls.
The New Walk Museum and Gallery is close to the University and its dinosaur collection is always popular with children.
Find a PhD or MPhil in Your Subject
Learn more about why we are the natural choice for the next generation of world-class researchers - find a PhD or MPhil in your subject. | <urn:uuid:26840900-684a-4a57-ab0e-8a05b43132e9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www2.le.ac.uk/study/research/research-at-leicester/city/leicester | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942652 | 571 | 1.625 | 2 |
Antony Polonsky was born in Johannesburg, South Africa and studied history and political science at the University of the Witwatersrand. He went to England on a Rhodes Scholarship in 1961 and read modern history at Worcester College and St Antony's College. In 1970, he was appointed lecturer in International History at the London School of Economics and Political Science and in 1989 was awarded the title of Professor. In 1992 he was appointed Visiting Professor of East European Jewish History at Brandeis University, Waltham, MA where, in 1993, he was granted the Walter Stern Hilborn Chair in Judaic and Social Studies and was Chair of the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies from 1995 to 1998. In 1999, he was appointed Albert Abramson Professor of Holocaust Studies, an appointment held jointly at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and Brandeis University. He has also been a visiting professor at the University of Warsaw, the Institute for the Human Sciences, Vienna and the University of Cape Town, Skirball visiting fellow at the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies, Senior Associate Member of Saint Antony's College, Oxford and Honorary Research Fellow at University College, London.
He is the author of Politics in Independent Poland (Oxford,1972); The Little Dictators. A History of Eastern Europe since 1918 (Routledge, 1975, Japanese edition, 1993) and The Great Powers and the Polish Question 1941-1945 (LSE, 1976) and co-author of The History of Poland since 1863 (Cambridge, 1981, paperback, 1983, 1985) and The Beginnings of Communist Rule in Poland (Routledge, 1981). He is the editor of numerous books including Abraham Lewin's A Cup of Tears: A Diary of the Warsaw Ghetto (Blackwell, 1988, paperback, 1990, French edition, 1991, Japanese edition, 1992) which was awarded the Joseph and Edith Sunlight Literary Prize in 1989 and the prize of the Jewish Book Council of America in the Holocaust section in 1990, ‘My Brother's Keeper?' Recent Polish Debates about the Holocaust (Routledge, 1990) and (with Joanna Michlic), The Neighbors Respond: The Controversy over the Jedwabne Massacre in Poland (Princeton University Press, 2004). He is also the editor of Polin: Studies in Polish Jewry of which twenty-two volumes have appeared. POLIN was the winner of the 1999 National Jewish Book Award in the category of Eastern European Studies and runner up in the same section in 2006. He has also published numerous articles on Polish and Jewish history. At present, he has just completed a three volume history of the Jews in Poland and Russia from 1350 to the present day. Volumes 1 and 2 have been published and Volume 3 is with the publishers.
Dr. Polonsky was a founder and is now vice-president of the Institute for Polish-Jewish Studies in Oxford and of the American Association for Polish-Jewish Studies, Cambridge, MA. He was for six years a member of the Board of Deputies of British Jews and was a member of its Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial Committee and Chairman of the Academic and Educational sub-committee of this Committee. He is an editor of The Library of Holocaust Testimonies. He is an honorary research fellow in the Department of Hebrew and Jewish Studies at University College, London, a member of the International Advisory Board of the Mordekhai Anieliewicz Centre for Jewish Studies at the University of Warsaw, of the Jewish University in Moscow, of the International Advisory Council of Sefer, the Center for University Teaching of Jewish Civilization in Moscow, of the Editorial Advisory Board of the Simon Dubnow Institute Yearbook and of the Editorial Board of Central Europe. He is a member of the Executive Committee of the National Polish American-Jewish American Task Force and an Associate of the Ukrainian Research Institute of Harvard University. He is joint chair of the committee to publish in English the post-war testimonies collected by the Jewish Historical Commission in Poland. He was for many years a member of the Inter-university film consortium in London and was the producer and director of a 55 minute documentary on Fascism. He was also a consultant for the documentary series, The Struggles for Poland. He has appeared frequently on radio and television as a commentator on Polish and Jewish matters. In 1999, he was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland and in 2006 the Rafael Scharf award for outstanding achievement in preserving and making known the heritage of Polish Jewry. In 2007 he was awarded the biannual Gantz-Zahler Prize in Nonfiction Publishing by the Foundation of Jewish Culture and in 2008 the Oskar Halecki prize of the Polish American Historical Association for contributing to the understanding the Polish experience in the United States. In 2010 he was awarded an honorary doctorate at Warsaw University.
Download Polonsky's podcast from the Voices on Antisemitism series. | <urn:uuid:42e9d2b8-ed7c-49a0-be2c-1bb5a55c9a33> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.brandeis.edu/departments/nejs/faculty/polonsky.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961649 | 1,010 | 1.71875 | 2 |
September 22, 2000
- The California Wellness Foundation. The California Wellness Foundation Annual Report. 1998. Woodland Hills, CA: The California Wellness Foundation. (E.30.04 S)
Abstract: This annual report of the California Wellness Foundation discusses the five program areas which receive the greatest support: community health; population health improvement; work and health; teenage pregnancy prevention; and violence prevention and the efforts toward support of those programs in the current fiscal year. The appendices include a review of the grants awarded during the fiscal year; a statement of financial position of the California Wellness Foundation; and a list of the Board of Directors and staff. The 1998 report reviews the first five years of the Violence Prevention Initiative.
- San Diego Safe Kids Coalition. Unintentional Injuries in San Diego County: A Report and Action Plan. Executive Summary. 2000. San Diego, CA: San Diego County Safe Kids Coalition. (E.30.02 S)
Abstract: Under the leadership of Children's Hospital and Health Center, the San Diego Safe Kids Coalition has produced this report to improve understanding of unintentional childhood injuries and deaths and to advance an action plan for prevention efforts. The Coalition collaborated with the County of San Diego, Health and Human Services Agency, Division of Emergency Medical Services in order to analyze the best available data. The complete report is available on CD-ROM and is intended as a reference tool and starting point for priority setting and community planning. The complete report provides data on injuries and deaths caused by the following unintentional mechanisms: Transportation; Household; Drowning; and Sports and Recreation. The report does not include information on injuries and deaths that are caused by intentional mechanisms such as homicide, suicide, and assault. This Executive Summary provides highlights from the complete data report and recommendations for actions for 2000-2003.
- Capitol'izing On Our Resources: 1999 Maternal and Child Health Conference. Sacramento, CA: California Department of Health Services, Maternal and Child Health, 1999. (E.30.12 B)
Abstract: This notebook contains materials from the California MCH conference held May 25-26, 1999 in Sacramento, CA.
- McArthur DL, Peek-Asa C, Kraus JF. Injury hospitalizations before and after the 1994 Northridge, California earthquake. American Journal of Emergency Medicine 2000; 18(4):361-366. (E.73 S)
Abstract: This study compared hospital-admitted injuries during the 14 days after the Northridge, California, earthquake of January 17, 1994, with hospital-admitted injuries during the preceding 16 days at the same facilities. Seventy-eight hospitals providing emergency care in Los Angeles County were screened; 16 were identified as having admitted at least one person for an earthquake-related injury. Retrospective chart reviews of hospitalized injuries for all of January 1994 were conducted at those facilities. The Northridge earthquake resulted in 138 injuries severe enough to require hospitalization. On the day of the earthquake, such injuries were 74% more frequent than usual overall. Some hospitals experienced as many as five times the number of injury admissions seen in the days preceding the event. The increase in caseload was short-lived, however; injury admissions tended to return to normal levels within two days after the quake. Previous reported estimates of the overall number of severe injuries caused by the Northridge earthquake appear to be exaggerated.
- Bouton PB, Fraser M. Local health departments and GIS: the perspective of the National Association of County and City Health Officials. Journal of Public Health Management and Practice 1999; 5(4):33-41. (E.01.06 S)
Abstract: This article provides thoughts about Geographic Information Systems (GIS) from the perspective of the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO). The authors describe a 1998 NACCHO project to identify innovative local health department (LHD) applications of GIS to prevent environmental pollution. They provide highlights from 2 of the LHD case studies conducted as part of this pollution prevention project. They also point out several other NACCHO activities where GIS has been of increasing importance and discuss the challenges that need to be addressed for GIS software, data, and methods to become a standard part of LHD community health planning and prevention effectiveness efforts.
- Grunbaum JA, Kann L, Williams BI, Kinchen SA, Collins JL, Baumler ER et al. Suveillance for characteristics of health education among secondary schools - School Health Education Profiles, 1998. CDC Surveillance Summaries, MMWR 49[SS-8], 1-44. 2000. (E.68 S)
Abstract: The School Health Education Profiles monitor characteristics of health education in middle or junior high schools and senior high schools in the US. The Profiles are school-based surveys conducted by state and local education agencies. This report summarizes results from 36 state surveys and 10 local surveys conducted among representative samples of school principals and lead health education teachers. During the study period, most schools in states and cities that conducted Profiles required health education in grades 6-12. Of these, a median of 91.0% of schools in states and 86.2% of schools in cities taught a separate health education course. The median percentage of schools in each state and city that tried to increase student knowledge in selected topics (i.e., prevention of tobacco use, alcohol and other drug use, pregnancy, HIV infection, other sexually transmitted diseases, violence, or suicide, dietary behaviors and nutrition, and physical activity and fitness) was >73% for each of these topics. The median percentage of schools with a health education teacher who coordinated health education was 38.7% across states and 37.6% across cities. A median of 41.8% of schools across states and a median of 31.0% of schools across cities had a lead health education teacher with professional preparation in health and physical education, whereas a median of 6.0% of schools across states and 5.5% across cities had a lead health education teacher with professional preparation in health education only. A median of 19.3% of schools across states and 21.2% across cities had a school health advisory council. The median percentage of schools with a written school or school district policy on HIV infected students or school staff members was 69.7% across states and 84.4% across cities. Many middle/junior high schools and senior high schools require health education to help provide students with knowledge and skills needed for adoption of a healthy lifestyle. However, these schools might not be covering all important topic areas or skills sufficiently. The number of lead health education teachers who are academically prepared in health education and the number of schools with health advisory councils needs to increase.
- California Office of Traffic Safety, Roseville Fire Department. Buckle Up Baby: Child Passenger Safety Workshop. 2000. Roseville, CA: Roseville Fire Department. (E.52.02.06 S)
Abstract: The California Office of Traffic Safety and the Roseville, CA Fire Department sponsored this training session on April 7, 2000 on how to operate a child passenger safety fitting station. This folder includes handouts on convertible child safety seats, booster seats, and shoulder harnesses; a list of materials needed to operate a fitting station, and lists of CPS information and resources.
- Lueder GT. Air bag-associated ocular trauma in children. Ophthalmology 2000; 107(8):1472-1475. (E.52.02.04 S)
Abstract: The purpose of this study was to describe a series of children with ocular injuries related to air bag deployment. A retrospective, observational case series was conducted of 7 patients with ocular injuries sustained in motor vehicle accidents in which air bags were deployed. All patients had periocular contusions. Minor injuries included corneal abrasions (n = 5), superficial eyelid laceration (n = 1), and traumatic iritis (n = 2). Serious injuries included corneal edema (n = 1) and a traumatic hyphema with secondary glaucoma and cataract (n = 1). The latter patient required surgery. All other injuries resolved with medical therapy. All patients recovered normal visual acuity. Serious ocular injuries in children may result from air bag deployment. Most such injuries are minor and resolve without sequelae. It is recommended that infants and children travel in the rear seat of automobiles to minimize their risk of injury.
- U.S.Department of Transportation NHTSA, Federal Highway Administration. Walking Through the Years: Pedestrian Safety for the Older Adult (65+). DOT HS 809 083, 1-13. 2000. Washington, DC, U.S. Department of Transportation, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. (E.51.04 S)
Abstract: This consumer-level report describes the major pedestrian risks facing older (65+) adults and suggests actions that they can take to avoid accidents. It includes information from a variety of studies done over the years by NHTSA, FHWA, and other highway safety organizations.
- Eckenrode J, Ganzel B, Henderson CR, Jr., Smith E, Olds DL, Powers J et al. Preventing Child Abuse and Neglect With a Program of Nurse Home Visitation: The Limiting Effects of Domestic Violence. Journal of the American Medical Association 2000; 284(11):1385-1391. (E.47.02.04 S)
Abstract: Home visitation to families with young children has been promoted as an effective way to prevent child maltreatment, but few studies have examined the conditions under which such programs meet this goal. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether the presence of domestic violence limits the effects of nurse home visitation interventions in reducing substantiated reports of child abuse and neglect. Fifteen-year follow-up study of a randomized trial was conducted in a semirural community in upstate New York. Of 400 socially disadvantaged pregnant women with no previous live births enrolled consecutively between April 1978 and September 1980, 324 mothers and their children participated in the follow-up study. Families were randomly assigned to receive routine perinatal care, routine care plus nurse home visits during pregnancy only, or routine care plus nurse home visits during pregnancy and through the child's second birthday. The main outcome measure was the number of substantiated reports over the entire 15-year period involving the study child as subject regardless of the identity of the perpetrator or involving the mother as perpetrator regardless of the identity of the child abstracted from state records and analyzed by treatment group and level of domestic violence in the home as measured by the Conflict Tactics Scale. Families receiving home visitation during pregnancy and infancy had significantly fewer child maltreatment reports involving the mother as perpetrator or the study child as subject than families not receiving home visitation. The number of maltreatment reports for mothers who received home visitation during pregnancy only was not different from the control group. For mothers who received visits through the child's second birthday, the treatment effect decreased as the level of domestic violence increased. Of women who reported 28 or fewer incidents of domestic violence (79% of sample), home-visited mothers had significantly fewer child maltreatment reports during the 15-year period than mothers not receiving the longer-term intervention. However, this intervention did not significantly reduce child maltreatment among mothers reporting more than 28 incidents of domestic violence (21% of sample). The authors conclude that the presence of domestic violence may limit the effectiveness of interventions to reduce incidence of child abuse and neglect.
- Frederickson D. Maltreatment of children. Journal of Child and Family Nursing 1999; 2(6):393-401. (E.80.02 S)
Abstract: Child maltreatment is comprised of four major categories. These include physical abuse, physical neglect, sexual abuse, and emotional abuse. Theory development has evolved to explanatory models. Research has provided a great deal of insight into the recognition of child maltreatment, the factors that place children at risk for maltreatment, and the factors that place a caregiver at risk for becoming abusive. The emotional effects of child maltreatment on the child include shame, aggression, delinquency, criminology, depression, and symptoms consistent with posttraumatic stress disorder. Theoretical frameworks for child maltreatment intervention both with the child and the perpetrator have been developed. Theory testing and development should continue to provide direction for further intervention research
- McQuillan CT, Rodriguez J. Adolescent suicide: a review of the literature. Boletin Asociacion Medica de Puerto Rico 2000; 92(1-3):30-38. (E.90 S)
Abstract: This article reviews the literature on the risk factors related to teen suicide in the United States and Puerto Rico. Findings indicate the interplay of multifactors including depression, homosexuality--due to the hostility that is often experienced by the person--, sexual abuse, lack of coping, social and problem-solving skills stemming from family dysfunction, feelings of isolation and helplessness, contagion, gender differences, alcohol and drug abuse, psychiatric disorders, biological factors, as well as natural disasters. Included in this report are some statistics on the prevalence of suicide among teens and in the military
Back to "New This Week" Menu | <urn:uuid:b7979327-84f4-4cae-bb77-e35cde592dd8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.safetylit.org/week/2000/new000922.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944874 | 2,723 | 1.648438 | 2 |
Liberal Hollywood hates real wars, but adores the hell out of war movies. How else can you explain the sheer bulk of actors, stars and would-be stars, who flock to be a part of war movies no matter how small their part? Maybe it’s the need to feel “tough,” so you play the toughest guys out there — and who is tougher than the men who survived a “world war”? World War II, by default of America’s victory, is the favorite subject of war movies.
In 1998 alone, there were two “epic” World War II movies, Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan and Terrence Malick’s The Thin Red Line. Since starring in either men’s movie garners undeniable prestige (with Malick getting the upper hand since it seems he only makes a movie per decade), Hollywood would-be tough guys must have been going crazy trying to decide which movie to join. Spielberg got Tom Hanks and Malick got, well, everyone else.
The Thin Red Line is a World War II movie about the American struggle for control over Guadalcanal against a ragged Japanese force that had been pounded by the Marines, and now attempts to survive the onslaught of the Army. As the movie opens, we are in a faraway island in the Pacific, where AWOL soldiers Witt (Jim Caviezel) and another fellow soldier are living the good life — that is, until war appears and they’re forced back into action. Witt, we learn, is something of an optimist, which means he’s the only one as Charlie Company prepares for, and proceeds to, lay siege on an island where the Japanese are holed up, dug in, and ready to fight to the end. We follow Charlie Company, along with Witt and various other personalities, as they attempt to take the island and an important landing strip away from the Japanese.
There are only two ways to look at The Thin Red Line: you either love it or you despise it. I happen to adore the movie, not just for the sheer size of Terrence Malick’s balls, which he must have in order to throw us into the middle of a massive hillside battle and refusing to let go until an hour later, but also for the movie’s softer, lyrical, and poetic side. The movie is well over 2 hours and 30 minutes, but I could have sat through another hour, maybe two. The movie was that interesting and entertaining. Despite the sheer number of dead and dying soldiers (and the bodycount is staggering, as it probably was in real life), the movie isn’t a downer. I know, it’s hard to imagine, but this is true. Malick presents to us the horrors of war and how it poisons the human soul, but he doesn’t barrage us with just those morbid images.
In-between the bloody conflict between the Americans and Japanese, Malick, by way of cinematographer John Toll (Braveheart), gives us flashes of resilient mother nature via her living creations and a tranquil village of locals who continues to survive, blissfully ignorant of the world war going on around them. Each image of nature or the village tells us that despite all the chaos, all the carnage and death man is delivering on himself, nature will remain long after we are finished and gone. Also balancing out the morbid scenes of mankind’s self-destruction, Malick transfers us quite literally through the minds, and eyes, of the fighting men, and this makes the movie quite life affirming.
So who is the real star of The Thin Red Line? Is it the sweeping view of the lush green mountains or thick, fog-infested swamps? The mind-boggling and terrifying battle scenes that seems to go on forever and have no rhyme or reason? Or the characters themselves, as they reveal their most innermost secrets, hopes, dreams, aspirations, and dread to us in voiceover?
The characters of The Thin Red Line are many and this means you won’t remember everyone despite the famous cameos by many stars, but that hardly matters. The characters are only there to represent the varied shades of man’s emotions.
In Witt, we have eternal Optimism, the ability to see the good in everything despite the harshest of conditions. With Jack Bell (Ben Chaplin), an officer busted down to Private because he couldn’t stand to be away from his wife, we have Hope for the future. Sean Penn shows up as Sergeant Welsh, the Pessimism that most men turn to for sanctuary. In Adrien Brody’s Fife, the Fear of all things that keeps men alive. Elias Koteas (Staros) represents Conscience, the source of all guilt and sometimes strength. Nick Nolte rounds out the team of human emotions as Ambition, that dangerous of all emotions that can drive men into the ground but without which nothing is possible.
The Thin Red Line is not a movie for everyone. Some people will adore the heck out of it, as I do, and others will not care for it at all. The latter group don’t know what they’re missing.
Terrence Malick (director) / James Jones (novel), Terrence Malick (screenplay)
CAST: Sean Penn …. 1st Sergeant Edward Welsh
Adrien Brody …. Corporal Fife
James Caviezel …. Private Witt
Ben Chaplin …. Private Jack Bell
George Clooney …. Captain Charles Bosche
John Cusack …. Captain John Gaff | <urn:uuid:dd0407ec-29d8-4b7f-a06b-60041b28aa32> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.beyondhollywood.com/the-thin-red-line-1998-movie-review/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946154 | 1,179 | 1.625 | 2 |
LETTER: Save Lone Elk Park for Home, Community
One West St. Louis County resident through a letter to the editor would like all involved with the proposed closure of Lone Elk Park to be loyal to necessary green space. "Please reconsider Mr. Dooley."
I live in Winchester, MO.
For many years, Lone Elk Park has been an element of my idea of home and community. Whenever my parents came in town from Iowa, we would find time to drive through Lone Elk.
I always enjoy photographing the bison, elk, deer, geese, ducks and turkey. Few parks in Missouri offer the opportunity to observe our once common residents. Few, if any, have the heart-warming history. I love the idea that community members, young and old, raised money to bring Yellowstone elk here to join the lonely survivor. There are two bachelor bulls that keep each other company there away from the herd. I love to watch them. They seem so loyal to each other.
Lone Elk is not an island to itself but rather a link in a belt of green space that supports a healthy habitat for the county's non-human residents.
In addition to critters mentioned earlier, it supports the huge diversity of birds in North America's central migratory route. Castlewood, West Tyson are its neighbors. The new Route 66 is not too far away. Across 44, Beaumont Park extends this natural community. What do we possibly need more than this? More housing, more retail?
Where is our loyalty to our special places? I think it's there. It's hidden in our silent but regular vigils. Now, though, it's time to make noise to counter [St. Louis County Executive Director Charlie] Dooley's challenge to our priorities.
Mr. Dooley proposes the sale and/or closings of 19 county parks. (See Eureka-Wildwood Patch article: Lone Elk Park, Greensfelder Park and West County Tyson Park Among Those County May Close)
He explains that in these hard times, we need to make a sacrifice. Does Mr. Dooley understand that Missouri has gone to great expense to bring back both the elk and bison to Missouri, and here we have them for the enjoyment and education of our community right here in Lone Elk Park?
When this area served as an ammunitions storage site, the commanding officer ordered the local elk killed. One calf survived, thus the name, Lone Elk Park. State Representative George Weber suggested getting that calf some company. The young and old raised the money. Children sold share certificates! The elk were brought from Yellowstone. You want to throw away our history? Our legacy? Sell off a huge chunk of the hosting area for the thousands of birds that rest here during their migrations? When their numbers extinguish, then what?
Please reconsider Mr. Dooley. Letting go our history, our natural communities, to save cash that makes up a fraction of our yearly budget is giving up too much of our value we will never get back. | <urn:uuid:85f85011-1905-411f-8d9c-79eb88f83017> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://eureka-wildwood.patch.com/articles/letter-save-lone-elk-park-for-home-community | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953788 | 628 | 1.78125 | 2 |
[Soul, Things I want My Kids to Know, more excerpts from Zubaty's book: The Corporate Cult]
This is The Rude Guy, Rich Zubaty. The Paul Harvey of podcasting. The ideology assassin. The windshield wiper of fear. And this is NOT radio.
Last show we talked about Ideas… the importance of ideas… and, we started talking about Soul. Soulfullness.
So I’m gonna hop right in where we left off… reading some excerpts from my book, The Corporate Cult… From the Introduction, which is subtitled: Things I Want My Kids to Know.
IDEAS FLOW INTO ACTION and action flows into ideas via a process called “soul”. That’s right, a “process” called soul. A movement called “soul”. Your soul is not something that flies out of your body when you die. Your soul is the movement within you, the invisible surf within you, that swells back and forth, constantly re-shaping the shoreline between ideas and action. When you put an idea into action, or when you formulate an action into an idea, your soul is working – integrating the visible and invisible parts of life – consecrating that restless zone between ideas and action, land and sea. Soul is a holy and mysterious process, where physics and metaphysics cooperate, to make timeless ideas come alive in time.
Your soul is at once the most public, and most private, part of you. Soul is: In and out. Full and empty. Worldly and other-worldly. Private and social. For instance, let’s say you believe it’s important to help poor people, so you give a homeless woman a peanut butter sandwich. Here is your soul, the most private part of you, enacting this “idea”, this belief, in public – in the physical world. Your soul is where eternity touches down in real time. Your soul is the invisible part of you that completes your personality, and consummates your worldview, by integrating ideas with action.
According to James Hillman, “The soul reveals itself in its ideas. Ideas open the eye of the soul.” Do not make the mistake of thinking that your ideas are separate from your reality. In a fundamental way, your ideas ARE your reality. “Ideas are life. Ideas are inseparable from practical actions. Every theory we hold practices upon us.” unquote
But there’s a problem. Modern culture slaughters soul. The most obvious deficiency of contemporary techno man, and woman, is our lack of soul. Any native can see it, as clearly as if we were walking around with turtles on our heads. We patronize huge entertainment industries, devoted to cranking out fantasy adventures, and formulaic, emotional, roller coaster rides, but that is no substitute for soul. We are desperate just to feel “something” in our numbed souls. We stumble through a life devoid of useful ideas, entertaining ourselves to death, frustrated by everything, mad at the world, snappy, quick to rally behind the government when it launches cruise missiles, at impossibly distant nations, in the name of our national religion. Demo-cracy. What does this tell us? Somehow our soul is disturbed. Somehow the process of moving ideas into action, and action into ideas, is being interrupted. The link between the visible and the invisible is ruptured. The soul is crying out for attention.
If you believe in democracy, but you can’t find it anywhere in a society that’s supposed to be full of it – you feel disconnected. If you invest in “labor saving devices” and then watch your life speed up so fast that when any of them break down, you’re schedule flies apart – you feel shattered. You scramble to catch up, washing clothes in the bath tub, opening cans with screwdrivers, trashing Bill Gates, and damning all computers. If you’re having trouble finding steady work in an economy that’s supposed to be doing so fabulously well, according to Wall Street – you feel shamed. You feel worthless – like there’s something really wrong with you. This gap between ideas and action, this erosion of soul, has a common name. It’s called “stress”. Stress is what happens when our ideas don’t connect with our actions. Stress is what happens when our beliefs conflict with the truth outside our window. Stress enters, where soul is lost.
And the bad part is, all of us are seething with a perpetual, subliminal level of stress, and we’re not even aware of it. We know what they teach us in school is useless. We know TV is nothing but gossip. We know what politicians yak about is unimportant to our lives. [And that what they AVOID yaking about, IS important to our lives.] So we become apathetic voters, convinced that no matter which party gets in, nothing really changes. We grow cynical. We begin to think we’re stupid, that we don’t understand, that there’s something wrong with us. Well guess what? We’re not stupid. There’s NOthing wrong with us. There’s something wrong with THEM.
They’re lying to us, withholding ideas from us, willfully eroding our souls to advance corporate agendas. They plunge us into an environment charged with stress where nothing makes sense, and convince us it’s normal. “Coping” with stress has become the objective of modern therapy, instead of eliminating the mad commercial causes of it. Are we just flat tires to be patched up over and over again, or is it finally time to fix the road? We pride ourselves on being so “efficient”, and sneer at older cultures – where people live longer and worry less – because their phones don’t work as well as ours. It’s laughable. Humans were not designed to live like we do.
Stress is the destruction of soul. Stressed people, people with damaged souls, are easily manipulated. If we feel rotten enough about our jobs, and rotten enough about our lives, it becomes child’s play for the corporate/government/media overlords to “build up our self-esteem” – inflate our ego-balloons – by enlisting our support for their wars against genocide, or their wars to preserve democracy, or their bombing to bring peace, or their invasions against Islamic “madmen”.
Older nations purse their lips and shake their heads. They’ve seen all this before – hundreds of years ago. It’s pretty sick stuff. And pathetically childish to anyone with a large view of history. French peasants had to take to the streets to pull off the French Revolution. Russian peasants had to take to the streets to pull off the Russian Revolution. Americans had to take to the streets to stop the Vietnam War. Social change doesn’t happen any differently under Democracy – they just tell us it does. And we BELIEVE them????? How stupid can we be? If we wanna stop a war, if we want systemic change, if we want a new president, we gotta take it to the streets. National strike. It’s the only thing that works.
Stress is the product of damaged souls. Damaged souls are produced by rupturing the link between ideas and actions. It’s time to close the gap between ideas and action. It’s time to increase our reservoirs of soul. It’s time to eliminate the causes of stress.
There are a few things you can do to short-circuit the brainwashing. Yelling at the TV helps me. At least I’m venting. I’m not bottling up their deceptions inside me, like shaken soda cans, trying to explode out my ears. Read. Read all kinds of stuff. Get off the internet and read books. History books. Science books. Not novels. Not New Age psychic drivel. And be cynical. Be critical. Don’t believe anything, that anyone, who works for a corporation tells you. They’re the enemy. They’ve been brainwashed with corporate mission statements. They actually believe that Archer Daniels Midland is feeding the world, and that Dow Chemical does great things. They work for an alien army of invaders… And whenever someone gets it in their head, that becoming a lawyer is gonna make them happy, take three steps back, and run. Get as far away from them as you can. You are living among aliens. Strange creatures with programmed minds, who look like people, but think like ants – holding hands and waving their antennas, as they march off the cliffs of history, singing about “freedom” and “democracy” – smashing apart on the rocks below.
This is your soul at stake here. No one can save it but you. Don’t believe things that aren’t true. That sounds simple enough, but in a society as flooded with distortions, and misinformation, as ours, we must be especially vigilant. Suspect anything, anything at all, that is formulated to stroke your ego. If it makes you feel good, it’s probably bad! You won’t hear that from a female talk show host. If it makes you feel good, it’s probably bad! If it sounds wrong, or makes you uncomfortable, there’s probably some truth to it. This is one of the main things men know that women don’t. If it feels good it’s probably bad. It’s just another manipulation. Another glorious, ego-enhancing summons to fight another one of THEIR wars. Does childbirth “feel” good. No. Not until it’s over. But it’s worth the pain. “Feeling good” is a carrot dangled in front of our face, by a society that is incapable of making us “feel good”, and which, in fact, is doing everything possible to keep us disturbed and malleable – because that’s how it can control us. The developed world would be transformed overnight if people regained possession of their own souls.
More than anything else I want my kids to be on guard against loss of soul – in their own lives – and in the lives of the people they befriend, and ultimately come to depend on. A life lived without meaningful ideas, is a subhuman existence. Surrounding yourself with dullards drags you down into a pit of truisms, and soundbites, and pop psychology, and hate radio, that rots your brain and saps your soul. You find yourself constantly on the defensive, trying to explain your purest insights, and most vibrant intuitions, to a squabbling gang of geese, who slurp their ideas off the tube, or Rush Limbaugh, and attack you if you disrupt their fantasies.
Living with a crippled soul is like trying to drive a car with bullfrogs for an engine. It makes a lot of noise, but it doesn’t go anywhere. A person with diminished soul becomes a dull-eyed amphibian, snapping at flies, preyed upon by the eagles of media, and corporate advertising. A person with damaged soul has no ability to step beneath life, and view it from below – to see how it’s put together from the bottom up. She is simply caught up in the latest gossip and newest fad, working her way up a pecking order designed by clucking fashion hens, in the chic henhouses of New York or Paris or San Francisco.
Soul is down, not up. Soul is not sparkling comets and flights of ecstasy. Soul is earthworms and slime and submarine caverns. Soul is not the bright light of knowledge and information. Soul is using your imagination to see in the dark. Soul is mud – the black stew of carbon nutrients, and dead things, where flower seeds germinate, and root, and then thrust upward to bloom. Soul is a slimy trail to the source of things – an earthquake between your ears – a lens aimed at the invisible world. Soul is having x-ray eyes, seeing right through soil and tree roots, from the bottom up. Soul is snorkeling on your belly in one foot of water, fondling starfish and sea worms and other ugly creatures which populate a universe that begins a mere stone’s throw away, from the comfort of dry land.
Soul is a sea turtle with a hard shell and moist eyes, diving on the outer reefs of our consciousness, snapping at flashing, darting schools of thought, crawling onto the warm sand to lay its eggs. And we are the island where this sea turtle of our soul, comes to dive for inspiration, and reproduce its ideas. It needs us and we need it. We are, every one of us, a mythic atoll, an island in the mind, where the forces of sea and land, ideas and action, wash back and forth across the sand. We are living breathing messengers of the cultural myths we inherited. We are walking talking energy fields, where the greatest super nova, and the tiniest electron, pull up a chair to drink coffee, and argue physics. We are charged with the superhuman task of trying to make sense out of everything – but we can’t do it! The world is too big. So we invent mythologies to hold the visible and invisible parts of life together, at the same time, in the same brain. We concoct metaphors to fashion a delicate link between our inner and outer worlds. And we enlist our reptilian souls, to paddle back and forth between the two, plodding through the muck, holding its breath in high surf, dragging its tail through chaos and disorder. This scuba dive in a mud puddle, this swim with the sharks, this juggling act with wet eggs and flippers, is the essential task of soul.
It’s hard enough to begin with, but for modern man the situation has become doubly precarious. Our islands have become radioactive. The waters where our sea turtle swims, are polluted with plastic bags and murky ideas. Our modern myths have become deadly to soul. Contemporary culture has much to say about technology, but little to say about soul. Consumer culture is a bona fide enemy of soul. It cannot thrive in a soulful society. Only a society frantic with fear and stress, hooked on the endlessly proliferating distractions of sense pleasures, ignorant of the deeper requirements of soul, would work so hard, and buy so much, as we. The average American enjoys more comfort and convenience than did the average king 200 years ago, and yet compulsively we seek more. There’s never enough. We “can’t get no satisfaction”. Consumer culture works intently, and relentlessly to strip us of soul – so we’ll buy more and more stuff.
A person with no soul is on sale to the world. The inducement to “be yourself” is meaningless in a society, where everyone gets their ideas off TV. Legions of entrepreneurs devote their lives to inventing some product or service that can be marketed by a large corporation. A new technology, a better kind of soap, a seamy novel, a sci-fi movie – whatever. They’re all the same thing: products designed to be licensed and sold by large corporations. Our perception of self-worth is determined by whether some large corporation will BUY us – or not. It used to be the Church which decided, whether or not we were good enough, to enter the “kingdom of heaven” – that promised land of peace and security and freedom from worry. Now it’s huge corporations that dangle the “keys to heaven” in our faces. What a sorry existential stew.
We’re letting the marketing departments of corporations decide whether we have mass appeal or not, because the only products they can effectively promote and distribute are products with MASS appeal. They have no facility for handling crafts, handmade items, or original thinking. Corporations are too big. Homegrown items – whether tomatoes, honey or books – can no longer find a place on the store shelves. A toy maker with two good toys, a baker with two good breads, a cowboy who mixed up an excellent barbecue sauce, are all told they must come out with 35 items in their product line, because that’s what corporations can sell. And if you can’t somehow get corporate money behind you, you can’t get your goods to market. So much for the “free market”. There’s more freedom of opportunity in any morning market in Bolivia. And yet we believe the rest of the world is so horribly oppressed, and we are so marvelous. Guess what? Walking into Wal-Mart is any spiritual adept’s definition of a trip to hell – millions of bright cheap things, mass produced by corporations, on sale to the world – devoid of soul. Wal-Mart robs YOU of soul. Wal-Mart robs the WORLD of soul.
And what I wanna know is, who cares about mass appeal? Every person is looking for some way to distinguish themselves FROM the masses. By definition, mass appeal restricts original thought and creativity. New ideas, brave ideas, are not going to be instantly applauded, in a society informed by television, and brainwashed with consumerism. Yes, we have a great variety of new and amusing products, but we have very few options for how to live our lives. We can either work for this corporation, or that corporation… or become Fringe Dwellers, living in the cracks of society.
You can drive from one end of America to the other, and every place looks the same… the same lousy strip-mall architecture, the same cheesy corporate signs. Our entertainment industry feeds our cravings for relief from this “sameness”, by cranking out “mythic” stories about freedom, adventure, and the battle between good and evil. But none of this cartoon hysteria translates into our daily lives. There are very few Darth Vaders to attract our wrath. The worst villains are not even people, they’re “legal entities” – corporations. How do you get mad at a legal entity? How do you arrest one or bring it to justice? It can kill people by selling faulty products, and yet its directors, who knew of the product defects, remain immune from criminal prosecution. You can only get the attention of this science fiction monster by making it BLEED money. And if you do that for very long, it just dissolves, and reappears across town under a different name. An amazing trick. Modern day economic genies. Same crooks, different name. Financial giants of shadowy substance. They run our lives, and we can’t even choke them, or kick them in the knee when they genetically alter our food, pollute our cities, or intentionally sell us defective, dangerous, and sometimes lethal products.
Nowadays even farmers are corporations. At least they THINK they are. They must plant a certain seed, and use certain pesticides, if they want to sell their crop to the handful of huge corporate buyers. The bank owns their land and machinery. If nature cooperates and they have a bumper crop, prices drop. If they have a poor crop, they sink deeper into debt. Farmers are, in fact, serfs, living under corporate feudalism. They take all the risks, and the only ones who benefit, one way or the other, are lordly corporations. The “family farm” is kaput. Skilled cultivators fleeing tyranny in Europe, shipped over to America, broke their backs building up farms, sent their sons to war to defend “freedom”, and endured the villainous reversal of being reduced to peasants again – working for banks and corporations – the New Aristocracy of Money. Maybe they’ll remember their past. Maybe they’ll remember there used to be revolutions over this kind of thing. People can depose a duke or king, but how do we depose a corporation? Who do we fight? How do we fight? Where will the leadership come from? Certainly not from the artists or intelligentsia.
The “artists” and “writers” of our era, all work for corporations. They’re not leaders. They’re paid stooges producing mass corporate art. And we used to laugh at Russia for its state sponsored art. What’s any different about these lackeys cranking out corporate art? Grinding out intellectual baby food for the masses? They wear rebelliously long hair, and sing sentimental songs about poverty, then buy ranches in Maui. They are shattered souls, doing drugs to gain ascendancy over their mashed “feelings”. We “resonate” with them because of our own shattered souls, and our own mashed feelings – and because we, like they, have no ideas about how to extricate ourselves from this pain.
(I told ya, last time, this wasn’t gonna be pretty.) The best lie is the one that’s almost true. Our “best” artists engage in a criminally deceptive hypocrisy. Pathetic. Tragic…For 50,000 years art was understood, and appreciated, as a metaphorical springboard, that launched us closer to God. All art was religious art. Now it’s a way to express our “feelings”, in a machine culture. Preposterous. We don’t even know what art is for any more. Deluded or not, Picasso claimed that he made not art, but “religious objects” unquote. At least he had some sense of what he was SUPPOSED to be doing. Our current crop hasn’t a clue. Corporations are not interested in religion or spirituality, unless they can sell it.
Do not confuse sentimentality with soul. They have nothing to do with each other. Our “great” filmmakers never grew up past age 14. They’re still playing with toy soldiers and making dinosaur movies. Or replaying World War II sixty years later. Compressing a gray world, bursting with complex problems and intermingled agendas, into simplistic formulas of black and white, good and evil, right and wrong. But who’s good, and who’s evil? Is an Arab sheik who’s resisting the corporate conquest of his oil reserves, evil? Are the American airmen who go to bomb him, good? How did corporate media become the arbiter of good and evil? I thought that was the Church’s job?…
The “art” of our era will be forgotten in 50 years. It’s not about anything besides “feelings”. There are no great ideas being explored. There are no new insights being delivered to the masses, by corporate artists. They offer nothing that helps us examine the issues of our era, or isolate the causes of our frustrations. How can one raise money for Farm Aid, without attacking the agri-corporations that are causing the destruction of the family farm? We don’t need to take up collections for farmers by listening to Willie Nelson and Neil Young warble about poverty. We, the masses, the spectators, don’t have enough money to spare. We don’t have enough money to make a difference. We need to take money AWAY from corporations. They’re the ones who have it. They’re the ones who should pay some price for their calculated destruction of the family farm. But we whine along with our pop musicians, indulging in sentimentality in E minor, neglecting to pinpoint the root causes of our problems – i.e. that huge corporations have conquered our economy. It’s masturbation. Our most noble efforts are misdirected. Our energy is deflected away from ideas that could make a difference. Our passions are pasted together out of computer wizardry, and special effects. Just because it’s new, does that mean it’s good? Just because it “feels” like the right thing to do, does that mean it’s going anywhere? – accomplishing anything? Something smells. What’s wrong here?
God can’t be filmed, that’s what’s wrong. We’re wearing our underpants on our heads, that’s what’s wrong. We’re eating soup with a fork, that’s what’s wrong. The invisible parts of life are being ignored. The most fundamental ideas about how to live don’t show up in the video store. Our brains are overloaded with info-tainment, and our souls are whimpering like lost puppies. We’re hammered by stress. Media has sold us their version of the antidote to stress, and we’ve tried it, and it DOESn’t work. We’re “entertaining ourselves to death”. The more “labor saving devices” we purchase, the more stressed out we get. Ideas divorced from reality equals fragmented soul. Simple math.
The real cause of stress is fragmented soul – the artificially instilled gap between ideas and actions, intentionally perpetuated by the engines of modern culture. Our brains don’t know what our bodies are doing, and vice versa – our human systems are rattled by stress. But take heart. There IS a way to reclaim our souls. There IS a way to reduce the stress in our lives. There IS a way to poke our heads above the garbage heap of modern culture. But not by taking the prescriptions flaunted in the media. There’s another way, a better way, a way that actually works. But it requires a bit of mental effort. It doesn’t come easily. It doesn’t come in a bottle, and it’s definitely not sold on TV. It’s called “learning.” Yes, LEARNING.
No, not learning about new vitamins or new software. Not learning about stock market schemes or the latest technical gadget. Not learning anything currently taught in the institutions of our era because the institutions of our era ARE the problem. They have co-opted learning. They have enshrined a type of learning that benefits them, and oppresses the rest of us. Does it really matter to you whether or not birds are dinosaurs? The high priests of pop culture want to sit on sofas tossing around high flying ideas, while we build their roads and clean their toilets. These university professors and corporate mavens and government clones are the cultural elite, the self-appointed priesthood of our era. And like every other period in human history, when the priest class grew too numerous, and sucked too many resources out of the local population, there comes a time when we, the peasants, must revolt against them. There comes a time when we must challenge their ideas. Is the Pharaoh really descended from the sun? Is monarchy the only workable form of government? Do corporations really have any place at all in a true democracy? What would our society look like if we abolished corporate lobbying, eliminated Corporate Welfare, and threw some real economic support behind small farmers, and small entrepreneurs? We must begin asking the questions that are never asked.
It’s time to re-invent learning.
OK, more on that next time.
So… Come on you soulful fucks. Help out. Put an idea into action. Go to my web sites… happyfool.orG and, therudeguy.com… and click on Make a Donation… Your donations are keeping me afloat right now. I need and appreciate every one.
Or maybe buy a book. Buy THIS book. The Corporate Cult. Your kids might need this as much as mine do. Or tell a friend about my oil paintings. Go to happyfool.orG and click on Oil Paintings. And try to tell other guys about the show. OK?
What I really need is a computer geek promoter, to help me expand my audience. I have about 500 regular listeners and get about $200 a month in donations. Takes me forty hours to produce each show, two shows a month, so I’m making about two dollars and fifty cents an hour doing this podcast. If I had 5000 listeners I MIGHT get $2000 a month, and I could stop living in my fucking truck. So help out if you can, co-create the future – internet audio.
And… If somebody out there wants to help, we can figure out some kind of profit-sharing plan, so you get PAID for your time and skills. Think about it. I need some help.
This is The Rude Guy. I’ll be back. Stay strong. Don’t let anybody intimidate you. Don’t let anybody shame you. No more bullshit. That’s our motto…. No more BULLssshhhiiittt.
Ahhhh, feels a little better already. | <urn:uuid:ffc22c49-cad9-41f4-b716-1129a92808d9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.therudeguy.com/?p=110 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942472 | 6,129 | 1.632813 | 2 |
8 months ago
Last edited at 3:15PM on 9/16/2012
Old people are a wealth of knowledge. They are walking history. And if you encounter a grouchy old person try to imagine being old in a society that worships youth. In the U.S. old people are often swept aside as being useless and burdensome unlike in other cultures where they are honored and revered. | <urn:uuid:959bac13-1b5a-464f-839d-6b96a69d7d0c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ask.com/answers/210925521/elderly-people-are-awesome-do-you-agree?qsrc=3112 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958951 | 82 | 1.5625 | 2 |
THE SAMSON OPTION: ISRAEL'S NUCLEAR ARSENAL AND AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY
Chapter 11: Playing the Game
The ambivalence and hypocrisy at the top of the American government about a nuclear-armed Israel inevitably was mirrored by the bureaucracy. By the middle 1960s, the game was fixed: President Johnson and his advisers would pretend that the American inspections amounted to proof that Israel was not building the bomb, leaving unblemished America's newly reaffirmed support for nuclear nonproliferation.
The men and women analyzing intelligence data and writing reports for their higher-ups understood, as Arthur Lundahl and Dino Brugioni had learned earlier, that there was little to be gained by relaying information that those at the top did not want to know. Nonetheless, the information was there.
There was much known, for example, about the Israeli Jericho missiles, rapidly being assembled by Dassault. "We had a direct line to God," a middle-level CIA technical analyst recalled. "We had everything-not only from the French but also from the Israelis. We stole some and we had spies. I was able to draw a scale model of the system. I even designed three warheads for it-nuclear, chemical, and HE [high explosive]-as a game. We were predicting what they could do." What Israel could do, the former CIA official said, was successfully target and fire a nuclear warhead. The problem arose in conveying the intelligence. "I was never able to get anything officially published" by the CIA for distribution throughout the government, he said. "Everybody knew" about the Israeli missile, he added, "but nobody would talk about it." The official said he decided to bootleg a copy of the intelligence report-risking his job by doing so--to senior officials in the Pentagon and State Department. "I remember briefing a DIA [Defense Intelligence Agency] admiral. He wasn't ready to believe it. I got him turned around, but he retired and no one else cared."
Even James Jesus Angleton, the CIA's director of counterintelligence, who also was responsible for liaison with Israel, had his problems when it came to the Israeli bomb. The moody Angleton was legendary-and feared-for his insistence on secrecy and his paranoia about Soviet penetration of the Agency. He was a master of backchannel and "eyes only" reports, and his increasing inability to deal with the real world eventually led to his firing in late 1974, but his glaring faults in counterintelligence apparently did not spill over to Israel. Former Agency officials, who, in prior interviews with me, had been unsparing in their criticism of Angleton's bizarre methods in counterintelligence, acknowledged that he had performed correctly and proficiently in his handling of Israel. Angleton had worked closely with members of the Jewish resistance in Italy while serving with the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) at the end of World War II; it was a dramatic period when thousands of Jewish refugees and concentration camp survivors were being illicitly funneled from Europe into Palestine, then under British control.
One of Angleton's closest colleagues was Meir (Meme) Deshalit, a resistance leader and Israeli intelligence official who had been posted to Washington in 1948. Deshalit was the older brother of Amos Deshalit, the physicist who had done much to develop Israel's nuclear arsenal before dying of cancer in 1969. Angleton shared Meir Deshalit's view of the Soviet and Arab threat to Israel; his personal contacts and strong feelings made him the logical choice to handle liaison between the CIA and the Israeli government. His was one of the most important assignments in the 1950s and early 1960s, the height of the Cold War, because of the continuing flow of Soviet and Eastern European refugees into Israel. Angleton and his Israeli counterparts ran the "rat lines," as the Jewish refugee link became known. It was the Jewish refugee operations, as many in the CIA understood, that provided the West in the early postwar years with its most important insights into the Soviet bloc. Some of the programs were financed off the shelf by CIA contingency funds, as part of KK MOUNTAIN.
Angleton's love for Israel and his shared views on the Arab and Soviet question, however, did not keep him from investigating, as a counterintelligence officer, any Israeli or American Jew he suspected of trafficking in classified information. One of the big question marks was nuclear technology. The CIA knew from its analysis of the fallout of the ongoing French nuclear tests in the Sahara that the increasingly modernized and miniaturized French warheads were based on United States design. A former American nuclear intelligence official recalled that he and his colleagues "were driven crazy" by the suspicion that Israel's quid pro quo for the French help at Dimona included access to design information purloined from the government's nuclear laboratories at Los Alamos and Livermore, California.
No evidence of such a link was found, but intelligence community investigators were surprised to discover at the end of the CHAOS inquiry a cache of Angleton's personal files, secured with black tape, that revealed what obviously had been a long-running- and highly questionable-study of American Jews in the government. The files showed that Angleton had constructed what amounted to a matrix of the position and Jewishness of senior officials in the CIA and elsewhere who had access to classified information of use to Israel. Someone in a sensitive position who was very active in Jewish affairs in his personal life, or perhaps had family members who were Zionists, scored high on what amounted to a Jewishness index.
One government investigator, talking about the Angleton files in a 1991 interview, recalled his surprise at discovering that even going to synagogue was a basis for suspicion. "I remembered the First Amendment," the investigator added sardonically. "You know, Freedom of Religion." The Angleton matrix suggested that at some point a suspect who measured high enough on the Jewishness scale was subjected to a full-bore field investigation. "Was there simply a background check, or was there physical or electronic surveillance?" the investigator asked rhetorically. "I don't know. I was angry but at the same time thought it wasn't irrational because a lot of Jews were giving help to Israel." In the end, the Angleton files were not investigated further or even brought to the attention of the House or Senate intelligence committees: "We decided not to do anything with it."
Samuel Halpern, a Jew who served for years as executive assistant to the director of the CIA's clandestine services, was under constant investigation by Angleton. Halpern's position, the highest reached by any Jew in the clandestine service, gave him access to the name and background of every foreigner who had ever been recruited by the CIA. His father, Hanoch, was a Pole who had become active in Zionism before World War II and, after emigrating to Palestine, had worked closely with Ben-Gurion and Moshe Sharett, among others, after the State of Israel was formed in 1948. "Jim looked at me real hard," Halpern recalled with a laugh, "but I told him, 'I'm not going to muck up your desk.' The Israelis never approached me. Why should they when I'm sitting on the third floor [of the CIA] and Jim's on the second?"
Angleton did more than just collect information on American Jews. He also was a sponsor, through the CHAOS program, of a highly secret CIA operation involving the Agency's purchase of a Washington trash collection company. The firm, known in the CIA as a proprietary, had contracts to pick up garbage at various Third World embassies, including the Israeli embassy. Another of its stops was the downtown Washington offices of B'nai B'rith, the powerful Jewish social and volunteer organization with worldwide activities. The trash would be systematically sorted and analyzed for any possible intelligence.
Angleton's close personal ties with the Deshalit family and others in Israel made it inevitable that he would learn about the construction in the Negev. One senior official recalled that Angleton's first intelligence report on Israel's plans to build the bomb was filed routinely in the late 1950s, and not by backchannel, and thus could be made available to those who needed to know inside the CIA's Directorate of Operations, the unit responsible for clandestine action. "I have no idea who his sources were," the senior official said. "He probably never told the director." Over the next few years Angleton continued to produce intelligence on Dimona, also based on information supplied by his personal contacts, but never learned-or, at least, never reported-the extent to which Israel was deceiving Washington about its nuclear weapons progress.
Angleton, of course, had been given periodic briefings in the late 1950s and early 1960s by Lundahl or Brugioni on the intelligence collected by the U-2 overflights of the Negev, but never evinced much interest. His forte was human intelligence, or HUMINT, as the intelligence community calls it, and not technical intelligence, such as the U-2 imagery. "He was a real funny guy," Brugioni recalled. "I'd meet with him, brief him; he'd ask a few questions, you'd leave--and never know what he's holding. Sometimes he'd have his office real dark and have a light only on you. He was a real spook."
For all of his mystique and freedom to operate, Angleton, too, was stymied by the Israeli bomb. His reports on Dimona, buttressed by the U-2 data, did not even result in an official CIA estimate that Israel was going nuclear. Such formal estimates, which are distributed to the President and other key government officials, were the responsibility of analysts in the CIA's Office of National Estimates (ONE). "Jim kept saying, 'Yes, they've got it,' and the analysts would say, 'I don't believe it,' " one former intelligence official recalled. The analysts simply did not think Angleton's HUM1NT sources were reliable, the official said, adding that tension and second-guessing over human intelligence sources were a way of life in the CIA. By 1965, an extensive dossier of HUMINT reports on Dimona had built up, the official said, and the nuclear issue was again raised with the ONE analysts: "They told me that even if Israel did have the bomb, they'd never use it."
The intelligence official, recalling the issue in an interview, got angry again at the analysts: "They were so stupid. You'd have to put the bomb under their noses before they'd believe it. They didn't have any understanding of Israel; didn't know what made them think. They were so stupid."
It is not known how many CIA analyses on the Israeli bomb were produced in the early 1960s by the Office of National Estimates, but the one memorandum that does exist was astonishingly inept about Israeli attitudes. The paper, entitled "Consequences of Israeli Acquisition of Nuclear Capability," was dated March 6, 1963, and was made available nearly twenty years later at the John F. Kennedy Library without any deletions. The national estimate concluded that Israel, once having attained a nuclear capability, "would use all the means at its command to persuade the U.S. to acquiesce in, and even to support, its possession. . . . Israel could be expected to use the argument that this possession entitled it to participate in all international negotiations respecting nuclear questions and disarmament." The staggering flaw in the CIA analysis was its basic assumption: that Israel would make public or otherwise let its nuclear capability become officially known. The reality was precisely the opposite: Israel had no intention of going public with the bomb in fear of American and worldwide Jewish disapproval that would result in international reprobation and diminished financial support from the Diaspora.
Such flawed intelligence analyses went a long way toward keeping the men at the top officially ignorant of what no one wanted to know. In public, the Johnson administration, as were its predecessors, was firmly opposed to the spread of nuclear weapons anywhere in the world; official acknowledgment of an Israeli bomb would have presented Washington with an unwanted dilemma-either sanction Israel or be accused of a nuclear double standard.
Israel was not considered a nuclear weapons state on October 18, 1964, when China exploded its long-awaited first nuclear bomb. President Johnson, three weeks away from his over whelming election triumph over Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona, the Republican presidential candidate, reaffirmed his commitment to nonproliferation in a nationally televised speech: "Until this week, only four powers [the United States, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, and France] had entered the dangerous world of nuclear explosions. Whatever their differences, all four are sober and serious states, with long experience as major powers in the modern world. Communist China has no such experience.... [Its] expensive and demanding effort tempts other states to equal folly," the President said. "Nuclear spread is dangerous to all mankind. . . . [W]e must continue to work against it, and we will."
The President may have believed his impassioned words, but not all of his senior advisers did. Six weeks later, McGeorge Bundy, Robert McNamara, and Secretary of State Dean Rusk discussed what they considered the administration's real policy options at a secret meeting on nonproliferation. Among those taking careful notes was Glenn T. Seaborg, chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, who recounted the session in his little-noted 1987 memoir, Stemming the Tide:
"Rusk said he thought a basic question was whether we really should have a nonproliferation policy prescribing that no countries beyond the present five might acquire nuclear weapons. Were we clear that this should be a major objective of U.S. policy? For example, might we not want to be in a position where India or Japan would be able to respond with nuclear weapons to a Chinese threat? Rusk mentioned the possibility of having an Asian group of nuclear weapons countries, pointing out that the real issue was among Asian countries and not between northern countries and the Asians.
"McNamara thought it would take decades for India or Japan to have any appreciable deterrent. Nevertheless, he thought the question Rusk had raised should be studied. He pointed out that adoption of a nonproliferation policy by the United States might require us to guarantee the security of nations that renounced nuclear weapons.
"I [Seaborg] expressed doubt that a policy condoning further proliferation should be considered, saying that, once a process of making exceptions was started, we would lose control and that this would inevitably lead to serious trouble. . . .
"Bundy warned about the need to keep very quiet the fact that we were discussing the basic questions of whether U.S. policy should be nonproliferation, because everyone assumed that this was our policy. Any intimation to the contrary would be very disturbing throughout the world. McNamara added that we had to the stop the leaks that come out of meetings like this. He agreed with Bundy that the fact that the U.S. commitment to nonproliferation was being questioned simply must not be allowed to leak."
One senior American who resisted the persuasive talk about expanding the nuclear club was John McCone, the increasingly frustrated CIA director. McCone sorely felt the loss of John Kennedy; his relationship with Lyndon Johnson was much less intimate and his advice not always welcome. McCone's solution to the Chinese bomb (and to the problems with North Vietnam) was to send in the Air Force. "McCone just raised hell" about the Chinese bomb, recalled Walt Elder. "He wanted permission to fly U-2S over the test site and was turned down." The CIA director wasn't daunted: he next floated "the idea of what if we got in and took out the Chinese capability?" Daniel Ellsberg recalled similar talk at high levels in the Pentagon: "We were saying, in essence, that if we could have stopped the Russian bomb, we would have saved the world a lot of trouble. It's too bad the Soviets got the bomb." One thought was to use unmarked bombers to strike at the Chinese, thus avoiding identification. Cooler heads prevailed, Ellsberg recalled: "The mission just looked too big to be plausibly denied."
McCone resigned as CIA director in 1965, despite his support for Johnson's continuing escalations in Vietnam. He explained to a colleague: "When I cannot get the President to read my reports, then it's time to go." McCone knew that Floyd Culler's inspections were accomplishing little; he also understood what Israel's continuing refusal to permit full- fledged international inspections meant. But, said Elder, the CIA director found that Johnson "didn't understand the implications" of the inspection issue and didn't want to hear about it. By the end of McCone's tenure, Elder added, he believed Lyndon Johnson as President had three basic concerns: "His standing in polls. 'Can I sell it to Congress?' And 'How can I get out of Vietnam?'"
There was yet another concern: Johnson's understanding that good nonproliferation policies made for bad politics. The President needed no one to remind him that any serious move to squeeze the Israelis on their nuclear weapons program would lead to a firestorm of protest from American Jews, many of whose leaders had consistently supported his presidency and the Vietnam War. He got another reminder of the political danger of nonproliferation from a special panel on that subject he convened a few weeks after the Chinese test. The distinguished panel, headed by Roswell L. Gilpatric, who had served John Kennedy as deputy secretary of defense, returned on January 21, 1965-the day after Johnson's inauguration-with a report that amounted to an indictment of past and present policy. It warned that the world was "fast approaching a point of no return" in opportunities for controlling the spread of nuclear weapons and urged the President, "as a matter of great urgency, [to] substantially increase the scope and intensity of our effort if we are to have any hope of success." The report also advocated the establishment of nuclear-free zones in Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East, including Israel and Egypt. Most significantly, it suggested that the President should reconsider-in terms of nonproliferation-a controversial American plan to create a multilateral force (MLF) that would give NATO members, including the West Germans, a joint finger on the nuclear trigger. The raising of any question about the MLF issue was especially sensitive, for the Soviet Union was insisting that any proposed nonproliferation treaty prohibit a separate European nuclear force, which it viewed as nothing more than a vehicle for providing the West Germans with the bomb.
At a White House meeting with the President, individual members of the panel listed a sweeping series of priorities -- including encouraging France to turn its force de frappe into a NATO nuclear missile battery-that prompted the President to note caustically, according to Glenn Seaborg, that implementation of the committee's report would be "a very pleasant undertaking." Johnson and his aides at the meeting, who included McGeorge Bundy and Dean Rusk, warned Gilpatric and the committee members not to discuss the report with any outsiders or even to acknowledge that a written document had been presented to the White House (the Gilpatric report remains highly classified today). Seaborg, who attended the meeting, noted in his memoir that Rusk, when asked by the President for his views, depicted the report as being "as explosive as a nuclear weapon." Its premature release, Rusk added, "could start the ball rolling in an undesirable manner"- in terms of the MLF and future negotiations on a nonproliferation treaty. The report went nowhere, despite the President's promise of further consultations with Gilpatric.
Political disaster, from the White House's point of view, struck in June, when newly elected Senator Robert Kennedy based his maiden Senate floor speech on many of the until then unknown and ignored recommendations of Gilpatric's panel. Kennedy, often invoking his dead brother, urged the President to rise above the immediate issues and begin dealing with nuclear proliferation: "Upon the success of this effort depends the only future our children will have. The need to halt the spread of nuclear weapons must' be a central priority of American policy." Kennedy specifically called for Johnson to immediately open worldwide negotiations for a comprehensive test ban treaty; such talks, he proposed, should include Communist China, one of North Vietnam's allies, and he indirectly criticized Johnson for his preoccupation with Vietnam by stating: "We cannot allow the demands of day-to-day policy to obstruct our efforts to solve the problems of nuclear spread. We cannot wait for peace in the Southeast-which will not come until nuclear weapons spread beyond recall." Johnson, of course, was made apoplectic by what he was convinced was Gilpatric's leaking of the report to Kennedy and responded by deleting material on nonproliferation from a speech he was scheduled to deliver the day after the Kennedy speech. Over the next months, Glenn Seaborg recalled, there was nothing more heard about the Gilpatric report from the White House, and nonproliferation continued to be treated as a topic fit only for the arms controllers in the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (ACDA), whose advice-no matter how prudent -- rarely carried weight with the White House. President Johnson held out for two years before agreeing in secret talks with the Soviets to drop the MLF, clearing the way for the 1968 Nonproliferation Treaty and giving the government's arms controllers an important victory.
In the mid-1960s, the Soviet Union had begun to step up its military and economic aid programs in the Middle East, and Israel was increasingly seen by the Johnson White House as a regional American bulwark. It was inevitable that high-level interest in the perennial and profitless issue of international inspection for Dimona began to wane in 1967-as the A-4E Skyhawks began arriving in Israel, as the routine Floyd Culler inspections proceeded, and as America got more and more enmeshed in the Southeast Asian war.
There were strong public clues, nonetheless, that Israel never stopped planning to build its bombs. In mid-1966, the Israeli government delayed in accepting nearly $60 million in possible American aid for the construction of a much-needed nuclear desalinization and power plant because the aid was contingent on an Israeli commitment to permit IAEA inspection of Dimona. Johnson and Eshkol had announced a preliminary agreement to build the plant in 1964, amid much fanfare, and subsequent studies showed the facility could produce two hundred megawatts of power and 100 million gallons of desalted water daily. Continued American insistence on IAEA inspections made the Israelis walk away, without any explicit explanation, from the project. The proposed desalinization plant was studied for the next decade, but the American conditions were never accepted, and the plant was never built. The pro-nuclear advocates in the Rafi Party, including Peres and Bergmann, urged Israel to refuse American aid for the plant and publicly accused the United States of attempting to violate Israeli sovereignty by linking its support to Dimona's IAEA inspection.
Privately, Peres and Bergmann-still influential, although out of office-suspected that the United States had a hidden agenda in its support of the nuclear desalinization plant: to divert Israeli funds, manpower, and resources from Israel's nuclear arsenal, in the hope that Israel would at some point be forced to make a choice between nuclear weapons and nuclear energy.
A second clue came in July 1966, during a debate in the Knesset on the most recent inspection of Dimona by Floyd Culler, whose conclusion-that there was still no evidence of a bomb facility-had again been made available by American officials to John Finney of the New York Times and, so some Israelis thought, also to Egypt. During the debate, Shimon Peres told of his recent participation at an international conference on nuclear weapons where, he said, the Middle East was discussed: "I found that there is unfortunately no possibility of limiting the spread of nuclear weapons in the near future-not because of Israel, but because big powers are not agreeing among themselves.... I was glad to discover that most experts on the subject do not believe it possible to envisage nuclear disarmament or the Middle East in isolation from the conventional arms race...." Peres was, in essence, defending Israel's decision not to give in to Washington's IAEA inspection demands on the ground that the Arabs had conventional superiority. The same argument-Warsaw Pact tank and troop superiority -had been used a few years earlier by the United States and its allies to justify the deployment of nuclear missiles in Europe.
By the late 1960s, much of the United States' primary analysis of nuclear intelligence had been shifted from the CIA to the design and engineering laboratories for nuclear weapons at Los Alamos and Sandia and, later, Livermore, where intelligence units dealing with the Soviet Union and China had been set up after World War II. The growing danger of proliferation became starkly clear during the Kennedy administration, when a group of scientists awaiting clearance before beginning work at Los Alamos successfully designed a nuclear bomb from the open literature. The laboratories' primary targets continued to be the reactors and research centers in the Soviet Union and China, but the intelligence units eventually began monitoring the transfer of nuclear technology and those countries that were viewed as "nth" nations, as near-nuclear countries came to be known. "We had tremendous data" that went beyond satellite photography and intercepted communications, a closely involved official said. "We had people who had worked inside plants in the USSR and China. We were even able to do mock-ups of their weapons system-go from the warhead back through the plant. As part of the drill, I was required to summarize who's got the bomb and who was next, in near-term capability." Israel was always at the top of his list, the official recalled, followed by South Africa. "We were watching the relationship between France and Israel and between Israel and South Africa," he added. "Those were the links."
His assignment also included monitoring the flow of uranium ore into Israel from supplier nations such as Argentina and South Africa. Such ore, known as yellowcake, served as the raw fuel for the heavy-water reactor at Dimona; by the mid-1960s, its sale was a highly competitive and profitable business whose transfer in lots under ten tons was not monitored by the IAEA in Vienna. The first known shipment of ore from South Africa to Israel had arrived in 1963 and, since it totaled ten tons, was duly reported. In subsequent years, however, clandestine shipments of South African yellowcake began to arrive at Dimona, often escorted by a special operations unit of the Israeli Defense Force. Israel's goal was to prevent outsiders from learning that the reactor was operating at two to three times greater capacity than publicly acknowledged, utilizing that much more uranium ore-and therefore capable of reprocessing greater amounts of plutonium. At least some of those later clandestine shipments from South Africa became known in the late 1960s to the intelligence officers in Los Alamos and Sandia, who were carefully watching-by satellites and other means -- most of the major uranium mines in the world. But after Israel's overwhelming victory in the 1967 Six-Day War, the intelligence about Dimona and its nuclear potential became highly compartmentalized, as the White House decided to side more openly with Israel in the Middle East, and thus much harder to access. "We knew about the yellowcake," the official recalled, "but we weren't allowed to keep a file on it. It simply wasn't part of the record. Anytime we began to follow it, somebody in the system would say, 'That's not relevant.'"
The U-2 was still flying, but Lundahl and Brugioni had gone on to new assignments in photo interpretation and were no longer directly involved in Israeli nuclear matters. Far more intelligence was being collected by America's CORONA and GAMBIT satellite systems, which, after much trial and error, had by the mid-1960s begun consistently to produce high- resolution photography from their orbital perches in outer space. Any interesting intelligence on Israel was now being routed to Livermore and Los Alamos through the CIA's Office of Science and Technology, headed by Carl E. Duckett, to which Lundahl's National Photo Interpretation Center was now reporting.
Duckett, a college dropout, had been recruited to the Agency in 1963 from the Army's Missile Command headquarters at the Redstone Arsenal in Alabama. As a civilian Army expert on Soviet missile systems, he had been regularly consulted in prior years by Lundahl and Brugioni on U-2, photo intelligence, but had been told nothing about the findings on Dimona. That process reversed once Duckett joined the CIA, where he got his own special access to the Israeli intelligence. In the beginning, Brugioni recalled, there were long meetings in the late afternoon, usually over a few drinks, at which Duckett and his colleagues would openly discuss the day's findings. Eventually those faded away. Duckett was a quick study, Brugioni said: "By the mid-1960s, it was all his baby." Lundahl and Brugioni soon came to understand that Duckett was no longer sharing all of his information about the Israeli bomb -- the U-2,'s spy flights were no longer as important, and there was no longer any need for them to know. It was the end of an era.
The screening out of Lundahl and Brugioni was perhaps more of a loss than Duckett and his colleagues in the Office of Science and Technology could understand: those two were the institutional memory of the U-2, intelligence on Dimona- almost none of which had been reduced to writing prior to 1960. "Duckett knew very little about what went on before," Brugioni said. "He never asked me and I never told him. Lundahl always said, 'This is very, very sensitive.'" In subsequent years, even the most senior officials of the American government would learn little about the pre-1960 U-2, flights over Dimona; the lack of written history meant that there was nothing in the files. It was the first of many disconnects that would come to dominate the processing of U.S. intelligence on Dimona.
1. The first prominent public mention of Angleton's role in counterintelligence came in a major front-page expose by the author in the New York Times of December 12, 1974. The story linked Angleton and his office to Operation CHAOS, the massive and illegal spying by the CIA on antiwar dissidents in America. Angleton, in a telephone conversation with me before the story was published, suggested that he could provide better stories, dealing with Communist penetration of the antiwar movement and CIA operatives in the Soviet Union, if the domestic spying story was not published. On the day of its publication, a Sunday, as I later wrote in the Times, Angleton telephoned me very early at home and complained that Cecily, his wife of thirty-one years, had learned only by reading my story that her husband was not a postal employee, as Angleton claimed he had told her. He added: "And now she's left me." The call shook me up; the upset in his voice seemed real. I mumbled something about a newsman's responsibility to the truth, hung up, and telephoned an old friend who had served in the CIA with Angleton. He laughingly told me that Cecily of course had known from the beginning what her husband did for a living, and had left him three years earlier to move to Arizona, only to return.
2. Johnson also reassured the nation that his administration had not been surprised by the Chinese test. The President perhaps did not know it at the time of his talk, but the American intelligence community was aghast to learn from air sampling that the Chinese bomb had been fueled by enriched uranium, and not, as predicted by the CIA, by far-easier-to- produce plutonium. The American guess had been that China would chemically reprocess plutonium from the spent uranium rods in a reactor, as at Dimona. Confronted with evidence to the contrary, some in the CIA believed that China might have stolen or otherwise misappropriated the enriched uranium for its bomb.
3. Rusk carried his fight to other bureaucratic forums, with the focus on a nuclear India. Daniel Ellsberg recalled being told by his Pentagon superiors after the Chinese test in 1964 that Rusk's position was that "India needed a nuclear weapon as a deterrent and there was no reason for them not to have it." Rusk's basic approach, Ellsberg added, was "Why shouldn't our friends have nuclear weapons now that our enemies have them?" It should be noted that there was no mention of this extraordinary debate in McGeorge Bundy's seemingly comprehensive history of the atom bomb, Danger and Survival, published in 1988. India's drive for the bomb, wrote Bundy, "remains a doubt ful prize in that something about this apocalyptically destructive standard of greatness is not truly Indian." Bundy could have added that there were a few Americans in high Washington positions in 1964 who had no doubt then that India's desire for the bomb was quite truly Indian.
4. Panel members included the retired Allen Dulles, the former secretary of state Dean Acheson, the former defense secretary Robert A. Lovett, the former White House science adviser George B. Kistiakowsky, and IBM chairman Arthur K. Watson.
5. Kennedy also warned that Israel and India "already possess weapons-grade fissionable material, and could fabricate an atomic device within a few months." Further Israeli progress on the bomb, he added, "would certainly impel the Egyptians to intensify their present efforts." The senator's remarks caused a sensation in Israel, but were little noted elsewhere. The New York Times's page-one account of the Kennedy speech included no mention of Israel.
6. Peres misstated the conference's findings. His Knesset statement was initially reported in Israel and Nuclear Weapons, by Fuad Jabber, published in 1971 by the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) in London. Jabber wrote that the conference, known as the International Assembly on Nuclear Weapons and sponsored in part by the IISS, had, in fact, issued a call for "a serious effort" to negotiate a nuclear-free zone in the Middle East. The assembly took place June 23-26, 1966, in Toronto, Canada. | <urn:uuid:7570b97c-9f7b-4b73-9c61-edafb6629f0f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.naderlibrary.com/lit.samsonoptionhersh.11.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982471 | 7,177 | 1.632813 | 2 |
Residential HVAC Mythbusting
September 01, 2011
Two nagging duct questions answered
The idea was most likely born out of watching too many episodes of Mythbusters on the Discovery Channel, but it’s really about the scientific method: When you are presented with a set of supposed facts, put them to the test. In July 2010, Delta-T, Incorporated, a company that formerly specialized in duct sealing (over 5,000 systems sealed) but now focuses on consulting on large-scale utility HVAC programs, ran a series of tests to investigate the veracity of accepted beliefs on the subject of assembling residential ductwork. We carried out two separate experiments, designed to answer two nagging questions. First, what is the best way to connect sheet-metal duct to flex duct? And second, which parts of sheet-metal ductwork is it most beneficial to seal?
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The Home Energy Online articles are for personal use only and may not be printed for distribution. For permission to reprint, please send an e-mail to [email protected]. | <urn:uuid:0c612a7f-1ee6-4ec6-9e14-58747b9a1e47> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.homeenergy.org/show/article/nav/healthyhomes/page/16/id/1714/viewFull/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951375 | 262 | 1.695313 | 2 |
Did you know that "On Wisconsin" was almost "On Minnesota?"
W.T. Purdy, the composer of our beloved "On Wisconsin" had never even visited the state when he wrote the melody in a Chicago boarding house, intending to enter it in a University of Minnesota fight song contest. Purdy's chance encounter with former U.W. student Carl Beck changed the song's fate, however, as Beck convinced him to dedicate it to Wisconsin instead.
Penniless, the two couldn't afford the $50 fee to publish the song. Armed wtih a $10 credit from an engraver, they convinced a printer to run 500 copies.
The song debuted on November 10, 1909, sung by the Wisconsin Glee Club, ironically preceding a Minnesota game and was performed again by the U.W. Marching Band the very next day. Purdy sold his copyright for less than $100 in 1918. "On Wisconsin" would take another 41 years to be declared the official State Song in 1959.
Yet another version of the world's most celebrated fight song graphically celebrated on a t-shirt.
The Wisconsin Store is pleased to present the second in their line of homages to a great state. The state map defining the counter of the "O" in the word "On." simply married to a map of the state.
Badgers will be running red in the streets of Madison with this new twist on a great old song.
Silkscreened on a 100-percent cotton
4.3-oz. premium fitted men's crew neck tee in either red or white.
On pre-release sale for just $16.99 through September 14th. Please note that shirts will be shipping on or about September 14th. | <urn:uuid:9b2164ca-4b16-42ab-8c9f-385e326b708e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://thewisconsinstore.com/on_wisconsin_over-o-mens_tshirt.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971682 | 360 | 1.71875 | 2 |
I spent quite a few years doing, what in in the welding trade is usually referred to as maintenance and repair work. I’ve worked on a some heavy equipment, quite a lot of farm machinery and a steady stream of commercial and residential jobs, so I suppose I have practical, but undisciplined views about the longevity of metal mechanical devises. I am not an engineer.
First of all, in the current system there is a huge incentive to master the art of planned obsolescence. When the market is as flighty, and style and trend conscious as Madison Ave. has taught it to be, building too well, designing for durability and longevity puts you out of business. Often a new and improved product is only improved esthetically, sometimes at the cost of function, by designing a fairly short lifespan into a product you can try to guarantee yourself a future market.
Secondly, there’s the issue of building a product that uses current technology well and can be upgraded. The value of new technology probably should be weighed against the cost of manufacturing the machine that incorporates it. I think I could make a pretty good argument that, considering mileage standards, purchase, and maintenance costs, modern pickup trucks are not a great deal. If you added safety upgrades, modern electronics and fuel injection to a 1960’s era pickup, something not all that hard to do, you might have a vehicle that could out work and out last it’s 2012 equivalent. If longevity and function, (I mean hauling loads), were the driving considerations in buying a pickup it wouldn’t be that hard to build a truck in which the drive train could be upgraded and with proper maintenance could function for a very long time at a very low environmental cost. (I do recognize how difficult it is to create a design that allows future technological upgrades when the designer has no idea what technology will develop.) I believe this kind of design can often be found in ocean going ships and some aircraft. A steam locomotive would be an example of technology that would be very hard to upgrade, no matter how well constructed.
Finally there’s the cost of building devices that can last indefinitely. In my world it’s all “cycles to failure”. By adding size and using better material it’s not hard to build a machine that has a hugely increased lifespan, but the trade off is in weight and cost. If too much of a machines operating costs go into merely moving the machine around, or if it’s too heavy and awkward it isn’t a successful design. And, even if a machine depreciates very slowly, if the initial cost is too high and it’s going to outlast your needs, that’s not good design either.
Of these issues, it is the issue of planned obsolescence that I find most objectionable. When a machine can function well and appropriately for it’s time, it just seems wrong to have it be designed fail. | <urn:uuid:98f27f42-29f0-4ca9-afa8-7bcb94285c95> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.centerforinquiry.net/forums/viewthread/13481/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967155 | 613 | 1.65625 | 2 |
Davos, Switzerland (CNN) -- Prime Minister David Cameron acknowledged Thursday there had been no movement on renegotiating Britain's inclusion in a treaty thrashed out by European leaders last month in a bid to stave off a debt crisis.
Britain was alone among the 27 European Union nations in refusing point-blank to sign the European deal, intended to ensure the closer integration of the national budgets of the 17 eurozone countries that use the euro as a currency.
The so-called "fiscal compact" would usher in a new legal framework and greater fiscal scrutiny, as well as measures to strengthen mechanisms that guarantee short-term stability for euro economies in trouble.
Britain's refusal to sign the treaty means the countries that back the compact must go ahead with the deal outside the European Union.
Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Cameron told CNN that he could not see that scenario changing.
"I haven't seen that movement because the conditions we set out are the conditions we set out -- and they haven't been moved towards," he said.
Cameron's comments come ahead of a European summit meeting in Brussels on Monday.
Some had thought that a deal would be reached between Britain's European partners that would allow Cameron to reverse his potential veto. But, Cameron said, "I don't see that development."
And he said Britain would not be disadvantaged by putting itself outside the discussions on the treaty.
"The reason we didn't join the treaty is the same reason we are not joining it today," he said.
"We asked for safeguards, we asked for conditions particularly around the single market and financial services... we haven't got those safeguards, so they can't have a treaty inside the European Union."
But Britain would still be at the heart of the debate on "what really matters" in Brussels, he said -- the single market, competitiveness and helping Europe's economies grow.
In December, Cameron said he had effectively vetoed an original deal, forcing German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy to forge ahead with a treaty that will be subservient to EU regulations.
The new treaty is due to be finalized until March 2012, after which it will have to be ratified by all participating countries. Hungary, Sweden and the Czech Republic also expressed reservations about treaty change -- but left the door open, pending parliamentary debate.
Cameron said it was in Britain's interest as well as that of its European neighbors that the current debt crisis was resolved, but acknowledged that it wouldn't be easy.
If the single currency is to work, the prime minister said, some short-term measures have to be taken and longer-term issues grappled with.
"Short term, to ease the current crisis you have got to resolve the Greek situation, you've got to strengthen the banks, and the firewall's got to be big enough to deal with any contagion in the system," he said.
And in an apparent sign of frustration at the lack of progress, he added: "You could almost set it to music because politicians have been saying it for so long -- but we've got to deliver it in the beginning of this year, and that's only the start."
Cameron also rejected suggestions he should ease the austerity measures his government has imposed in Britain, even as the eurozone heads into recession.
Britain has to show the world it is paying down its debt in order to ensure its recovery and keep interest rates as low as they are, he said.
"If you took your foot off the pedal and you eased up and spent some more money... you could lose all the benefit of that, by those interest rates going up." | <urn:uuid:a3f069a5-8500-4ed9-9fcc-9295ea776e89> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://edition.cnn.com/2012/01/26/world/europe/switzerland-uk-cameron/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979676 | 747 | 1.648438 | 2 |
What does the term 'kiting' mean when used for games? I've seen the term thrown around here and there in reference to a few different games. Are there specific types of games that it applies to?
Kiting refers to keeping an enemy chasing you while also keeping it at a range where it cannot attack you. This is often paired with attacking him back using your own long-range attack, but that is not necessary (see the comments below for an example).
The effect looks like you have the enemy on the end of a string, kind of like a 'kite', because you are both moving in the same direction and he's never catching up to you. It is a generic term that applies to any game with mechanics that allow it.
Though the most basic example of kiting is dealing ranged damage to an enemy (hereafter called "mob") that has slower run speed, "kiting," in the more abstract sense, does not necessarily require that the mob follow you around. "Kiting" is a blanket term used to describe any strategy in which the mob is taking damage, but it is not dealing damage. Even root+nuking a mob could, in some sense, be considered kiting. Here are some strategies that are considered kiting:
In EQ1, "fear kiting" was widely used by necromancers. Necros would fear the mob, and it would run in the opposite direction, at which point you'd cast spells on it. When fear broke, you would simply recast it. While the mob was feared, the player would chase the mob, instead of the other way around.
Another form of kiting is done with a group, where one high aggro person would have the mob chase him around, while others would beat on the mob. Since the person at range was highest on the aggro list, the mob would ignore the rest of the group, even though the rest of the group was within striking range. Sometimes a pet or charmed pet is used instead of a group. This is sometimes called "aggro kiting."
Another form of kiting is "charm kiting," which is where you charm a mob to make him your pet, send him at another, more powerful target, and when the more powerful mob kills your pet, you root/snare/stun/mez it, and charm another pet. The process is repeated until the powerful target is dead, which can take anywhere in between 3-30 minutes. This is different from the kiting mentioned in the previous paragraph because, here, your charmed pet is actually taking damage, but if it is easily replaced, that's not a problem.
Yet another version of charm kiting is done as part of an experience grind. Once again, since charmed pets are often weakened while charmed, they will lose to an equally powered mob 99.999% of the time. The idea is to break the charm right before your pet dies, at which point you finish it off. However, it's faster to send your pet at multiple mobs, in an attempt to have its health drop more quickly. This is extremely dangerous, as it requires you to run around to avoid the 3+ mobs that you have aggro'd. Having 4-5 mobs on you is typical, but I've done it with 10+ mobs. Since someone employing this strategy is often being followed by a "swarm" of mobs, this is called "swarm kiting."
Another type of kiting is "AE kiting," which is just like normal kiting, except with multiple mobs. You snare 2-4 (typically) mobs or simply get to where you can run faster than them, and then you run them in circles, which makes them bunch up into a small group (in most games; in some games, however, the AI that controls the NPCs is too smart for this, and the mobs will refuse to bunch up, making AE kiting impossible.) Then, you cast a targeted AOE (or PBAOE, but that's more dangerous.)
There's a few more, but you should have the idea by now.
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Since no one else seems to have touched on this, kiting can apply to a variety of game genres, depending on the game, but one that it applies strongly to is the dual-stick shooter genre, where players often end up circling the stage continuously, while enemies follow after them.
The term is also often used in MMO (Massively Multiplayer Online) games. In this context, it often refers to one player 'baiting' any number of enemies while other players attack them.
I don't have enough rep to comment on @StrixVaria answer, which is great +1", so I'll post as an answer.
I think kiting can simply be defined as:
"Forcing an enemy to follow you around."
In MMOs tanks kite mobs while getting the crap beat out of them. So the "at a range where it cannot attack you" doesn't apply. Also many mechanics like avoidance, spell reflection, self healing, etc... can be in effect to allow you to survive while kiting. | <urn:uuid:889a78aa-1f59-4fb6-b1a7-eac0648a5692> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/18903/what-is-kiting?answertab=active | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97888 | 1,072 | 1.640625 | 2 |
09-23-2012 05:32 PM
I have installed an AIR app ( bar ) into the simulator ( currently using the default icon ) but when clicked, it does nothing.
I have tried various SWFs including extremely simple ones with no success.
I have tried in the PlayBook Sim. and the BB10 Sim. The only difference in the latter is that after clicking the icon, the screen wipes away before it returns to the home state, after doing nothing with my app.
I have tried AIR 2.5 - 3.2 with no success.
In the commandline I see : blackberry-airpackager version 1.6
I am using Vmware 4.0.4 ( after many hours of installing and removing various Vmware versions )
There is many Old Posts with suggestions of how to package and install AIR apps created in Flash Pro. for use with PlayBook.
What is the Newest and Correct method for PB as well as BB10?
Solved! Go to Solution.
09-23-2012 05:36 PM
09-24-2012 04:08 PM
Thanks to steve_web:
The problem was that I was trying to execute the commandline packager from the SDK/bin folder and using full directory paths to th SWF and xml files.
This resulted in there being a similar directory structure in the air folder within the BAR.
I was doing this because I could not get the CLASSPATH working to run the packager outside of the bin folder.
I eventually got it working when I realized it was the PATH not the CLASSPATH that needed to be added.
In short.. the app worked but it did not load the swf because it was in a series of subfolders in the BAR. | <urn:uuid:0d30ac84-e7ef-4dda-9a3d-8622b885f33b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://supportforums.blackberry.com/t5/Adobe-AIR-Development/App-installs-in-simulator-but-will-not-run/m-p/1917255 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958561 | 373 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Sunday, August 7, 2011
The summary is hidden because it may contain spoilers. If you would like to read the full summary, simply use your cursor to highlight the next few lines and it will magically appear.
Jack is practically invisible at home, but when his parents send him to Hazelwood, Iowa, to spend a summer with his odd aunt and uncle, he suddenly makes friends, is beaten up by the town bully, and is plotted against by the richest man in town.
Little, Brown; 323 pages | <urn:uuid:5c6ac069-abe8-424d-b725-d5bbe6717678> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://acplmocknewbery.blogspot.com/2011/08/mostly-true-story-of-jack-by-kelly.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981302 | 105 | 1.5625 | 2 |
Jane Juedeman loves the challenge of unlocking the door to the world of reading for her OASIS students. To see a child's self-confidence and reading ability blossom and grow energizes her and makes all her time and efforts worthwhile.
When Juedeman retired after 33 years of teaching mostly third graders, there was a void in her life. She knew she wanted to do volunteer work, but says "I also knew I wanted to continue to work with children."
When a fellow teacher told her about the OASIS Intergenerational Tutoring Program, she was really excited. "Now I could volunteer and still continue to work with children, but without all the pressure and paperwork!" What's more, she tutors at her former school, Mesnier Elementary, in Affton, Missouri. There she tries to impart a love for reading and self-confidence in the Kindergarteners, second and third graders which she tutors individually each week.
It takes patience and a little imagination, something Juedeman has plenty of, to discover what each child's interests are. Once you discover this, she says, you have the key that unlocks the door to the world of reading for each child.
"At the beginning of the year, I use a small booklet called 'All About Me.' It gets them talking about things they enjoy doing on say, a rainy day, or with their family or on vacation. Pets are a great jumping-off point, since most children have at least one at home."
She recalls one second grade boy in particular, who was not interested in reading. Try as she may, she could not come up with anything that excited him. Then one day, by accident she discovered he had a keen interest in football.
"I began using various football stories and games to build up his enthusiasm for reading. He really came alive when I asked him, 'If you had a football team, what would their jersey look like and what name would they have?' He went so far as to design and decorate a shirt for his team! Toward the end of the year he was the one bringing in books to read, rather than me. This was so thrilling to see. Even his teacher remarked on how much progress he had made. It is very rewarding to have a teacher say she sees great improvement in a child. That they are more willing to choose a book and try to read it now, or raise their hand more often in class, because they have grown in self-confidence."
Juedeman has been a St. Louis OASIS tutor for the past 4 years and has loved every minute of it. "I feel I am still helping someone even a little bit and it keeps me in touch with children." She tries to recruit people for the program every chance she gets. Anyone can be a tutor, she says. "You don't need to have an education background." All you need is a love for children and a willingness to spend time with them helping to develop a love for reading. OASIS offers a basic training program for tutors before the school year begins. After that, there are monthly meetings with a coordinator, where new ideas, success stories and materials are freely shared.
Now, she says "I am even working on recruiting my husband, a former high school teacher, for the program." No doubt, he'll be hooked, as her enthusiasm is contagious!
By Elinor Hayes, St. Louis OASIS Volunteer | <urn:uuid:d25f6bba-dee2-4a0a-afa3-ed90c1c57220> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.oasisnet.org/FacesofOASIS/JaneJuedeman.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.985942 | 715 | 1.8125 | 2 |
Photo: Elena Poniatowska & Others Protest Murder of MX Journalists
Some 50 writers, poets, journalists and defenders of freedom of expression, both Mexicans and foreigners, invited by PEN International, condemned the murders of 67 journalists in this country over the last decade.
At the meeting were members of the delegation headed by the president of PEN International, John Ralston, as well as Mexican writers Elena Poniatowska, Laura Esquivel, Homero Aridjis, Ramon Xirau, Marta Lamas, Eduardo Lizalde and others.
Dozens of writers spoke out to demand an end to the impunity of organized crime and the ineptitude of the authorities to crack down on its murderous gunmen.
“We’re joined together here today to say the violence must end. And we are together here to tell the United States that its drug consumption and its drug and arms trafficking are an important part of the problem,” Ralston said in his speech.
Ralston demanded an end to the violence, that the necessary legal changes be made, that corruption in public life associated with crime be dealt with, and that the army continue to operate under a legal statute that protects it.
Homero Aridjis recalled that the number of deaths in the fight against the cartels has risen to more than 50,000, so many that the murders of journalists go unnoticed and the crimes unpunished.
“Mexico is a country where there are murders but no murderers,” he said.
“Telling the truth in Mexico puts your life in danger,” Elena Poniatowska said. “Until when will practicing journalism be a death sentence in this country? How long do we have to wait for the authorities to offer real guarantees that effectively protect life and the profession?”
Mexico’s independent National Human Rights Commission, or CNDH, says that 75 reporters have been killed since 2000 and several more have been reported missing.
Nine journalists were killed in 2011 alone, according to the CNDH.
In October, the U.N. rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, Frank La Rue, said Mexico is the deadliest country in the Americas and fifth most dangerous country worldwide for members of the media.
The killings have been attributed to organized crime and rogue public officials.
Founded in 1921, PEN International is a global writers’ association that promotes intellectual cooperation and friendship among its members.
An acronym for poets, essayists and novelists, PEN now also includes other writers such as journalists and historians. | <urn:uuid:3903b348-bb6e-446a-abad-acf2c75198d7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.hispanicallyspeakingnews.com/latino-daily-news/details/some-of-mexicos-most-renown-writers-condemn-killing-of-journalists/13657/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947524 | 545 | 1.742188 | 2 |
The WRRC Programmme helped support the participation of VNC partners to the fourth WLUML Feminist Leadership Institute in Senegal in 2009, which was a two-week long training institute which brought together WHRDs from Asia, Africa, the Middle East and diasporas with sessions on media, human rights, rights within Islam, sexuality, and advocacy in Muslim contexts.
The Workshop - one of the activities of the SWG Year 3 Workplan - was for Asian project partners and SWG members. Another Workshop was organized for African project partners and SWG members in December 2011 in Lagos, Nigeria.
This project was implemented by Women Workers Help Line (WWHL), an organisation that has been working in Pakistan to promote women’s social, political and economic rights, including campaigns for the repeal of all discriminatory laws against women. In this project, WWHL provided capacity building, leadership training and knowledge dissemination for women peasants, for whom land rights are closely linked to issues of food sovereignty. A charter of demand for women’s rights to land and property was drawn up after consultations with different stakeholders, social movements and NGOs.
This project was implemented by Human Angle, an organisation that has been working in Nigeria to protect the right of widows to inherit their deceased husbands’ estate, without being dispossessed by their in-laws. Human Angle uses the following ways to achieve this aim:
BAOBAB for Women's Human Rights hosted the Sexuality Workshop held for African Partners from December 12-16, 2010 in Lagos, Nigeria. A total of 18 partners including one logistics person were in attendance. The overall workshop objective was to consolidate the projects executed by African Partners under the MDG 3 grant awarded to Women Under Muslim Laws (WLUML) and Institute for Women’s Empowerment (IWE), discuss ways forward and build synergies across different countries implementing the project. The following planned outcomes were achieved from the project:
BAOBAB for Women’s Human Rights (Nigeria) in collaboration with the Association for Progressive Communication (South Africa) - with support from Women’s Living Under Muslim Laws - convened a Capacity Building Training for the Women Reclaiming & Redefining Cultures (WRRC) working group members on Strategic E-Campaigning from June 7th – 9th 2010 in Lagos, Nigeria. Nineteen women from Nigeria, Senegal, The Gambia, London, Niger, Canada and Sudan participated in the training.
The Strategic e-Campaigning Workshop was held in Asia as part of the Violence is Not Our Culture campaign being managed by the Women Redefining and Reclaiming Culture Programme (WRRC) and the Women Living Under Muslim Laws (WLUML) international solidarity network.
The Regional Coordination Office for Africa and the Middle East of the Women under Muslim Laws Network (WLUML-RCO/AME) organized a workshop on the topic of sexuality and sexual rights in Rabat, Morocco from May 5-8, 2009. This regional meeting, which examined the issue of “Sexuality and Sexual Rights”, drew some two dozen participants from a wide range of countries, including Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Sudan, Senegal, Nigeria, Egypt, Uganda, RDC Congo, Lebanon and Pakistan.
In 2010-2011, Salmmah Women’s Resource Center in Sudan followed up on their previous year’s project under WRRC on sexual harassment, which had aimed to raise awareness, collect baseline data, inform policy makers of the underlying contributing factors, and suggest examples of measures to adopt for effective remedy. | <urn:uuid:10d860a6-ec26-450a-84c4-dcff33333089> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wluml.org/zh-hant/archive/wrrc/results/taxonomy-300 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948987 | 739 | 1.796875 | 2 |
This is ONE OF 3 responses to VC 24 Roger 2 ("Rodney King Jury")...
Your statement is more than "somewhat paraphrased"! I don't know of any responsible source who feels the jurors in the Rodney King trial deserve "death threats." But most people in this country were shocked and dismayed by their verdict.
Is that really so hard to understand? Put the infamous video aside for a moment. Consider the testimony of other LA police officers that the beating clearly violated regulations. Even chief Gates, himself a borderline fascist, found the tape "revolting and unconscionable." Consider the repeated blatant racist statements by several of the officers in front of many witnesses. Consider also the comments of the sole Hispanic juror who said the white jurors had made up their mind before the trial even began.
And what of the videotape? I found it curious that you should refer to it as a "one-sided" videotape. This tape does not have a "side"; it simply records a crowd of white police officers beating (and beating and beating) a black man who is lying face down on the pavement. It was not edited, not dramatized for television. It was simply pointed in one direction and turned on.
Given all this, it is only natural that we should question the verdict of this jury. And the issue here, of course, is not just this one decision but a continuing pattern which strongly suggests that there are two standards of justice in this country, one for the whites and one for the rest.
I don't think anyone is naive enough to believe that the jury system is infallible. What we have been taught, however, is that although jurors are only human and are quite capable of making mistakes, the system as a whole is impartial. This is why lady justice is depicted as wearing a blindfold. At the very least, she is supposed to be color blind.
The anger felt by many in the black community is that again and again blacks defendants are found guilty far more often then their white counterparts, and are punished far more severely. Finally, an all too typical case of police brutality was caught on film for all the world to see. And still the white men were set free.
As citizens of this country we have every right to question a justice system that can be so easily manipulated. And we ignore the underlying racism at our peril. | <urn:uuid:959210fa-0500-4833-84a4-7a1e98c61cd8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cartania.com/archipelago/v24/vc24john14.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979358 | 489 | 1.53125 | 2 |
WITH Osama bin Laden so much in the news, there's renewed interest in the mysterious death three years ago of Carlos Mavroleon, 40. The aristocratic journalist, a convert to Islam, was in Peshawar, Pakistan, trying to land an interview with the terror mastermind for "60 Minutes" when he died in his hotel room of a heroin overdose. He apparently had bought a stethoscope and tried to sneak across the border as a doctor. Mavroleon was arrested and briefly imprisoned in Pakistan, where he spent $500 in bribes to secure a private cell and make sure his equipment wasn't stolen. Police found no signs of foul play and ruled the death an accident.
World renowned journalist Carlos Mavroleon was killed in the course of duty in 1998. This short film is a tribute to one of the most popular, talented and daring journalists the freelance community has ever known.
by: David Dienstag
...In the cold night air of Do Bandi, I was tucked in the tightest fetal position I have been in since birth. But my feet were freezing. I put my wool pakula hat over them but it was not enough. Now my head was cold. It was too cold to sleep. My mind's theater spun on. Everything about Afghanistan seemed to be a contradiction of some sort. It was August and I was cold. There were houses and I was sleeping outside. I was using my hat for my feet. But there were larger contradictions that had much greater consequences. I thought of my friend, Carlos Mavroleon.
I first met Carlos in the lobby of the Roosevelt Hotel in NY in 1985. I was there to show the flag for a small lobbying organization that I worked for that was in support of the Mujaheddin. We didn't have a mission so much as we needed to be present in solidarity with an Afghan mission to the UN. I was talking with a Hizbi Islami political officer when Carlos walked right up and volunteered to the delegation seated around us. He spoke at length in Pashto. Volunteering to fight in Afghanistan was rare enough among Americans. I was one of the few who had. But conversing in Pashto was rare indeed and right away everyone including myself asked "who is this guy?"
He wore an old army M-79 jacket, very much out of place in a posh mid town hotel like the Roosevelt. But it was absolutely the right fashion to join with the Mujaheddin. I was struck by this subtle prescience. Every member of the delegation was not only fascinated by him, they fixed their attention on him like smiling cobras. They simply forgot that I was there. It was very frustrating given my intentions. But Carlos and I became fast friends.
Carlos had an Etonian English accent and sounded like a spitfire pilot in a WWII movie. Half Greek, Half Iranian, he was strikingly good looking and had a natural air of cool confidence that masked some deep inner tragedy with a pencil-thin-mustache-smile. The whole impression was out of its time and made no sense but it worked. Carlos was a master of appearances. You could never fathom a person like that, only accept him and exchanged friendship. Like so many friends I had in those days, there were a lot of questions that occurred to me that I didn't ask. In those days, so many things didn't make sense, you'd get tired of wondering, or asking. You just accepted it, made a note of it, and pushed on.
There were so many bigger questions to concentrate on. Why did the CIA actively oppose air defense weapons for the Mujaheddin for six years while Afghans were being mauled by Soviet helicopters? It was one of those contradictions. The director, William Casey, was known to be a passionate anti communist. But his Deputy director, John McMahon, lobbied vigorously against the shipping of redeye missiles to the Mujaheddin. Why?
Years later, I ran into Carlos in Peshawar. I didn't recognize him. He was dressed as a Pashtun tribesman. He cautioned me not to call him "Carlos", the name I knew him as. His new name was "Kareemullah" now and he was a fighting cadre of Younis Khalis, an enigmatic political leader/warlord who operated on the road from Khyber to Khost and was among the first of the Mujaheddin to be exposed to Arabs beginning to flood into Afghanistan. He numbered Arabs in the thousands and said that most Afghans hated them. He said that they frequently lectured Afghans about God and religion, something no Afghan needs to learn about. They would descend upon a village and buy every scrap of food in it, consume it wastefully and leave nothing behind for other Mujaheddin. No American intelligence officer seemed especially concerned about it. Embassy spooks insisted that their numbers were no more than a hundred or so in spite of reports and indications of much greater numbers. Even more alarming they were extremely anti American and even engaged in fire fights with other native Mujaheddin more than they fought Russians. They were concentrated with Professor Sayaaf and Gul Buddin Heckmatyer, both well known to be Islamic radicals who were well supplied by the CIA in spite of venemous anti west rhetoric. Gul Buddin was famous for his friendship with Charlie Wilson, a congressman from Texas who steered congressional efforts for Afghanistan. They seemed to be good friends by the congressman's own account. Then Gul Buddin would go back to Pakistan and go back to his hateful rhetoric. Another contradiction.
I told Carlos aka Kareemullah of the Washington paradox and he told me of the Arab problem, both with the blessing of the CIA. He couldn't quite believe me and I couldn't quite believe him. We were both anti communist zealots and were uncomfortable in the mold of conspiracy theorists. That was a playground for liberals, not us. I shivered in the cold mountain air wondering, shivering and lost in a war of contradictions.
Sunday August 20, 2000
Peshawar is a rough town. Its bazaars are thick with suppressed violence and its traders rarely smile. Five times a day the call to prayer howls through the air in a clatter of static and guttural vowels. At night the roads rattle with automatic gunfire and it is impossible to tell if there has been a wedding or an assassination.
Many people die in Peshawar, violently or otherwise. Nobody chooses to end their days there. No one asks for his ashes to be scattered in the churned mud of the Storytellers Bazaar or from the battlements of the Purana Qila, the old fort. To the west of the city, the Khyber Pass leads up through the dusty, rocky hills of the Hindu Kush towards the border with Afghanistan. When the pollution above the city clears, the hills are sharp against a very blue sky. But they are gritty, sullen mountains and no traveller wants his bones to lie among them.
Carlos Mavroleon didn’t want to die here. Certainly not in the small, claustrophobic hotel room where they found his heroin-soaked body, on 27 August 1998. Carlos didn’t want to die anywhere. Perhaps more than at any other time in his incredible life, Carlos wanted to be alive.
He had packed it in to his 40 years. The old Etonian heir to a £100m fortune, he had been a war correspondent, a Wall Street broker, a lover of glamorous women from glamorous political dynasties (the Kennedys) and from less glamorous ones (the Heseltines). He had been a cool, gimlet-eyed war reporter, blowing off the tension of his assignments in the bars and clubs of Notting Hill. He had commanded a unit of Afghan Mujahideen against the Red Army and had been a bodyguard for a Pakistani tribal chief. And, for most of his adult life, Carlos had been a regular user of speed, coke, Ecstasy, heroin and enough pharmaceutical products to stock a large, if specialised, chemist.
But through it all, it seems, he knew what he was doing. Carlos was rarely, if ever, out of control. He pushed it to the edge, looked over - and came back again. And again and again and again. Except in Peshawar on that stinking hot August day two years ago.
On 7 August 1998, two massive blasts devastated the American embassies in Tanzania and Kenya and killed more than 200 people. American investigators followed the trail of the bombers from East Africa to Pakistan and on, via Peshawar, into eastern Afghanistan. Thirteen days after the explosions, President Clinton launched 75 cruise missiles against the camps that the CIA believed were run by Osama Bin Laden, the terrorist mastermind supposedly behind the attacks. It was called, slightly optimistically, Operation Infinite Reach, and successfully killed a dozen or so young Pakistanis who were training in the camps as well several blameless old men and a large number of goats. When the missiles went in, I was in Kandahar, a fiercely Islamic city in the desert south of Afghanistan. We heard of the attack at about midnight and I spent much of the night filing to my newspaper. It was only at dawn that I really began to realise the situation. We sat tight in the United Nations compound and listened to the radio and the chanting from the mosque.
Feelings ran high in the aftermath of the strike. In Kandahar, it took a long speech from the most senior cleric in the city to stop the mob marching on us. In Kabul, the capital 300 miles to the north, two UN peacekeepers were machine-gunned, one fatally. There were huge demonstrations against the Americans across Pakistan. Reports started circulating in Peshawar that a bounty of $15,000 had been offered by Bin Laden for dead Westerners.
Carlos was staying with his family at his father’s seaside home in Athens when the missiles went in. He arrived back at his flat in Fulham, west London, to find 12 messages winking at him on the answerphone. Carlos was known to other journalists as a ’shithole specialist’. The worse the war, the deeper the poverty, the nastier the place, the better Carlos liked it. His favourite shithole was Afghanistan. The calls on his answerphone can’t have been unexpected. He rang CBS, the American TV network, to accept an assignment for their flagship Sixty Minutes programme. Leslie Cockburn, the producer at CBS, knew him well. ‘I can’t imagine why you are calling,’ he joked when he called her. ‘By the way, I have a multiple Afghan visa.’
CBS wanted him to get to Peshawar as soon as possible to try to get to the camps. The hardline Taliban militia who ruled much of Afghanistan - including the bit I was stuck in - were not letting any journalists into Afghanistan. To get into the country would mean travelling in disguise. It would be very risky. Even a team of Afghan journalists had been badly beaten up and narrowly escaped execution when they tried the same exercise. But if anyone could pull it off, he could. Carlos called his fiancée, a 26-year-old TV researcher who he was due to marry in November, and then rang his father. ‘Don’t worry, papa, I’ll be careful,’ he told him. He packed his gear, picked up a $5,000 expenses advance and flew straight out to Pakistan on Emirates first class. He arrived in Peshawar on 23 August and checked into Green’s hotel just off the central Saddar Bazaar. He had four days to live.
Saddar police station is only a mile from Green’s hotel. Ten days after Carlos’ death a smiling detective called Nisar Ali Marwat flicked a brown file on to his glass-topped desk and told me to read it. Under a slowly rotating fan, I leafed through the badly typed pages. A heavily moustached sergeant brought sweet, milky tea in stained cups. Another, sitting on a broken chair behind me, played with his handgun while I read, emptying and refilling the magazine with small, snub-nosed bullets.
The death certificate was numbered 83/98. It gave the cause of death as ‘Heroin poisoning (self)’. The autopsy was conducted at 8am on 28 August by Professor Inayatur Rehman Khalil of the Khyber Medical College, Peshawar. Time of death: between 18 and 24 hours before the time of the autopsy. Carlos’s body was fully rigormortised and showed no visible signs of violence. All organs were normal. The face and upper part of the chest were ‘livid’. There was a blood-stained discharge from the right nostril. The left arm showed a prick-mark in the ante-cubital region and an insulin syringe contaminated with blood lay beside the body. The syringe tested positive for diacetyl morphine (heroin). Carlos’s stomach also tested weakly for diacetyl morphine. There were three small packets of drugs in the room. One, opened, was diacetyl morphine. The second was crude powdered opium. The third was an antihistamine tranquilizer called chlorophenaramine maleate.
According to the police statements, Carlos was sitting upright on his bed when he was found, a cigarette between his lips. The bloody syringe was on the coffee table in front of him. There was also a blackened coin. He had died of ‘heroin asphyxiation’.
A press photograph taken of his body as it was removed from the hotel shows a swarthy, good-looking man with tight, black curly hair that made him look much younger than his 40 years and a lean, muscular body. He was stripped to the waist when he died and was wearing baggy, local-style trousers.
Another sheet of paper listed his belongings: satellite phone and spare battery, camera charger, British passport B451472, small video camera, Leatherman-style knife/tool, Sony audio recorder, first-aid kit, Maglite torch, tripod and head, Sony shortwave radio stethoscope, four syringes, duty-free pack of Marlboro Lights, sewing kit, video camera battery packs and charger, two shalwar kameez (local baggy trouser and shirt), white local prayer cap, local leather sandals, Holy Koran (translation), books of Islamic history - four, $1,800 in $100 bills, $2,400 in $50 bills, and 12,265 Pakistani rupees [£150].
I read the list and looked up at Nisar Ali Marwat. The man behind me had put his pistol away. The tea cups had left oily stains on the glass of his desk. He shrugged.
When ‘Bluey’ Mavroleon said goodbye to his son for the last time he cannot have been too reassured by his promise to be careful. Carlos may have been kind, brave, intelligent and charming. But, by ordinary standards, he was not careful.
But then Carlos had never lived by ordinary standards. He was born in April 1958 and grew up in the rarefied air of real high society, not the ersatz Hello! version. His father is a Greek shipping tycoon who was once married to Somerset Maugham’s granddaughter Camilla. She eventually left him, when Carlos was three, for Count Freddy Chandon, head of the champagne house Moët et Chandon. Carlos’s mother, Giaconda, is Mexican. His brother, Nicky, is married to the filmstar Barbara Carrera. The family fortune is estimated at £100m. Carlos’s address book contained phone numbers for Fawn Hall, the secretary at the heart of the Iran-Contra affair and an old flame, Barbara Streisand and Christina Onassis. He went out with Annabel Heseltine, the journalist daughter of the former deputy prime minister for two years. She wanted to marry him. When it became clear that something awful had happened to Carlos, Ethel Kennedy, wife of Bobby senior, rang the White House to find out exactly what was wrong.
In 1979, Bluey inherited the family fortune. Carlos grew up in London’s Eaton and Cadogan squares and was sent to Eton but, though he did well, hated it. He started to rebel, at first in the ordinary ways; with left-wing politics, music that his parents wouldn’t like, soft drugs and drink. But as ever he soon left the ordinary far behind. At 14, he left his privileged world and signed himself into a London comprehensive.
After two years of taking a lot of LSD and indulging in ‘industrial scale shoplifting’, he told his parents he was going to the southwest of France to stay with friends. There were no phones, he said, so they wouldn’t hear from him for at least two weeks. He had calculated that would give him enough time to get free. He planned to head to Burma and smuggle rubies.
He got as far as Pakistan. High in the Hindu Kush foothills, close to the border with Afghanistan, in lands that are barely controlled by the current Pakistani administration let alone by the British Raj, Carlos did odd jobs - including bodyguard and labourer, learned to speak the guttural language of the Pashto tribesmen who looked after him and converted to Islam. He never contacted his family. They gave him up for dead.
After nearly two years, he returned to Britain and Belgravia, thin, sick and still restless. His family welcomed him back, hopeful that his youthful wanderlust was sated. Carlos worked hard to get his A levels, but played hard, too. He moved from amphetamines and acid to heroin. Before long, he had picked up a serious habit which he never entirely shook.
He may have been reckless, but he wasn’t stupid. He crammed at Millfield, a top public school, and got a place at Princeton University. Not satisfied with that, he applied to Harvard and, on the strength of a successful interview and a fistful of forged references, got in to read politics. With his money and connections, he was soon mixing with the best of America’s East Coast society. He was a favoured guest of the Kennedy clan. He had an affair with Mary Richardson, who later married Bobby Jnr, and a short fling with Fawn Hall.
From Harvard he went on to Wall Street. It was the 80s and Carlos, intelligent, well-connected and bold, did well. He lived in Manhattan. He made a lot of money. And spent much of it on cocaine and heroin.
And yet it wasn’t enough. By 1985, the attractions of his Manhattan lifestyle had palled. He flew to Islamabad - the capital of Pakistan - and drove up to Peshawar. It was then the main headquarters and logistics base for the guerrilla groups. He introduced himself to them and convinced them to take him into Afghanistan. It was his first taste of war. Within months of returning to America he had sold the New York apartment and was on his way back to the sub-continent. He was 26.
A canal runs through Peshawar. It is full of refuse and dead animals, but the children play in it anyway. By the banks of the canal, in a bungalow set back behind high walls and a courtyard, is the Afghan Media Resource Centre (AMRC). Throughout the Afghan war, it funded journalists’ trips into Afghanistan and disseminated the material they collected. It is widely believed to have been set up and supported by the CIA. Carlos used to sleep on its floor between trips ‘inside’.
One of the films they have at the AMRC was taken in June 1988 near the eastern Afghan city of Jalalabad. I watched it an hour or so after reading through the police report on Carlos’s death. A keen young Afghan projected it on to the only wall not covered in pictures of blown up tanks, dead guerrillas or Russian soldiers, burned out villages and downed helicopters.
First the camera pans across a field full of Mujahideen fighters. They are waiting to go into action, squatting with their weapons in lines in the sun or standing in the shade of trees. In the background are the mountains typical of eastern Afghanistan. The film flickers, jumps and weaves. A bearded, grinning Carlos appears.
‘My name is Karimullah,’ he says, his voice deep and unaccented. He is wearing the pakol - the beret-like woollen cap of northern Pakistan and Afghanistan - and has four curved magazines and an AK47 slung across his shoulders. He is a head taller than everyone else. His new name means ‘blessed by God’.
‘I am a Mujahideen,’ he continues. ‘We are making an attack today on the city of Jalalabad. All the Mujahideen commanders have come together for this attack. I am very happy and proud to be with my Mujahideen brothers. Allahu Akbar. God is great.’ Karimullah then continues in fluent Pashto. ‘I am from London. In London I fought the Jihad with a pen. Now I fight it with a sword. I have come to Afghanistan to take part in the Jihad.’
The cameraman asks if when the Jihad is over Carlos/Karimullah will bring his family to Afghanistan. ‘Inshallah [God willing],’ he replies with a broad smile. Carlos had arrived in Peshawar three years previously. At first he had been involved in the political side of the Mujahideen’s struggle, handling foreign journalists and visiting American VIPs, but the urge to be physically involved in the action became too strong. By 1988, he was an experienced fighter and, according to former comrades-in-arms, a good one.
‘When you go into battle, you do what you are told. Karimullah would do whatever he was asked and do it well,’ said one former comrade. Several former fighters said that by the end of his time in Afghanistan, Carlos was in charge of a dozen men and was running ambushes by himself. He was always in the thick of any action and even prayed longer and harder than his comrades. One former Mujahideen remembered how Carlos had gone outside for dawn prayers in a freezing gale and had returned wet through. ‘We laughed at him when he came back in, but he just said “Ahumdilallah [God be praised]”, and lay down again.’
In 1989, the Soviets pulled out. The war carried on as the guerrillas took on the Moscow-backed government’s forces, but Carlos was becoming disillusioned with the infighting among the various groups. It was time to reinvent himself again. He returned to London and within months had metamorphosed into a war correspondent. At the end of his time in Afghanistan he had worked as a cameraman and had shot footage of frontline action. With that, and his languages and charm, the work was soon rolling in. In 1991, he was in Oman trying to sneak, in disguise, into Kuwait during the Gulf War. He failed, but succeeded in getting into northern Iraq a few months later. The next assignment was Somalia, then the Sudan, Burma, Angola, Rwanda and back to Afghanistan. On several occasions, he found himself back in Peshawar. Twice he tried and failed to use his connections with the Mujahideen to get access to Osama Bin Laden.
In the early 90s, he made a number of trips to Somalia for the American networks. Tim Deagle, a journalist who had worked with Carlos in East Africa, said their time together had revealed Carlos as ‘a seriously good human being’. ‘Despite everything we saw - and we saw hundreds of dead bodies in a day - he never lost his compassion. We went into one village and there were about three people left uninjured and he went around giving out first aid and looking after people. Most would have just taken their pictures and left.’
Yet there was a spirit of recklessness in Carlos, a flamboyance, that seemed never to die. Deagle remembered his colleague insisted on a lunch-stop during a particularly chaotic moment during the fighting. ‘He had found two lobsters, so we stopped in a field hospital with an army withdrawing around us and cooked them up and ate them with bayonets.’
On another occasion, Deagle found Carlos standing on top of a jeep with a pistol in his hand, a huge stack of dollars in the other and a crowd of angry Somali gunmen around him. ‘NBC and ABC had asked him to pay off the people they had hired for protection. Carlos told them all they had to pray before he would pay them. You or I would have been executed on the spot, but he got away with it. He always did.’
In between trips, he had a number of relationships - ‘women just flocked to him’ according to his brother - and took a lot of cocaine. He spent time in the clubs and bars of Chelsea and Notting Hill. He read dozens of books, usually classics, and read and re-read TE Lawrence’s Seven Pillars of Wisdom . He wrote book reviews for the Literary Review . Almost always he managed to keep his addiction hidden. Colleagues who he worked with closely for years never saw him take drugs. There are hints though that he did. Several people in Peshawar told me that he had got into an argument with an Afghan journalist after smoking heroin in Jalalabad. It was in 1996 after a second failed attempt to find Bin Laden. It seems Carlos didn’t cope with disappointment well.
Green’s hotel is gloomy and claustrophobic. Poor backpackers and wealthy Pakistanis stay there, not journalists working for American networks. Carlos’s room cost £8 a night and was on the third floor facing east. From its small window there was a view of tangled electricity wires and roofs.
Carlos arrived in Peshawar on the evening of Sunday 23 August. He dumped his bags and walked a hundred or so yards to the office of The News - a local paper - to catch up with Rahimullah Yusufzai, a Pathan reporter who knows everyone and everything. If Osama Bin Laden wants to talk to the Western world he gives a statement to Rahimullah. So do the Taliban.
Rahimullah knew Carlos from the time of the Afghan war and was generous with his advice. He was happy to talk over the various ways to get to the bombed camps, even though he was trying to work out how to reach them himself. Yusufzai told Carlos what he must have suspected: that his only chance was to disguise himself as a local and work his way through the mountains and across the border. The best place to try, Rahimullah said, was from the small town of Miram Shah which is only a score or so miles from the camps themselves. The next day Carlos hired a car - a big Toyota pick-up - and a driver and set off. By nightfall he was at Bannu, a dusty town on the edge of the mountains, by late afternoon on the next day he was in Miram Shah itself.
Within hours he was picked up by Pakistani intelligence services. It was the evening of Tuesday the 25th. Though the Pakistani spooks didn’t touch him, they scared him. The whole of the country was jittery after the strikes and the intelligence services were more jumpy than anyone. Despite his credentials, he must have had a hard job convincing his interrogators of his true identity and purpose. After a tense and sleepless night he was put on a bus back to Peshawar. As he was not found to be in the possession of heroin when picked up on Tuesday evening, it is fair to assume that he bought the drug after his release from custody.
Around 7.30pm the next day, Cockburn, his producer, began calling Carlos’s satellite phone. It rang out every time. By the evening, she was very anxious. She called Green’s and was told that Carlos had his key and was in his room which was locked. She kept trying the sat’phone. Eventually the hotel staff used a master key to open the door of the room. Carlos was dead on the bed. He had died a few hours earlier.
I arrived in Peshawar on the day Carlos died. After three days stuck in the UN compound while the authorities tried to restrain angry mobs in the streets we were finally evacuated by the UN back to Pakistan and I had driven up to Peshawar to cover the story of the missile strikes’ fall-out from there. After only a few hours in the city, a local newspaper editor, Faisal Quazi, called me on my mobile to ask if I knew anything about the dead British cameraman.
That evening, Peter Jouvenal, a veteran cameraman who knew Carlos from the days of the Afghan war, mentioned over a drink that the dead man had been to Eton. Suddenly everyone wanted an answer to the same question: how did a man with so much end up dying in such a mean and sordid way? Two year’s on there is still no good answer. And, as a result, though the authorities have officially closed the file, there are many who believe that the bald facts of the police report and the post-mortem are concealing something more sinister.
One thing everyone seems to agree on is that Carlos would have been unlikely to have accidentally overdosed. Nicky Mavroleon pointed out that his brother was an experienced drug user. ‘Carlos used to tell me that to him it was like having a drink. When he was having a good time he just wanted to get high… but he always knew what he was doing,’ he said. Carlos did have a doctorate in drugs and he was far from unused to the vagaries of the local Peshawar heroin.
Also, everyone seems to agree Carlos had not injected for years. Not since 1993 according to his doctor. He had been put off by a friend dying of Aids some years before, his father said. Would he suddenly switch back to syringes? Particularly if, as the police suggest, he had already been smoking the drug.
Could he have committed suicide? Rahimullah Yusufzai saw him shortly before he died and said that though he was shaken by his ordeal at the hands of the intelligence men he was not too worried. A CNN cameraman who bumped into him in a Peshawar street later that day said, with no pun intended, that he ’seemed full of beans, really on a high’.
‘He told us how he had been in prison and seemed to think that it was all very amusing,’ the cameraman said. ‘He had a cutting from a local paper that said that he was a British spy which he said he was going to have framed.’
Everybody who knew him said he was planning to settle down and was as happy as he had ever been. He was to marry in the autumn and was, according to his father, ‘devoted’ to his fiancée. He had also never entirely lost his Muslim faith and in Islam suicide is as great a sin as it is in Catholicism.
And it seems strange that he would be taking drugs at all. As an old south Asian hand, he must have known that, at least following his arrest, he would almost certainly be under surveillance? Would he have bought the heroin anyway? So would an experienced drug-user make a major mistake using a method he had given up at a time of his life when more than anything he wanted to be clean and happy?
The answer has to be yes. If the suicide scenario is rejected, as it has to be, and the accidental overdose explanation is thrown out too, you are left with nothing but half-baked conspiracy theories. We know that he was tailed throughout his stay in Peshawar and that Green’s hotel staff were interrogated by intelligence men both before and after his death. And we know that he was suspected of being a spy. And we can assume the intelligence services, who were tailing him, knew he had bought drugs. But Peshawar breeds conspiracy theories. The basic fact is that there are easier ways to kill someone than making them inject themselves with a deadly syringe. You have to apply Occam’s Razor. What is more plausible - an accidental suicide or a plot involving spooks and forced overdoses? In the end, all that you are left with is a grieving family, a brown file on a police chief’s desk, a dozen badly typed sheets of paper and the pathologist’s ‘Heroin poisoning (self)’. The most likely scenario is that a bitterly disappointed Carlos turned to the stand-by which had always helped him when he was feeling low. Relatives say that despite his amazing life he actually had very low self-esteem. The heroin was a prop when he felt down.
And that afternoon in Peshawar the disappointment must have been acute. He desperately wanted the assignment to work. To have got the footage from the camps would have made him a media star. He was 40, wanted children, wanted to settle down and wanted some conventional respect from his more conventional peers. And having, in the last few years, watched reporters like Carlos working in Iraq, in Sierra Leone, in half a dozen other such places, I have seen, and felt the sense of heroic difference, the adolescent joy at your distance from the nine-to-five, from the office, from the suits. Heroin gives you that distance, too. If, when he returned to Green’s hotel, Carlos momentarily lacked it he wouldn’t for long. To start with he would have felt a mellow, sleepy high as the drug triggered the release of dopamine in his brain. It is quite likely that, if he started off smoking the drug, he would welcome the rush of an injection straight into the bloodstream. If you haven’t been using the drug for a while the rush is, one regular heroin user tells me, intensified. A wave of contentment overcomes you. Things stop mattering. For Carlos, by the late afternoon of 27 August 1998, as the towers of Peshawar’s mosques stretched their shadows across the superheated roofs of the city and the loudspeakers crackled into the Maghreb prayer, nothing mattered at all.
I left Pakistan earlier this year. Every week I get calls from old friends and contacts in Peshawar and Islamabad. Recently, I have been asking if anything new has turned up on Carlos’s death. People have forgotten it now, and these days I am offered friendly advice rather than information. ‘Let sleeping ghosts lie,’ said one police officer I know.
If Carlos has a ghost it is unlikely to be sleeping.
Melik Kaylan says that nothing is as it seems in Peshawar, except sex, drugs and death
IMAGINE history as a sort of turbulent Greek goddess with a fatal attraction for certain of the world's storied cities. These cities tend to be located in ancient sites of great beauty and huge strategic import. Time and again she likes to revisit them and linger with a vengeance. Result: war without and intrigue within, porous borders, arms dealers, spies, femmes fatales, extremists, smugglers and, these days, the inevitable swarm of boozy correspondents. Beirut was a lurid recent example. And before that Havana, Saigon, Vienna, Istanbul. My nomination for the next such entrepot is Peshawar, the capital of the old North-west Frontier Province in Pakistan, adjacent to the Khyber Pass. I've just returned from a two-week stint there and the signs are unmistakable. In that short time I was shot at, arrested at a border post, subjected to a 6.4 Richter-scale earthquake, and told repeatedly by fruityaccented locals that 'Peshawar could be a dangerous place' for someone like me.
I went to Peshawar to research a documentary about the mysterious death there a year ago of a friend of mine, the CBS reporter Carlos Mavroleon, from a purported heroin overdose. It was, I soon realised, a task not unlike that of Joseph Cotten, who trawls through the labyrinths of postwar Vienna in The Third Man, searching for his friend Harry Lime. Except that the war wasn't quite over in Peshawar. During my first days I noticed warplanes rushing about overhead, especially in the radiant early-morning skies when they always seemed to head in the same direction, fully loaded with bombs. I was told by knowledgable locals that these were Pakistan Air Force fighter-bombers of Chinese design bound for sorties into Afghanistan - sorties in aid of the Taliban, that is. They were off to bomb the bases of Ahmed Shah Masood, the Taliban's last remaining foe who still holds out stubbornly in the Panshir mountains.
Naturally, neither Pakistan nor Peshawar is engaged officially in a war with anyone - not in Afghanistan, not in Kashmir. That, too, is an important part of the entrepot syndrome. Large chunks of the visible reality are not there officially. The air fairly groans with the weight of open secrets, even of the more commonor-garden variety, pertaining, say, to the smuggling of guns or narcotics, which are visible everywhere in Peshawar (more so than alcohol, which is illegal for all Muslims). Gun shops proliferate in the city's endless crumbling bazaars, competing with Astrakhan hat shops, shalwar-kameez tailors, lapis lazuli dealers, spice sellers and open-air butchers. On the outskirts, a whole neighbourhood is given over to the famous armaments souk, offering anything from rocket-propelled grenades to homemade Uzis to Kalashnikovs for rent at f tO a day. You can try them out on the mud walls behind the shop stalls.
Similarly, the drugs trade burgeons daily because of the Aghan civil war's need for financing. Cheap heroin, cut with potent and often lethal additives such as silverpolish powder, sells for pennies at street corners. (Hard to get the good stuff, say officials, as it is all exported.) Peshawar has become a city full of addicts. Some are pasty-faced foreigners in the last outpost of the hippie trail, hair mostly cropped to guard against lice but often still sporting the old rope shoulder-bags. They're often incongruously dressed in white. In contrast, the local addicts are dirt-smeared, desperate, diseased. Like so much of the city's infrastructure, they seem to be crumbling into dust, squatting in rags along the grassy disused railway lines. And there is in Peshawar, as in all these entrepots, a highly intelligent and charming chief of police, who presides with great humour over this pageant, always exceedingly helpful, always ready to have a chat. Every time he smiles and raises his eyebrows in a gesture of helplessness, he invites you, in effect, to share complicity in the charade of open secrets.
But even if one ignores the warplanes and gun shops, one could be forgiven for thinking that Peshawar is in a state of near-war just by the number of legally armed men on its dust-choked streets. One local newspaper estimated that the Pakistani government runs ten different official police and militia forces in the North-West Frontier zone. Admittedly, the area was always an armed camp, the nearby Khyber Pass being the conduit for every variety of nefarious cross-border activity down the centuries. That a large number of the soldiers, often heavily bewhiskered, still wear zesty tribal smocks crossed with bandoliers and topped by fancy turbans just goes to emphasise that warfare was ever the region's cheerful stock-in-trade.
Before the British, the Sikhs fought incessantly with the fierce local tribes. During the later Raj, even in the relatively peaceful interwar decades, the Khyber area was the only place that a British soldier knew he would see real action in India. Even today, in the tribal areas just beyond the city perimeter, government law formally gives way to tribal law. Everybody is armed, and one gets used to the sound of automatic gunfire wafting from there over the city at night - or one tries to. I slept badly. It's usually just a wedding, I was told. They fire into the air. Yes, but the local papers also told tales daily of whole families who had been slaughtered by intruders in their compound.
But all this is integral to the bright, melancholy and lethal allure of the entrepot. Charm is central to the ethos. A place like Brest Litovsk, for example, would never qualify. There has to be a whiff of ancien-regime elegance still in the environment, however decrepit, both in the architecture and in people's manners. That way the frequent outbreaks of barbarism can seem part of the texture, part of the exoticism, traditional even, hence more palatable to us outsiders. One local girl who dared make friends with a Feringhee (non-Muslim foreigner) a couple of years ago was found beheaded in her bedroom cupboard. That can easily be viewed as a cruel but time-honoured native custom. Similarly, the mouldering decay of the splendidly curlicued local architecture can seem organic to the place. In fact, it's caused chiefly by the vile diesel exhaust everywhere, especially from the luridly coloured, two-stroke, motorised rickshaws that infest the city like hornets.
Peshawar unfolds in a chaotic continuum: the warrens of old bazaars set into ancient wood buildings, the awful concrete sprawls, the mud-brick native areas and the tree-lined colonial suburbs. I stayed with friends in the latter area. Not in the old British cantonment but nearby, in University Town, which houses in white villas behind high walls NGOs, drug barons and the American Club, It was on a balmy night walking home from the club that my partner and I suddenly heard three loud shots not 30 yards from us, and a clicking in the leaves above. We froze, ducked slightly and waited. He's a veteran of the place. He said nothing, so neither did 1. Nothing more happened and we walked on homewards. We didn't mention it subsequently to anyone and I slept badly as usual.
Not two days later we were in the club bar, when the earthquake struck, and it happened at a bad time. The club won't admit Muslims of any nationality. As it happens, I'm American and Muslim-born in Turkey. I had to commit an embarrassing public apostasy in front of the surly doormen who, at first, had stubbornly refused me entry. In the Taliban-choked atmosphere of the area, that kind of thing can get around. I was already jittery when, some minutes later, the building hummed, then shook. Only for ten seconds or so but enough to drive us all out manically laughing into the night air.
Perhaps the native staff detected an element of divine retribution, for they were not amused. Or perhaps it was my imagination. That, too, is central to the entrepot experience. The local personnel, however ion _serving and apparently loyal, remain impenetrable in that Somerset Maughamish way. Many may indeed be spies for the government, as they certainly are in local hotels. But then one of the Americans drinking at the club was setting.up a cellphone network for the Afghan government. This at a time when the US placed an embargo on the Taliban and in a business venture that could never recoup the $10 million investment. How would the Afghans pay - with opium? So who was he working for?
In the entrepot, nothing is what it seems, nothing is quite real, until bullets and bombs impose the reality check. In the inbetween time, fantasy can blossom hysterically. On my last day, 1 went to Islamabad and stayed with a well-heeled family not far from the foreign embassies. Inside the house, I flirted racily with their tribal servant-girl, an extraordinary-looking creature with flame-coloured eyes. As she watched me from a window departing for the airport, a series of loud explosions came from a nearby building. Somebody had just fired mortar bombs at the American embassy.
16 ago 2007 [http://www.myspace.com/richardstanley13]
Dark out there. So dark.
Been raining so long I can't imagine it any other way.
And I'm alone at this keyboard and although I'd rather be asleep or getting laid or catching the sun some place I got no choice because there are things I have to tell you that can't wait. Things that concern our survival as a species in the long term and my survival in the here and now as a living, breathing blog writing film director with a thriving MySpace site and a bunch of irons in the production fire.
I knew this period would be a transient one and all the signs seem to indicate my tenure in this drowning city is drawing to an end at which point these postings will grow less frequent. I warned at the top there was an agenda at work here. A madness to my method. When I made my first posting a couple of months ago there were only a handful of you. I salute those who have been here long enough to recall the manifesto I ran at the beginning and welcome all who have found this site since. The virtual tribe now numbers more than six hundred souls, six hundred j-pegs in the shadow theatre in-box. Chickenfeed compared to the ten thousand plus views recorded for my last blogs. Enough to get myself corporate sponsorship were I that way inclined which I ain't. Ten thousand, silent hits. All but invisible. Could be anyone. Random google searches. Journalists looking for copy. Fans looking for gossip. Entertainment lawyers lookin' for action. Your mother. My mother. Ex-girlfriends. What have you. Except I have Spyware and various resources at my disposal such as Lauri Löytökoski in Finland who has been recording similar unidentified cyber traffic on the unofficial site
BETWEEN DEATH AND THE DEVIL@ www.everythingisundercontrol.org/nagtloper
and we know darn well what audience we're playing to. While much of the banter over the last weeks has been perfectly light hearted I dropped odd details into the blogs for reasons that may have seemed unclear at the time. This was because I have been aware there were bigger fish than you might imagine cruising these cyber-shallows. I now intend to introduce you to our nameless guests and make this blog's agenda clear.
Friends, fellow surfers, assembled skins of the virtual tribe I would like you to meet the hidden rulers of your world or at least their emissaries:-
And what does that stand for, you ask?
mil is for military, oh my brothers and whs is Washington Headquarters Services.
"WHS provides consolidated administrative and operational support to
several Defense Agencies, DoD Field Activities, the headquarters and various elements of the military departments, the White House, and to some degree Congress." - From Wikipedia
In case you doubt me ( which is only natural ) the IP address for wakko.whs.mil is 126.96.36.199.
OrgName: The Pentagon
Address: OPN-BM, Pentagon
Address: Rm BE884
Please step into the light, gentlemen ! Don't be shy.
Forgive the Spyware but some things are best dealt with in the open. I know we're all supposed to be on the same side but in this war you can never be too sure and if I have to stand alone against you then do not expect me to do so in silence. Not unless you do the honorable thing, unblock my credit cards and pay me off at which point I'll happily co-operate in any and all investigations, sign the official secrets act and never say another blessed word about it. Until then I have a reputation and a livelihood to defend.
Brothers and sisters, fellow Americans, tax payers one and all, meet your 'elected' government. The Pentagon, the White House and 'to some degree' Congress…
Not to mention their friends:-
ns.nic.ddn.mil / Defense Information Systems Agency
aos.arl.army.mil / U.S. Army Research Lab
My, my ! What a bunch! Step forward and take a bow !
The walking dude sends the ancient sign of greeting and welcomes you to his campfire.
Now you might be telling yourself I'm a natural paranoid making mountains out of molehills, that a janitor or bored public servant was probably just foolin' around on an in-house terminal but my techno-savvy cohort, Lauri records 143 Page views and 1483 Hits on a single file alone which seems like an awful lot of foolin' to me.
Like it or not there's no way of avoiding the fact that Lauri and myself along with most of the other Shadow Theatre Irregulars and God knows how many others on this site are under surveillance from the powers that be. Why ? Because although I may be a film maker and a fantasist it seems I may have gotten one or two things right along the way. Of course the problem with messengers is they tend to get shot which is why I'm posting this screed and having examined all the angles I believe I'm within my rights.
Since I've obviously got your attention I thought I'd tell you a story. It's an old story and you've probably heard it before but to set the record straight I will try to tell you about my role in 'World War Three' – not my choice of words but that's how the spook phrased it when he debriefed myself and Ms.Moor at Grosvenor Square a few days after 9/11. He went by the name of 'James'.
We were referred to him directly by CIA, Langley and did our best to co-operate under the circumstances. Most of what I reproduce has been printed elsewhere as sleeve notes for Subversive Cinema's 'DUST DEVIL' disc ( although the garbled text managed to get pretty much every Afghan name back to front and sideways ) This statement is essentially a fuller, amended version merged with material culled from recent private mails. I chose to make the content of those mails available to save the intelligence community the effort of rummaging through the in-box's and to hopefully preserve my friends privacy, something that matters a lot to dodgy, liberal, long haired types like myself at the end of the day.
For those who know this already, you can tune out now as I doubt you will gather anything new from this hoary yarn, give or take a few trivial corrections. For the rest here is the full existing account of how I got myself into this mess.
I hope you're sitting comfortably…
GONNA TRY FOR THE KINGDOM IF I CAN – AN OPEN LETTER TO THE PENTAGON
I have the dark hair and eyes of my native American great grandmother whose partner was a plantation overseer in Trinidad, dark enough to feel a natural antipathy for the blue-eyed Afrikaners. The rest of me is Anglo-Welsh colonial stock, transplanted to the southernmost tip of Africa where I was born and raised. There was a military tradition in the family and after cadet school where I excelled in the school shooting team I might have expected to become an officer. Only I hated everything the South African army stood for.
The Afrikaners justified apartheid by telling themselves they were fighting Godless communism. It was the time of the Angolan bush war and everyone knew there were Russian T-62 tanks and Cuban troops waiting just across the border, ready to roll on Pretoria at any time. One more proxy war between capitalism and communism fought at a sufficient distance to preserve a couple of generations from the fire Stateside . Certainly none of my family wanted to admit they were basically killing black people for a living. For me there were only two alternatives. Stay and serve time as a deserter or get the hell out of Dodge.
I knew I didn't belong in Africa but in some other place which matched my hair and eyes, some homeland I'd never seen.
Staying just one jump in front of the military police and a none too promising career in the stockade I high tailed it across the border to Namibia ( formerly the German colony of South West Africa ) and hence to Frankfurt, the Netherlands and finally London where I joined the Committee on South African War Reservists ( COSAWR ) and held a torch outside the embassy in Trafalgar Square but my relatives shrugged it off, preferring to believe I was too chickenshit to face up to the communist threat than to accept my opinions as a genuine challenge to their warped morality. So I went to Afghanistan instead.
We first entered the country as part of a UN food convoy, distributing flour to the border area east of Jallalabad. Frustrated by the rigid protocols which forced us to stick to a carefully defined route I resolved to return the only way I could, by embedding myself with one of the burgeoning fundamentalist parties along with two fellow westerners, cameraman Mr. Horn and former Wall Street banker Carlos Mavroleon .
Carlos was the son of a Greek shipping tycoon with demons of his own to grapple with. Islam offered him a way out of his various addictions but I guess changing his name to Kari Mullah and taking up arms against the Soviets was hardly what his parents had in mind when they put him through Harvard. By the time we met in '89 they had more or less disinherited him and he was down and out in London, doing any odd job he could find to save up enough money to return to the jihad. In fact he was driving a truck on a video shoot when we first got talking, bitching about the gears being as tricky as the stickshift on a BTR 60, a lightweight Soviet troop transporter used in the invasion of Afghanistan.
In fact you can still see us debating our options now but you'll have to look carefully.
We're in the background of a video for 'NOIR DESIR' that for some reason played for years on the Paris Metro. I'm sitting in a boat just off the Norfolk coast somewhere in the late eighties beside the huddled outline of Paul Trijbits who would later become the head of the Film council and for a while the 'most powerful man in the British film industry', watching lead singer, Bernard Cantat ( later jailed for the murder of his girlfriend Marie Trintignant ) doing his thing in the vessel ahead. Carlos is standing beside us, oar in hand like some sort of Volga boatsman, immediately identifiable by his Afghan pachul and threadbare Italian army jacket, all three of us staring into the mist, headed some place else.
The second Nephilim video 'Blue Water' hadn't turned out the way we wished, largely because of of bad luck in running into one of the worst storms in British history making the resulting cut into something of a salvage job. It was a tough old winter, I had just been ditched by my first girlfriend and those earliest wounds are always the deepest. Either way I was in a devil may care mood and offered to pay Carlos's expenses if he could get me across the border into Afghanistan.
With Carlos's aid we threw in our lot with the Hezb-i-Islam under General Younis Khalis but the war and the ideologies that motivated it held little interest or attraction for me other than having effectively left the country culturally isolated, cut off from the mainstream of the twentieth century. Precisely the conditions I was looking for…
I had studied anthropology at College and knew that the Native Americans and the Inuit were related to the tribal people and horse cultures of northern and central Asia, people like the Yakut, the Evenki, the Tungus and the Goldi who still cling to their shamanic beliefs, the old religion that dates back to Cro-Magnon man, to the ice age and the cave paintings of Lascaux and Troisfrere. The Hopis speak of their ancestors entering America via a back door now blocked by ice, and if those tribal people were moving north across the roof of the world then it figures they were probably spreading south as well, into the mountain locked vastness of the Karakorums, Himalayas and Hindu Kush where time moves at a very different rate and the distant past is still a recent memory. While still a bone of academic contention it does not seem unlikely to me that the lost tribes of Kafiristan may represent the remnants of that first migration (3rd - 2nd millennium B.C. ) of pagan Indo-European people from south Russia and Central Asia.
In South Africa the word 'kaffir' was a racist insult, a fighting word, the word the slavers had used for their heathen cargo. But Kaffiristan was the land of the pagan, of the unbeliever, the very last to be converted to anything. Sir George Scott Robertson accurately states that 'civilization fell asleep centuries ago in Kafiristan'.
Quintus Rufus makes mention of them in A.D. 50 and Arrian in approximately A.D. 100 while Herodotus describes similar people apparently living in Eithiopia ! There is definite evidence of bloody confrontations with Tamerlane ( May A.D.1398 ) and the Moghul Emperoer, Babur. ( A.D. 1507 )
Before 1910 the people of the Hindu Kush worshiped a supreme being IMRA ( whose prophet was MONI ), a fertility Goddess DIZANI ( or DIZNI which has a certain ironic ring to it ), a rain God SUTERAN and a devil/ trickster ( also the God of money ! ) BA- GISHT identifiable by his missing thumbs or forefingers. Even now there are villages where the Wahabi's fear to tread and where some perform an ancient ecstatic dance ( akin to Haitian 'Voodoo' ) known as the Attani Meli kaishana or 'The Dance of the Animals' in which the hunters become possessed by the 'spirits of the animals they hunt', an ecstatic rite also practiced in remote corners of Chitral.
Of course dogs are unclean in Islam ( if one licks your hand you have to wash before being allowed to pray ) so the accusation that the neighboring tribe are 'dogs' or 'wolves wearing human skin'has to be taken with a certain pinch of salt, yet stories persist.
( A northern alliance commander recently on trial in London for war crimes was accused amongst other things of feeding his prisoners to a 'human dog' he apparently kept in a pit for this very purpose ! ) There are no jails or mental hospitals in the mountains and it is possible some villages have become human garbage bins, populated by social outcasts and murderous brigands but underneath it all beats another, deeper rhythm, one I recognized.
In Europe the old ways have been banished for centuries but in Kaffiristan the tradition survived until 1910 when Abdur Rahman brought Islam to the Hindu Kush and forcibly converted its people by the sword. Barely a lifetime ago in a country where news travels slowly and there are still white spots on the maps which simply read 'relief data incomplete'. Close one eye and the men become braves, the patouks become ponchos, the mud walled villages are revealed as pueblos and those dark haired children that ran, jibing at the hooves of our horses seem awfully familiar.
In point of fact the Afghans made for poor Muslims. I never saw a woman wearing a veil in the high villages and their faces were decorated with henna and golden jewelry that bore the same strange patterns such as surviving roof beams scavenged from the earlier temples and some of the horsehead marker stones in the graveyards, literally the spirit horses that carry the dead on their journey to the underworld.
I thought the people of the high mountains were the last survivors of a culture literally freeze dried from an earlier epoch and would have given my life to defend them but my companion, Mr.Horn (who came closer to death than I on that journey ) quietly disagreed. For him they were people of the future, a race that would endure to repopulate the earth once our civilization has gone the way of all histories and our technologies are one with the dust.
And their woman were beautiful and their men were strong and wore strange flowers plaited into their long floppy hair as they danced, jumping one by one over the sacred fire...
If I could get it down to one image, my war in thumbnail, it was that Hind helicopter gunship carved on a cave wall as a warning to future generations in Am-La, the valley of light. Beside it was the outline of the aeroplane that had crashed some years before in the mountains above Dudruk. Finding no survivors the locals had cut up the wreck and turned it into something useful, raw material for plough blades and irrigation pipes. A few days later the 'choppers had come and strange men had disembarked speaking a language no-one could understand, the first outsiders to enter the valley since the nineteen forties when their previous visitor had been a chinese trader who had walked in through the Wakhan corridor, dragging his bad tempered pack animals behind him. ( I was shown a coin minted in the time of Pu-Yi, the wartime puppet emperor )
When the Spetsnaz found the remains of their downed Mig they rounded up the locals, brandishing guns and shouting angry incomprehensible words. Before leaving they blew up most of Dudruk and shot all the men they could find between fifteen and fifty as an example to the others. Those who were left had rebuilt their lives and repaired the shattered walls of their homes accordingly and when they were done they carved a picture of the craft into the rock so that it might last ten thousand years, so that all could see it and know to fear it if it came again. It might as well have been a flying saucer, like something Erich von Daniken would've creamed himself over...
Two years ago an American Special Ops unit got mislaid in the same area. Before sending in the choppers to pick 'em up the yanks decided to bomb the surrounding villages first, a routine 'softening up' exercise to make certain the rescue party met with no resistance. Those valleys were one of the few earthly paradises I have been privileged to enter and had I still been there now I don't doubt I would have fired on those boys as readily as I would have fired on the Russians in the eighties. As with most modern warfare you never really get to see the faces of the people you're fighting. We were bombed and strafed often enough but the only Russians I got to see up close were dead ones. Two kids who probably never even knew what country they were in. Held hostage and then shot after being captured near Abdul Kheil their bodies were heaved into a fox hole and fed to the dogs. What was left of them was nothing like human. I felt neither disgust, nor pity. Instead I went and found a shadow to sit in and cracked open a few more walnuts with my AK's banana clip. It was hot in the sun and I dozed off and had an absurd dream about flat hunting in London.
We were all on the same side back then. America had armed the Afghans willy-nilly, fighting the cold war by proxy and inevitably backed the most right wing, fundamentalist elements, the same forces supported by the Saudis and the young Sheik, Osama bin Laden who was still cutting roads. Let's get this clear at least. I am not now nor have I ever been a Muslim any more than I am a Christian or a communist and have no sympathy for the Wahibi's who in my eyes are symptomatic of the same murderous, intolerance as the fanatics who put the kafir priests to the sword in 1910 or threw the last of the Cathars onto the bonfire after the fall of Montsegur in 1244. I make sci-fi horror movies. Hanging videotapes from trees just never appealed. The Wahabi's were religious fanatics and foreigners, Arabs who were paid for their services, unlike the Afghans who had no choice but to fight. For their sins the Wahabi's felt much the same way about me and would have killed me on sight had they known I was a westerner but in times of chaos your enemies enemy is oft-times your friend and for the while an uneasy truce existed.
I think the first contact I had with Sheik Osama and the group that were to become the rump of the nebulous movement known to you as 'Al Qaeda' was at a hastily convened sitting of the ad-hoc guerilla government (or 'shura') in Chiga Serai, a tiny trading town on the Kunar river that was briefly declared the capital of free Afghanistan after the Soviet withdrawal in 1989 in the vain hope of gaining some form of recognition from the outside world. The kind of town where you could buy boiled sweets, chick peas, bullets, flour, heroin, gasoline, hashish or plastique all under one roof. What I'd call 'one stop shopping'.
We were the only westerners present and I made the mistake of approaching the Wahabi's to see if they had fresh batteries for my Sony walkman.
My sympathies were always with the tribal people who mistrusted the Arabs just as they mistrusted all outside forces that sought to meddle in their ways. While I made firm friends with the Afghans, Carlos, seemingly an old hand belonged to neither one side or another. Possessed of the missionary zeal of a recent convert he seemed fearful of the pagan ways that drew me from the council of white bearded mullahs and back to the high pastures at every turn. He was confused by how I could choose to film the sunset or sit, watching the moon rise and listen to the sound of the river rather than retreat into the mosque at dawn and dusk to face the bare mud wall that represented the shortest cut to Meccah. Like the Americans and the Russians before them the Wahabi's instinctively feared the night, retreating into their floodlit compounds with the coming of the dark.
On one of my last attempts to penetrate the mountainous heartland of the country, working from an aerial navigation chart provided by the U.S Defense Mapping Agency Aerospace Center ( St Louis AFS, Missouri 63118. ATTN PP. ) which I had corrected by hand, making close to a thousand tiny amendments we found ourselves caught outside as the shadows lengthened in the headwaters of the Pech valley and talk turned again to the unseen creatures of the high mountains and the nameless tribes that lived beyond. The night walkers and shapeshifters that one of my recent correspondents rightly linked to the pishacas, rakshasas, and vetalas of Hindu mythology, the children of a non-Aryan sage and a daughter of Daksha who had allegedly possessed the head or horns of a goat. My Afghan friend now long lost to me, jocular, ginger bearded Nawab told me the high mountains were full of them although he had never seen their faces clearly as they always turned away . Such things, he said would never be seen clearly by mortals 'til the day of judgement. Carlos usually fell silent at times like this, refusing to translate any details that rested uneasily with his faith but for once he chimed in to explain that while these beings might well be creations of Allah they were evil and capricious like the Djinn and not to be associated with.
Then his eyes fell to the image of the horned man on the copper medallion at my throat and while I insisted it was in no way intended as a 'representation of God' Carlos sullenly maintained it was nonetheless a part of the 'malthusian forces of darkness from which Islam sought to rescue Afghanistan' and as such an anathema to him.
Like I said, war makes for strange bed fellows.
At the time myself and Mr.Horn began to think Carlos was a little crazy, potentially dangerous even in the way he seemed hell bent in drawing us again and again into the very thick of the mayhem but like Conrad's 'LORD JIM' he had something to prove that no-one but himself could ever fully understand. He averted his eyes from the heathen music and totems that confronted him and frowned on my efforts to introduce the tribal people to spaghetti westerns and the joys of early Ennio Morricone whose crooning, screaming vocals and galloping rhythms mirrored their own strange, keening songs. Sensing his disapproval I often declined the smouldering joints passed my way although it was the finest Hashish known to man and to my lasting regret I never tasted the ever-present opium or knew the dreams that came with it. But I enjoyed the sight of the poppy fields and the vividness of their colors nonetheless. The incursion of the poppy into the Hindu Kush is a relatively recent deal of course, taking the place of the vineyards that were stamped out when Islam came in 1910 and put an end to the making of wine and the songs and ways that went with it.
It was only years later that I learned from a man named Aiden Hartley who had known Carlos in Mogadishu that our friend had once had a heavy habit of his own and radical Islam was what he got instead of rehab. He was looking for something that would make sense of his jumbled life and the last thing he needed was a pagan like myself challenging the very faith that gave him refuge.
And although at times he was a pain in the neck, so much so that I felt like shooting him myself on at least one occasion,.at least he had faith and aspired towards what he felt could be a better world even if he couldn't help falling time and again below those aspirations. And as Goethe says: " He who strives constantly upwards, him can we save..."
Above : Carlos Mavroleon Below: Forward position at Islam -Dara
For a while we were united in our cause and I did what little I could to help. Having some prior knowledge of automatic weapons I was able to help the locals recalibrate their gun sites and taught them enough rudimentary English to be able to write their names on their rifle straps to avoid potential squabbling. My map played a central part in the local commander's planning.
above: Unloading ammunition at Islam Dara. ( stills courtesy of Immo Horn 1989 )
Hazrat Ali was the main man in Am-La, a beaming bear of a man who invited us into his house with open arms but for a native he seemed singularly poorly informed when it came to the topography his crew commanded. Years later he was the put in charge of the Allied assault on Tora Bora and it came as no surprise uncle Osama slipped through the net.
The last I saw of Hazrat Ali was in 'TIME' magazine, older now and wearing the same kinda look as the one worn by Murray Boyd, the location manager on 'ISLAND OF DOCTOR MOREAU' when he said "No worries, mate ! Sea's gonna be flat as a millpond" the day before the hurricane blew in. But I digress…
The UN refused to recognize the guerrilla government, the shura, unless it was established in one of the existing provincial capitals. Until then food aid continued to go to the Communist regime, now crumbling as the Soviet Union withdrew support.
Thus it was that with the backing of the free world and the tacit support of America and the UN, we eventually swept down on Jallalabad, starting the battle that lead to the installation of the Taliban. For the record the attack was launched to the soundtrack of 'NAVAJO JOE'. Having experimented with Carl Orff and Jimi Hendrix it turned out that Ennio Morricone was the only one that really cut across the cultural barriers.
Of course it was a disaster.
The initial assault on Jallallabad was the single biggest guerilla defeat of the ten year war and the mujaheddin lost over a thousand men a day in the carnage but time is of the essence and there is no point lingering over the details now.
My final journal entry on the morning of the battle reads: " Let's do this all again from the top some day. Let's do it again when when we're 103 and the birds bring us honey and flowers for tea..."
After that the pages are blank.
siege of jallallabad 1989 - stills by Immo Horn
We were attached to a BM-12 missile crew that were supposed to take out the runway before the Mig's could make it into the air. My fault perhaps for making such a big deal out of the contours that enabled us to situate the rocket crews in natural gulleys and wash outs in the surrounding hills. Unfortunately we were well within range of a communist garrison on an overlooking hill that was supposed to have been taken out by another group the night before but Hazrat Ali was away in Pakistan at the time looking for a wife for his younger brother Sunak and the correct order didn't get passed down.
Leaving us to be massacred...
The last I saw of Carlos was when he went to pray just before dawn.
The moment we opened fire we gave away our position and were pounded into submission by incoming .
It was pretty much over by the end of day one.
I had my John Woo moment at sunset. We were working our way down a gulley. Our target was the nearest river but when we came around the corner to we saw all the grass was on fire and there was no way to go forward but going back was inconcievable. No one said a word. We just looked at each other and then, hard as it is to believe, my brothers, I raised my rifle and ran screaming through the flames towards the enemy lines and the incoming fire. It was so hot I couldn't even see where I was going. We never did make it to the river but we didn't die either so I suppose it's no big deal or anything. But we should have died. The missile that hit us just after dark should have done the trick in any sane world. I was picked up and blown through the air and for a while everything was silent and blinding white. Like the movie had slowed right down to a stop. Then the light broke up into sparks, moving so slowly I could see every one of them, every tiny white hot splinter of shrapnel in perfect focus. Some of those sparks went right through Mr.Horn's body without severing any major arteries and miraculously cut the nerves to his legs so that he was spared the worst of the pain. They fanned out past me into the gathering night and as the dark returned I hit the ground and normal sound and motion returned.
I got up and let go of my backpack because I simply couldn't hold on to it and Mr. Horn and the Kalashnikov all at the same time. He's a big lad, Mr.Horn. All of seven feet, the descendant of a lost race of German giants which is why he presented such an easy target.
I managed to half drag, half carry him back across the field of fire to the advance position. Everything was coming apart, the writing clearly on the wall and requisitioning a donkey I decided to head for home, striking out across the minefields towards the distant mountains where we belonged.
I used to catch snakes for pocket money when I was a kid. The local venom man milked them for serum before turning them free. Mostly boomslang and puff adders but you could get five bucks for a decent cobra which was a fortune in those days. Before leaving Peshawar I'd done a half assed course on mine recognition but on the ground I relied on the same instincts I had used to avoid getting bitten as a kid. Doubtless a form of dellusion but God knows how many times I paused in mid stride or changed course just in time, somehow always knowing the boobytaps were there just the same as the way you stop, catch your breath and look for the snake, knowing it's there a beat before you consciously see it. Total horseshit perhaps but it was enough to keep me moving and my relaxed, loping gait meant I never fell or twisted my ankle although at times the going was rough and when the way was dark it was my dark adjusted therian eyes that gave me enough of an edge to stay in the land of the living or at least within striking distance of it's borders.
In danger all that counts is moving forward.
I can't remember who said that. Nietchsche or Conan the Barbarian.
All I know is we walked a while. And then we walked again.
A former associate of mine, Sonja Nasery Cole ( otherwise known as the 'Stinger' girl ) likes to argue that she was ultimately responsible for persuading Reagan to arm the resistance with heat seeking rockets but by the final stages of the war the communists had learned to drop parachute flares to throw the American ground to air missiles off their scent. They were so bright they burned out your visual purple so you couldn't see the stars, only those incandescent points of light that descended so slowly it was as if the whole world were rising to meet them. It was perhaps the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. I could feel the changing air pressure in my diaphragm and the bass of the heavy artillery rose through the soles of my feet like the thunder of some tremendous party, the night cut with the flicker and strobe of incoming fire, tracers weaving cat's cradles in my retinas, incendiaries rising in great golden balls of living plasma, falling and fading in slow cooling sparks, into nothing. And all the while the city burned behind us, a ruddy glow beyond the hills, a thickening plume that seemed to rise forever to fill a third part of the heavens.
Allow me that Biblical reference, my brethren, for Biblical it was. The sight of thousands fleeing their homes, dragging their families and all they owned on the backs of mules and camels, fleeing aimlessly into the dark like Joseph, Mary and the baby Jesus lighting out for Egypt land. We made it as far as a Red Crescent field hospital, a huddle of tents strewn amidst the boulders at the mouth of a river known as Islam Dara.
There were no doctors or surgeons, only wounded people, a few boxes of analgesics and enough morphine to stop the pain which is sometimes enough even if you can't always save people. I have College level physiology and could help the overworked Pakistani medical student who was trying to stay on top of the situation with the externals, burns, amputations, etc but there was no realistic hope for the internals, not in a place like that.
The only chance I had of keeping Mr.Horn alive lay in somehow making it back through enemy lines and across the mountains to the border, the outside world and what remained of the 20th century. Despite the prominent symbols painted on the tents we endured an air strike on the field hospital before loading all those with a reasonable chance of survival into the remaining trucks and making a break for it. The enemy found our range almost immediately and our pathetic, slow moving convoy came under sustained fire.
I tried saying Hail Mary's and chanting every mantra I could recall but in the end when there was fire all around us I put my dog tags and that copper medallion I am still wearing now in my mouth and bit down, hoping someone might identify me by them and it was my own foolish, simple pagan faith that came to my rescue and gave me the strength to keep going, the one thing in my life I can be justly proud of.
And the Djinn were merciful, my brothers and sent a storm to hide us from the Migs whose Doppler lookdown systems were no match for the dust cloud that swirled about us like great black wings. And we came as far as Am-La and I stopped to retrieve the surviving film stock cached before the battle before striking out for Chiga Serai and the free territories. The spring rains had begun, the pass Sheik Osama and his Arabs had cut through the Kashkund mountains turned to mud and for a long, terrible while I found myself trapped in a dank, Afghan remake of 'THE WAGES OF FEAR' and if you've seen that movie you'll know how bad it sucked to be there with those trucks filled with spent ammunition and dying people stripping gears, running out of gas and sliding backwards into the deepening sludge, engines churning helplessly all day and night, every day while the rest of us tried to wedge anything we had beneath the straining wheels for traction.
We lost one of the trucks over a cliff and buried the folk on board at sunrise.
The light seems sharper and clearer at that altitude and the colors of the grave digger's scarves stood out vividly against the snow. I remember I was listening to Wagner, Overture to 'Tristan and Isolde' when my Walkman finally gave up the ghost..
Mr.Horn's legs had started to rot and there were literally vultures following us, hopping from rock to rock which is never a good thing. Then the sun faded behind the clouds and the rain set in…
We thought if we could just make it to the top of the mountains we'd be alright, even if we had to do it on our own, on foot but when we finally made it to the summit the tribal militia who controlled the border were less than happy to see us. We had lost our friends and supporters in the guerilla party just as I had lost my passport and I.D with our discarded backpacks. There had been a party of bullets going on around us at the time and if I had paused even for a split second to retrieve my documents we would have been beef jerky. Instead we were placed under de facto arrest at the border and held in a mud walled garrison while the rain hammered down, Mr.Horn slipped steadily into a coma and the company medic argued with the stern faced men who held us, arguing for our lives I realized later. At one point I was marched out into the courtyard. At first I thought I was being taken for a piss call but then I saw my escort were picking up their guns. And again the nameless medic intervened on our behalf, arguing with the local commander in a dialect I couldn't hope to comprehend.
We were bundled into the back of another truck and by the next afternoon the sun had come out and we had made it all the way back across the tribal territories to the Red Cross Hospital in Peshawar. Unfortunately the Swiss doctors in charge were already overloaded with casualties from the Jallallabad action and refused to admit Mr.Horn, accusing us of being mercenaries. In the end the Afghan surgeons at the red Crescent hospital cleaned his wounds and removed the pieces of shrapnel still lodged within him. While they did the cutting I wandered down the dusty trunk road and caught sight of a KFC outlet where I ordered a Coke and rejoined the West.
Immo Horn with Dr. Nasir who saved his legs
Mr Horn still has those pieces of shrapnel on display, the closest thing to a medal you can expect in our line of work. That shambollic hospital was like something from'GONE WITH THE WIND', the ranks of the maimed and the burned flowing out across the surrounding fields, on stretchers, cots or blankets, makeshift tents improvised from sodden patouks. It was here that Trix Worrel, the writer of 'FOR QUEEN AND COUNTRY' and the television sit-com 'DESMOND'S' finally caught up with me.
He had been tasked by Paul Trijbits to bring me back to London so that they could close the deal on 'HARDWARE'.
At first I was loathe to abandon the country that become an adopted homeland.
The sight of burned or limbless children tends to stir strange emotions in the hearts of even the worst of us, even heathens like myself. And there was unfinished business.
Carlos was still missing, presumed dead and it now transpired that he had been less than straightforward in his initial dealings, having helped himself to a large sum of money from a West London property magnate before leaving town, apparently with the intention of closing one of those illicit transactions that Frontier Province is famous for.
Now Carlos was gone, the deal that none of the rest of us even knew existed had fallen through and the big cheese in Fulham wanted his money back.
There was another small catch. Although miraculously our backpacks were later retrieved from the battlefield and returned by the Hezb who must have carried them clear over the Kashkund mountains along with my maps, notebooks and several remaining cans of film, the one thing that conspicuously failed to turn up with them was my passport which at the time I assumed to have been filched by my otherwise impeccably honest cadres. And getting back to River City without ID proved to be a bit of a head scratcher.
In the end it was my ex-girlfriend, Kate, who managed to get through to a line in the Hezbi-Islami party political office in University Town and persuaded me to give up my plans to return to the mountains with a shipment of Polio and Smallpox vaccine from one of the medical charities. It was at the time of The Satanic Verses. There was a fatwah on Salman Rushdie's head and the British consulate in Peshawar had been just been firebombed. I managed to get Mr.Horn flown out from Peshawar along with the surviving exposed stock before making my way overland to Islamabad to find diplomatic representation. I was arrested by Pakistani police the moment I arrived in the capital and only survived by repeating the phrase 'Call my consul' until someone finally did.
A kind man named vice-consul Pete Roffey got me out of the slammer and helped me trade what I knew about the massacre in Ningrahar province for a fresh passport. That was the first time I was ever debriefed by western intelligence and I told them all I knew, which was quite a lot even though I didn't realize it at the time.
I made it to Karachi, then Abu Dabi, then Istanbul and hence to London where Kate met me at Heathrow. It was raining and she looked pale and unhappy. She told me she didn't want to hear about it, not one word. We drove back to the flat in Kennington in silence and when I finally walked into my lounge I found there were people waiting for me there, adults, folk from a firm called 'Brigade Security'. Apparently their boss wanted his money, either that or they were going to feed me to the dogs. I recall one of my favourite L.P's playing on the stereo somewhere in the background.
In the end Paul Trijbits got Brigade Security off my back, paid the outstanding and saved my worthless ass and saved Mr.Horn too who lay all the while quietly going to pieces in a backroom because the NHS wouldn't admit him and his girlfriend didn't want to saddle herself with a gimp. Even a stoic one. In return I traded Paul the underlying rights to 'HARDWARE' and he let me live under a table in the production office while we got the beast up and running. For a while I was half convinced I was dead and living in some other world that barely resembled the one we had left behind. I can remember the sound of the one that got us, totally different from all the other incoming. The soundless white flash that followed like a freeze frame. Then slowly I realized I was out of luck and we were alive after all…
A hack from the Sunday Times later wrote that I had 'adopted late eighties grunge style clothing and hygiene' during the shoot but believe me I looked that way because I was sleeping on the floor and didn't have two beans at the time.
Somewhere in the middle of it Carlos turned up, still alive too and looking a little sheepish about it.
He said he'd been pinned down by enemy fire but the long and the short of it was he'd left us to die, getting back to the advance position only few days later when he arranged for the return of our personal effects. We shook hands on it but there was bad blood between us and he never looked me squarely in the eye again.
The journey had shaken Carlos and changed him somehow. While he might not have fitted in on Wall Street he knew in his heart he could never be an Afghan
He tempered his faith and traded on his talents as a fixer and veteran of the jihad to become a stringer for the networks, covering the fall of the Mengistu regime in Ethiopia. Either which way it was the nineties and no-one cared about Afghanistan any more than they cared about low budget British sci-fi horror movies. We drifted apart, found new girlfriends, new obsessions, new wars but none of them seemed to satisfy. Carlos got Mogadishu and I lit out for Haiti and got with the Voodoo. I think we both caught a dose of Rwanda but received it on separate channels.
There were still times when I was convinced I had been killed by that rocket but those thoughts came less frequently now and by the summer of 1998 things were starting to look up for Carlos too. His family had decided not to disinherit him and he had finally gotten engaged to the love of his life. He had just gotten back from a trip to Kenya when al-Qaeda detonated a truck bomb outside the US embassy in downtown Nairobi. The blast killed 213 people. Many victims were vaporized or buried alive by rubble from the embassy or a nearby multistory office block that collapsed like a house of cards.
President Clinton ordered a punitive missile strike on Afghanistan and Sudan although the news took second billing to the first day of Monica Lewinsky's notorious testimony. Hilary Clinton looked the camera straight down the lens and told the world:"We're victims of a massive right wing conspiracy ! " People laughed but she was right.
Travelling under an assumed name Carlos retraced his steps to Peshawar and a few days later was arrested and detained by the ISI, the Pakistani military police while trying to cross the Afghan border. He was interrogated and on release succeeded in reaching a hospital in Miram Shah where he made contact with survivors of the missile strike on Sheik Osama's camp. Some believe the information he became party to at that time placed his life in danger. Following the attack the Sheik had posted a $20 000 bounty on the head of any American found in the area and Carlos was carrying a sat 'phone, which men like bin Laden knew would allow the CIA to get an accurate fix on the bearer whenever it was switched on.
Somehow Carlos made it back alive.
He booked into a room at Dean's Hotel in Peshawar, Room 304, a far swankier set of digs that he could have afforded back in the day. The first thing he did was call his fiancee.Then he had a shower and a hot meal before 'phoning a producer named Leslie Cockburn at CBS television. He had a story to tell. A big story. Miss Cockburn thought the situation through but by the time the network tried to call back approximately an hour later there was no-one left to answer. When hotel staff forced the door they found Carlos seated upright next to the telephone table, stone, cold dead, the butt of a Marlboro Red clenched between his lips, burned right down to its filter, the ash resting in his lap.
An empty syringe was apparently found near his body. No actual drugs. No makings. Just a needle. My passport was retrieved from his personal effects, having been removed from my bag back in 1989 after we abandoned our packs at the advance position. My stolen identity one last puzzling detail amidst the clutter of camera equipment, cigarette cartons, gaffer tape, five grand in cash, the sat 'phone and a bunch of happy snaps of the one time Wall street trader posing with his Afghan buddies, intended presumably as a way of befriending any militias he encountered along the road.
At the funeral in River City we sang 'Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord and readers quoted from Byron and Kipling. Later an official wake was held at the London stock exchange. Monitors above the urinals showed a continuous tickertape crawl of shifting figures while Ted Coppel from Nightline stood in front of another screen in an adjoining reception area, this one showing images culled from our documentary 'THE VOICE OF THE MOON' and we listened as he eulogized Carlos Mavroleon for his role in 'alerting the world to the situation in Afghanistan.' I sat near the back with Mr.Horn and his wife Deborah, taking advantage of the cocktail snacks and joking about how that would be the only time we'd get to hear someone from the networks say something nice about our unstransmitted footage. Mr. Horn said nothing. He had not only recovered the full use of his legs but in the interim had become an accomplished ballroom dancer. He remains a strong walker to this day. And of course the world was so f***ng unalerted it isn't funny.
The police claimed Carlos died from a self administered heroin overdose.
An autopsy was never conducted and those who tried to ask questions about the affair were gently but firmly warned away. We tried to keep the story alive for a while and sent out treatments and one pagers to every television station we could think of but it was the nineties, the economy was booming and no-one wanted to know about that sort of thing.
I still have copies of those treatments on file and even now they seem a little paranoid in their far fetched assumption that regardless of whether or not Carlos was assassinated he seemed to have been on the brink of blowing the whistle on the misappropriation of American and Saudi money to create a terrorist movement apparently hell bent on starting World War 3 , if not by training up militants to destabilize Kashmir then by some other means.
Nuclear war was just so passé in the nineties, not something that real adults felt the need to waste their time on. Some nutty right wing theorist in the States had apparently decided that history was dead and no longer an active process worth losing sleep over. For a while I thought about trying to write a book but my agent succeeded in talking me out of it.
By 2001 the millennium bug had proved a wash and it had all become just one more 'conspiracy theory' parked on the same shelf as David Icke and his reptilloids.
Producers would roll their eyes or sneak snide glances at their P.A's , shutters coming down before you even had time to spit out the A-word.
" Ohhh Richard ! You and your little Afghan, friends ! I mean it's just not the real world, is it ?" sighed an industry maven who shall remain nameless. "Look around you !"
She shook her head, gesturing at the brightly lit Soho bistro before us.
"This is the real world !"
But it wasn't…
By the time the first aeroplane hit the World Trade Center my mother was being treated for cancer and I was already feeling pretty brought down by the assassination of Ahmed Shah Massood some 24 hours previously. Massood who I never met on account of my alliance with the Hezb was a hero of the guerilla war and had stood as the lone opponent of the Taliban, a giant amongst men, the country's natural leader and only real hope.
The suicide camera crew had made their appointment through his press agent and although they were reportedly carrying British passports their identities were never publically established. Clearly someone knew that after years of being willfully ignored by the west Massood's role was about to become a crucial one so he was surgically removed by outside parties working to a detailed game plan. Apparently Massood recognized one of his killers as they entered the room, either that or he suffered a belated premonition, yelling for the guards to "Get them out of here ! Get these men out of here…" Accordingly the bomb ( which was hidden in the camera ) was detonated in the doorway before the phony journalists could enter the office, atomizing the press agent and mortally wounding the guerilla leader who is rumored to have lingered on for a day or so before giving up the struggle. Shortly afterwards Abdul Haq was betrayed and murdered and his brother Abdul Qadir gunned down on the streets of Kabul in what was dismissed in the press as a minor skirmish between rival opium barons. Either way the countries natural leaders were being rapidly expunged.
As those images of the burning towers flickered across the monitors in the silent transit lounge I endured a sense of helpless deja-vu, of being forced to watch something unfolding that could and should have been averted. That was the day I met Maggie Moor who like myself was on her way home from a film festival in Germany and had made it as far as Frankfurt before the sky fell in. Maggie occupies a special place in my heart because she was the first person to listen to me. It's an old story but by dint of her proximity at the time she was the first to hear it in a post-9/11 environment and it no longer sounded like gobbledy-gook. As they say in that 'America' song, "SANDMAN", all the planes had been grounded and unable to make it back to the States Miss Moor did the only thing she could. As soon as she got to a working telephone she told the operator to connect her to CIA headquarters at Langley who set up the meeting with 'James' at Grosvenor Square.
I told my story over again and 'James' took notes. He consistently misspelled the Afghan names, couldn't tell the difference between Engineer Machmud and Ahmed Shah Massood and seemed baffled by the plethora of rival clans and parties having merged them in his mind into a single indistinct foreign other. If the CIA said it was impossible to infiltrate Al Qaeda then who was I to say that some Greek guy whose name he couldn't pronounce had succeeded where the company had failed, relying instead on information retrieved at a distance by either the Pakistani ISI or satellites and drones whose lookdown systems are scarcely more sophisticated than those Russian Migs that failed to kill us back in '89.
Maggie was no beginner at this game. She supplements her occasional earnings as an actress by moonlighting as a process server for the oldest private investigation agency in Manhattan, a company run by an elderly Jewish gentleman and former MOSSAD agent who claims to have been amongst those responsible for tracking down the terrorists in the Black September affair. She could tell 'James' wasn't taking us seriously and refused to part with any maps, notebooks, charts or co-ordinates without the promise of protection or reward.
That was the last straw. Narrowing his piggy Ivy Leaguer eyes 'James' fixed her with a look as if she were so far beneath him she belonged not to a different gender but some other taxomic group entirely.
"How does that make you people feel, huh ? Trying to profit out of world war three ?" Shaking his head he pushed back his chair, drawing the line under my second debriefing.
World War Three.
He said it. Not me. But it had an nice old fashioned eighties ring about it.
We tried to tell ourselves that anything we knew was probably old news anyway and that there were responsible adults in charge now but by the time the Allies got 'round to bombing all those places 'James' couldn't pronounce the folk they were looking for had melted like ghosts into the mountains, into the sea of the people. The company insisted they were on the case and had the situation by the tail but when I saw they had put 'feared warlord' and 'northern alliance' commander Hazrat Ali in charge of the Tora Bora operation my heart sank further.
For a couple of weeks Afghanistan was all the rage and there was a brief run on our footage, mostly for stock shots to illustrate the prehistory of the war. We were the only human beings to have ever taken movie cameras into the Hindu Kush which held some small curiosity for the video generation who seemed surprised by the light and color.
I was tapped by Sonja, the 'stinger girl' to come up with a piece for a fund raising dinner thrown by the 'Afghan World Foundation', a dodgy charity headed by Hamid Karzai. She slyly hinted that she had friends in the Academy and if I co-operated they could get a belated nomination for our still untransmitted documentary.
I played along in the hope of getting myself embedded with US forces in Kabul.
There was a rumor Bush would be attending the bash in Beverly Hills and I became frightened they might try to force me to shake his hand. But the Iraq war was in the wind and just like that Afghanistan dropped out of the media as if it had never existed. I think it was a deliberate policy decision by the administration to not mention the A-word in public and they didn't after that, not for many years. The last thing anyone wanted were camera crews actually covering the situation as it developed on the ground and the fund raiser was duly cancelled. For some reason I got to shake Kissinger's hand instead, quite by accident, the two of us just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Later I was driven by Don Stroud's brother, Charlie, to a meeting with my anonymous sponsors in a penthouse in Century City where we waited for a while in an atrium decorated by archeological plunder from around the world, Roman city Gods and original poster artwork by Milos Manara for an unproduced Fellini project " JOURNEY TO TULUN" before being told by my patrons that I had 'performed a great service to the people of Afghanistan' and presented with a free mug, the only real profit I got to see on the war apart from a one way ticket back to River City, my plans for shooting a companion to ' THE VOICE OF THE MOON' from an American perspective 'THE EYE OF THE SUN' unrealized beyond a few short sequences and sketches for sequences.
In the past there had been times when myself and Mr.Horn imagined we might be under surveillance but we usually shrugged it off as transient paranoia, like the nagging suspicion we might in fact be dead all along but after 9/11 the intrusions became too persistent to be ignored. Electronic eavesdropping in the UK is routinely carried out by a computer named ESCHELON which logs on to key words and word combinations to harvest the digital raw material ( known as 'towrope' ) for more comprehensive searches carried out by GCHQ Cheltenham. For a while myself and Mr. Horn were able to follow the futile hunt for bin Laden simply by the buzz words, whatever combination of those names no-one ever seemed to bother taking down that would set off the unmistakable clicking and switching that signaled whether we were warm or cold in our assumptions. Sometimes the background noise was so overbearing that we literally had to shout above it to make ourselves heard.
The earliest incursion on Lauri's site seems to have been around September 2005 and curiously the hits peaked at key moments such as the weeks prior to the theft of Ms.Moor's laptop or my bank account being inexplicably frozen the day before Xmas. ( Thank you, Gordon ! I really appreciated that! Like I'm funding a terrorist movement on my income! ) In fact our pals at wakko.whs.mil seem to have really taken a shine to the latest draft of 'GROUND ZERO' and even downloaded and mass copied the 'HARDWARE' soundtrack though I can't help grinning at the thought of 'This is what you want, This is what you get' finding it's natural home at the Pentagon. Cheeky when you consider Murdoch won't let me use my own music on the site, forcing me to make do with 'THE TERMINATOR' theme instead. But that's a lousy war for ya…
It's not that we haven't tried to tell the powers that be everything we know but if our attempts to 'alert the world' failed it was because the world didn't want to hear, not because we had any desire or reason to keep what little we knew secret. Instead my ability to travel freely has been restricted, my reputation questioned and my credit rating flatlined. In the end 'VOICE OF THE MOON' crept into release as a freebie in the 'DUST DEVIL' box put out by SUBVERSIVE CINEMA although it has yet to appear in any form in Europe or the wider world.
I changed agents and have started hesitantly trying to write about the subject. With the Iraq war spiraling towards it's inevitable conclusion even the New York Times is suggesting maybe we should withdraw, throw in the towel and bring the boys home. What no-one seems to apprehend is that once you've embarked on this sort of kill spree you can't just call it off and expect the barbarian hordes to put down their guns and go home just because our side is losing. That's not how wars work.
The Soviet Union collapsed within a year of withdrawing from Afghanistan. Same deal with the British Empire after the fall of Kabul. And how long can we continue to support Karzai or shore up Musharraf when the man has one foot on a banana peel and the other on a rollerskate ? And when he falls will we finally discover we have created the nightmare scenario we sought initially to avoid, a fundamentalist state gifted with nuclear capability because unlike Iraq our 'allies' in Pakistan really do have weapons of mass destruction. With Russia rearming rapidly and China demonstrating it's satellite smashing ability to lay claim to the 'high frontier' and switch off our ICBM's before they even leave the silos the prospects of nuclear war never seemed more likely or less inviting.
For a while I thought the trail had gone completely cold but it's oddly comforting to know Big Brother is still watching after all. Still taking notes.
All I can say is try to get the spelling right this time.
Over the years there have been various attempts to portray Carlos as a hero, a man who died trying to warn the world of a clear and present danger but there was just something about him that didn't quite fit the George Clooney shaped hole they tried to force him into. To believe he was murdered is almost reassuring compared to the notion that he might have been able to single handedly stop the War on Terror from happening if he hadn't stuck that needle in his arm before making the crucial 'phone call. .
You can see him in Voice of the Moon, laughing on the back of that bony, black horse. It was warm in the sun, still going towards the war, artillery fire like thunder beyond the hills and it all still ahead of us. One of my compadres, Abu Zarqawi, who was recently killed in Iraq after developing a dismaying penchant for separating civilian workers from their heads and e-mailing them home, said he often wished he'd died back that day because his soul would have made it to heaven a whole lot faster.
Funny thing is, I think I know what he means.
I've been debating the wisdom of posting this blog and what it's consequences might be. The rain stopped and I was wandering down Ladbroke Grove, thinking the mess through when I heard a bicycle bell and turned to recognize one of my former associates, Mark Pilkington, who used to write a column in the 'Guardian'. When he asked how I was doing I shrugged and mumbled something about the Pentagon raiding my site and how I was thinking of posting an open letter to them.
Mark sighed " Well, I'm sure it's no different from what everyone else on this planet goes through every single day of their lives…"
And just like that he was off, riding on the edge of a patch of July sunlight.
And I thought what I wouldn't give for that to be true.
Carlos Mavroleon 1958 - 1998
Carlos wrote :-'In the midst of carnage you will see the utter evil and the supreme good side by side...'
Most of us long for the kind of clarity you find in battle but only rarely in so-called 'everyday life'. The privilege of experiencing those extremes stretches our hearts or souls so that afterwards there is something left inside us, a void we can never hope to fill.
And of course there's more. Notebook after notebook but I don't have the time, energy or inclination to input it so if you gentlemen who run the world want the details you can
drop by any time. I'm generally home.
I'm alone at this keyboard, bare foot and unarmed and I ain't afraid of a single dog man one of you.
*********THIS IS RICHARD STANLEY, THE LAST FREE MAN IN WEST LONDON SIGNING OFF*********************************************
Posted on September 29, 2004
Linden was approached by Kudler, a nationally known specialist on post-traumatic stress disorder, about combining their expertise to study the effects of natural and man-made trauma on the reporters who cover it. The time seemed ripe for such a symposium, given the extraordinary perils foreign correspondents face in a world of terrorism and the war against it, kidnappings and genocide.
"We're being inundated with beheadings readily viewable on the Internet and referenced in mainstream media," says Linden. "Everyone can relate to it, but how much of it should the public be exposed to? How much do they deserve to be shielded from this?"
On Friday, Linden and Kudler will moderate two morning panel discussions--which are intended for working journalists and students--before the seminar concludes at 2 p.m. with a free public screening of Dying to Tell the Story. Panel participants will include NPR's Daniel Zwerdling, Pentagon media officer Lt. Col. Dave Lapan, Emmy-winning CBS correspondent W. Randall Pinkston and others.
Dying to Tell the Story was produced in 1998 by Kathy Eldon, Dan's mother, and is hosted and narrated by his younger sister Amy. The film, which was nominated for an Emmy in 1998, is more than a film about Eldon, whose career as a journalist was quite short. Using his life and death as a framing device, the documentary is equally valuable for its portraits of some of the world's most famous war journalists, including CNN's Christiane Amanpour and the BBC's Martin Bell (who claims that the journalists who get killed tend to be either young like Eldon or old-timers who finally run out of luck).
All of the journalists in the film strive to debunk the popular notion of war journalists as global catastrophe cowboys. One of them, an obviously haunted Spaniard named Carlos Mavroleon, discusses his inability to maintain romantic relationships when he was constantly running out the door on short notice, "with a wad of cash and an aeroplane ticket to hell." Still, he admits, "I [always] left with a smile on my face."
Shortly after the film's release, Mavroleon died in Peshawar, Pakistan. The official cause of death was a drug overdose but Kathy Eldon maintains that the circumstances are murky. "He was there to track down a totally unknown man at that time: Osama bin Laden." Although Mavroleon had a history of drug problems, she says, "he hadn't been doing drugs for months or even years."
"He was one of the main guys in our film because he was really bang-bang," says Eldon, who works, often with daughter Amy, on a variety of film, book, television and Internet peace and spirituality projects through Creative Visions, her Los Angeles-based production company. One big, ongoing project is a feature film based on her son's life called The Journey is the Moment. "We've been talking to Orlando Bloom," Eldon says. "We'll see if he wants to do it."
The most moving witness in Dying to Tell the Story is a London-based journalist named Mohammed Shaffi, who was the sole survivor of the mob attack that killed Dan Eldon and three other journalists. In the film, Amy Eldon eventually seeks out Shaffi to accompany her to Somalia and walk her through her brother's final hours. Although Shaffi had cheated death many times, he breaks down on camera as he discusses that 1993 encounter with a mob, enraged by an attack by a Black Hawk helicopter. Shaffi was shot several times and badly beaten and stoned, according to Kathy Eldon, and only avoided the coup de grace by shouting that he was a Muslim. (Shaffi, too, is dead. In early 2001, he succumbed to a massive heart attack in a Jerusalem hotel. "A broken heart" is Kathy Eldon's diagnosis.)
Elsewhere in the film, viewers get a delicious glimpse of a reporter getting into an American president's face, as when Christiane Amanpour, exhausted and furious after covering the Balkan conflicts in the early 1990s to little international notice, memorably confronted Bill Clinton on television in 1994. (She even called him a flip-flopper.)
For Tom Linden, Friday's seminar provides an important opportunity to turn the spotlight back on journalists themselves, people whose psychic health is generally overlooked even when it should be obvious that such prolonged exposure to human terror and misery is quite harmful.
While Dr. Kudler's focus will be on PTSD, Linden will concentrate on the proper balance between the public's need to know and gratuitous exhibitionism. He thinks the news coverage from Iraq has been erratic for a variety of reasons, not all of them sinister or conspiratorial.
"We're not being shown a lot," Linden says. "There's the problem of access: Arab journalists are able to get around more easily." But, Linden goes on to say, "I believe the American media exercises a lot of self-censorship. They limit what they show."
Not all self-censorship bothers Linden. "We're being shielded from [gory images of] terrorist attacks and beheadings, which may be a good thing." In the place of sensationalistic images of individual atrocities, Linden says, "the important thing is maintain the big picture."
Linden acknowledges that he hunted down one Internet beheading video, "partly just to see that it's really there. I'm sorry I saw it, because I can't get it out of my head. Yet millions around the world saw it."
Despite the timid reporting by mainstream television outlets, Linden is generally optimistic that the reporting is getting through. "They can't sugarcoat it anymore," he says. "The truth about what's happening in Iraq is coming out. We have reporters to thank for that."
"If there hadn't been great reporting from Vietnam, 100,000 would have died instead of 50,000," Linden says, while conceding that today's mainstream media is much more deferential to the interests of the military and the executive branch. The aggressive reporting, he says, "is not happening through Vietnam channels but through other channels [such as the Internet]."
"Cognitive dissonance is happening--the difference between what you hear and what you see," Linden says. "Will it shorten the war? We don't know. It's pretty hard to close the floodgates."
"I have a lot of respect for people trying to tell the story and how important it is," Linden says. "But it's not Hollywood. People die. We need to honor them by reading their stories."
Eldon, who knows this better than anyone, agrees. "If they're going to risk their lives, we have to pay attention," she says. "Sometimes we have reader fatigue, but if we turn off the TV or put down the paper, we won't help our leaders make better decisions."
"Trauma in Journalism: Dying to Tell the Story" will take place in Carroll Hall on the UNC Campus. For more information on the conference program, visit www.jomc.unc.edu/executive education/trauma or call 966-7024.
URL for this story: http://localhost/gyrobase/Content?oid=22738
On Aug. 1, his literary agent, Tina Bennett of Janklow & Nesbit Associates, sold his memoir to editor Morgan Entrekin at Grove/Atlantic Inc. for $150,000. The book will recount his family history and his life in Afghanistan before he came to the U.S. in 1989, and it will describe his emotionally wrenching return to his devastated homeland in 1999. Ms. Bennett discovered him when a fellow client saw Mr. Farivar's Village Voice article about his time at Tora Bora and urged him to contact Ms. Bennett. Mr. Entrekin, who happened to be a friend of Carlos Mavroleon, snapped up Mr. Farivar's book proposal. "A lot of the writers I've published knew Carlos and fit in this subject area," he said.
The book, which is still untitled, will be published in 2004. On a recent Monday evening, the clean-shaven Mr. Farivar, 33, wearing a rumpled red-and-white checked Oxford, khakis and a pair of black lace-ups, told his story to The Observer over iced tea at French Roast on Sixth Avenue in Greenwich Village. Checking his cell phone every 15 minutes or so, the collegial Mr. Farivar seemed to have come a long way since firing mortars at Russians from the bunkers of Tora Bora. As he tells it, the first of his many strokes of luck was meeting Mr. Mavroleon in the White Mountains of Eastern Afghanistan. The shipping heir had converted to Islam in the 1970's (on a backpacking trip after leaving Eton school) and had recently come under the influence of an Islamic political leader named Khalis-who happened to be a protégé of Mr. Farivar's grandfather, a highly respected mullah.
The two swiftly became close friends.
What happened next is, well, right out of a book. A Harvard graduate named Richard Murphy, seeking a job as a freelance war correspondent, was told by a friend to contact the globetrotting Mr. Mavroleon, who at the time was living in London. Mr. Mavroleon told him to go to Pakistan and find Mr. Farivar-and to deliver a special package to him. "Inside the package was an application to Harvard," recalls Mr. Farivar, "with a letter of recommendation that Carlos had written on my behalf to one of his professors there. I didn't know what to make of it. When Carlos mentioned Harvard-I had never even heard of Harvard." Mr. Murphy helped Mr. Farivar fill out the application, write the essay and send it in.
As a teenager, Mr. Farivar had left Afghanistan with his family to escape the Soviets and eventually lived in Peshawar, Pakistan, with his uncle, who taught him English. Mr. Farivar attended a madrasa until he was 16, where he learned Arabic and studied Islam. "Gradually, the monotony and rigidity of it kind of wore out for me. It turned me off." Mr. Farivar quit the Saudi-funded religious school and got a job as a typist at a foreign relief agency funded by Austrians.
In 1987, he joined an Islamic faction and shipped off with two cousins to join the jihad at Tora Bora, where he manned a mortar gun. "I wanted to fight for my country because everyone else was doing it," he said. "Every time my cousin would come back from his missions, he would tell me how great it felt to be on the battlefield fighting the Russians."
Combat was "exciting and thrilling," he recalled. "You're in the middle of nowhere and you're being attacked from different directions with all sorts of weapons-missiles, rockets, mortars. I thought bombs were scary because they were unpredictable and came from out of nowhere. Usually with missiles and rockets, you can predict where they'll land and take cover."
During that time, Mr. Farivar earned money writing war reports for a U.S. government–funded media outlet called the Afghan Media Resource Center. With the help of a "big, fat" American he'd met, he even freelanced a piece for Soldier of Fortune magazine in 1988, about the efficacy of a new Spanish mortar being used in combat. In the spring of 1989, the Harvard admissions office took an interest in Mr. Farivar. But they felt his academic history was a bit spotty, what with the madrasas and all, and they wanted him to attend a year of high school first. Luckily for Mr. Farivar, one of the admissions officers mentioned his situation to someone at the Lawrenceville School, outside Princeton. At a cocktail party, that someone mentioned Mr. Farivar's story to a teacher who happened to be Whitney Azoy, Lawrenceville's Afghan expert and a former diplomat and anthropologist. Mr. Azoy championed the application with the head of admissions, one Phil Pratt.
According to Mr. Farivar, Mr. Pratt was skeptical. "What sports does he play?" he asked.
"Well, in Afghanistan there's fighting," replied Mr. Azoy. "There are no sports there." (Perhaps for fear of scaring off Mr. Pratt from Mr. Farivar's cause, he left out mention of buzkashi , the Afghan national sport, which involves hundreds of men on horses struggling over the mutilated carcass of a calf.)
Mr. Pratt pressed. "Then what extracurricular activities is he involved in?"
"Well-maybe killing Russians?"
According to Mr. Farivar, Mr. Pratt turned his application down.
But Mr. Azoy pleaded to the headmaster, Si Bunting, who, according to Mr. Farivar, eventually accepted him into the school. "I still don't know a lot of the secrets of how I got here," said Mr. Farivar.
He arrived at Kennedy Airport in September of 1989. When he got to the rolling green campus of Lawrenceville, Mr. Bunting was wearing a T-shirt and shorts, which was astounding to Mr. Farivar: "I had never seen a man in shorts." Mr. Farivar recalls being fairly traumatized for the first year. The kids at Lawrenceville didn't know what to make of him. For one thing, he was 21 years old. "There I was-I got off the plane with my big Osama bin Laden beard, my Afghan rebel hat and traditional garb. There I was with these 15-year-old kids. They were probably scared. I must have seemed very unapproachable, and I must have smelled."
He played a little ultimate Frisbee, but he spent more time praying. Things improved once he got to Harvard. "I felt much more comfortable. I also found it easier to make friends with people." For the first couple of years, he tried to stick closely to his Islamic traditions. He prayed five times a day and kept his beard for the first two years. "Gradually, I realized that if I really wanted to get a full experience of college life, I had to mingle."
He joined some social clubs, shaved, drank, chased girls. "A lot of decadence and debauchery went on at these elite social clubs," he said. He graduated in 1994 after writing his thesis on Thomas Aquinas, then worked briefly in Flagstaff, Ariz., as a travel guide at the Grand Canyon (he spent the previous summer writing about the Southwest for Let's Go travel guides). In 1995, he moved to New York and got a job at an Associated Press–Dow Jones newswire venture, working first on the foreign-exchange and equities desks, and then the petroleum beat. "I really like the oil story," he said. "It's centered around my part of the world. The sheiks were all very well known to me before I got here."
Ten years after leaving Afghanistan, he took his first trip back. "It was really heartbreaking," he recalled. "So many people I'd known had died. The most depressing thing of all was, I did not meet a single person who did not want to leave the country." Mr. Farivar now lives in Jersey City, to be near the Dow Jones offices, and still practices some Islamic traditions, observing Ramadan and avoiding pork. He spends most of his free time in Manhattan. "There's nothing going on in Jersey City. Jersey City is like Afghanistan," he said.
As for Mr. Mavroleon, he died under mysterious circumstances in Pakistan in 1998 while working as a freelance reporter and cameraman on a story about Osama bin Laden for 60 Minutes , shortly after President Clinton ordered the bombing of an Afghan terrorist camp. "He was a very passionate and pious man," said Mr. Farivar. "He loved Afghanistan."
On the set of Endpapers, the Off Broadway play about the machinations of the publishing world, a dingy array of cluttered cubicles and bookcases adds a bit of authenticity to the offices of the play's fictional "mid-sized New York book publisher."
But even more accurate are the slush piles the actors onstage flip through and mark up when they have no lines to speak: They're real manuscripts from St. Martin's Press, procured by the playwright, Tom McCormack, who is the former C.E.O. of the publisher. "I called my old colleagues at St. Martin's, and they sent a van down with scores of manuscripts," Mr. McCormack said. He admits that not all of it is scintillating reading: "Some of it is from the scholarly and reference division, so the actors may find themselves reading about 14th-century Chinese art."
Still, the castmembers are glad to have it. At first, there were only a few manuscripts circulating among them to serve as slush. After the show had run for a couple of months, boredom set in. Shannon Burkett, who plays the assistant to the bean-counting publishing executive, Ted Giles, and who once temped as an assistant to Priscilla McGeehon, an editor at Addison-Wesley, was among the first to demand that the stage manager get more. "I was going to take the pencils off my desk and poke them in my eyes if they didn't get me something new to read," she said. She'd already read the biography of Christo three times.
And while the word these days is that editors don't edit, that doesn't mean actors playing editors don't edit. "I was looking at all these interesting doodles and stuff that were on there," said Bruce McCarty, who plays the heart-of-gold editor, Griff. "I said, 'Gee, whoever this editor was at St. Martin's was a little possessed.' And it turned out it was Pippa [Pearthree, who plays editor Cora McCarthy] who had already had those pages."
"I suggested that St. Martin's send them their real slush and give the actors a reader's fee," said Mr. McCormack.
Mr. McCarty's latest onstage read is a book about the World Trade Organization. "At one point, the writer said of a W.T.O. meeting in Seattle, 'They did not have in mind such a majestic purpose as forming a constitution.' I thought that was a funny word to use-'majestic'-so I commented on that in my notes: 'Maybe we should reconsider the word.'"
The book, however, has already been published.
Journalists Killed in 1998: 24 Confirmed
Carlos Mavroleon, free-lancer, August 27, 1998, Peshawar
Mavroleon, a free-lance television producer and cameraman on assignment for the CBS news program "60 Minutes," was found dead in a hotel room in Peshawar of an apparent drug overdose, according to Pakistani officials. Though the government of Pakistan concluded that the cause of death was "heroin poisoning (self)," some colleagues and family members believe Mavroleon may have been killed for his journalistic work.
Mavroleon had arrived in Peshawar on August 23 on assignment to film damage from the recent U.S. cruise missile attacks on the Afghan border town of Khost, about 180 miles to the southwest. The U.S. intended to hit training camps run by Osama bin Laden, whom Washington had identified as the suspected mastermind behind the August 7 attacks on U.S. embassies in eastern Africa.
On August 25, Mavroleon was detained and jailed overnight in Miranshah, a town in North Waziristan on the Afghan border. After being interrogated by Pakistani agents from the Intelligence Bureau and Inter-Services Intelligence, he was released on the afternoon of August 26 and sent back to Peshawar by bus.
In phone messages to a "60 Minutes" producer on August 25, Mavroleon had said he was "in terrible trouble" and that "they're on to me in a big way."
On the morning of August 27, Mavroleon met with Peter Jouvenal, a British cameraman and old friend, and Rahimullah Yusufzai, Peshawar bureau chief for the Pakistani daily The News. They joked about a report on Mavroleon's arrest that had appeared in the Urdu-language press labeling the journalist a "spy."
They were among the last people to see him alive.
Mavroleon died of "asphyxia due to heroin (diacetyl morphine) intoxication" at around 6 p.m. that evening, according to the official autopsy report.
I won’t see The Perfect Storm and regret reading the book. Author Sebastian Junger is the kind of literary San Gennaro effigy that publishers hoist about in a pious frenzy knowing we’ll throng blindly to the parade. Let us foil them. Let’s, for once, play the papal skeptic and face down the plaster saint’s hagiolatry.
I take you back two years ago this August to the death of my friend Carlos Mavroleon in his hotel room in the Pak-Afghan frontier town of Peshawar while on assignment for 60 Minutes. Clinton had just launched his Monica Missiles against bin Laden’s Afghan camps, and Carlos was investigating the results. Pakistani authorities declared his death a self-inflicted heroin overdose. Many colleagues, friends and family doubted the verdict. Numerous probes got under way, but Junger delivered first with a hefty eight-pager in Vanity Fair (February 1999) endorsing the Pak authorities’ opinion. Result: our industry walked away en bloc, allowing Junger’s reputation to rise on the wreckage of Mavroleon’s. "Sorry, Vanity Fair has already done the story," they whined in unison. Mavroleon’s producer at 60 Minutes, Leslie Cockburn, went to Peshawar and did a secret report pulling apart the official verdict. She begged for further investigation. None came.
Carlos Mavroleon’s reputation is worth preserving. Born to a wealthy Anglo-Greek ship-owning family, he ran away from English boarding school at age 15 and lived among tribesmen in northern Pakistan for two years. His father disowned him financially. Yet he graduated cum laude from Harvard and sailed into the 80s Wall Street boom. Which he abandoned to go to Afghanistan and fight with the mujahideen against the Soviet invasion. Under the nom de guerre Kerimullah, he shot down Soviet helicopters. Between battles, he helped a fellow Muj into Harvard by writing his application. Later Carlos became a legendary war cameraman in African conflicts.
So many stories of wit and bravery, all rejected by Junger as the twisted "reckless courage" of a spoiled rich kid. Unlike Junger’s brand of parachute journalism, Carlos lived and loved the tribal cultures he covered. He converted to Islam, learned their languages and earned his courage painstakingly. One story suffices: Somali gunmen escorting a tv crew begin to point guns, demand wages and issue threats. Carlos shouts at them to kneel and pray for thanks to Allah before they got a penny. They quiet down.
Junger’s thesis seemed reasonable. If not an accidental overdose, it must be murder. But who would bother to kill Carlos? And why go to such lengths of cover-up in a region where anyone can murder with anonymous bullets? With a little solid work, he might have answered these questions. Instead, he could dismiss all the crime scene’s anomalous details without scrutiny.
We found the answers, because Fox TV assigned us to the story. Fox Files boss Pamela Browne knew Carlos. (Carlos had saved a Fox crew taken hostage by Somali gunmen by offering himself in their place.) Sadly, halfway into our work Fox Files got canceled. So what I tell you now is an exclusive. No one has heard it before. And it really should cause a ruckus.
First, we found that Junger had likely endangered the life of a source. He did so without the knowledge of the source (call him "Guy"), an English gem dealer who travels the region often. Guy claimed he’d heard from a well-placed friend in the Peshawar bazaar that Mavroleon’s death was a hit. Junger apparently found the contact and pretended to be Guy’s friend. "Guy says you think it was a hit," the contact claimed Junger had said to him. Can you imagine anything more irresponsible–and unlikely to yield the truth? In a bazaar teeming with Taliban and bin Ladenites? When Guy went back months later, he walked into a viper’s nest.
In Vanity Fair, Junger skates over the pivotal fact that Carlos, disguised as a local doctor, got to a hospital in the forbidden zone of the tribal territories. The missile strike’s casualties of high rank lay there wounded. Carlos certainly encountered them, because his notes show names of patients. Junger never understood that Carlos had approached the crucial secret: that the camps serviced not bin Laden but the Pak military intelligence. They were training guerrillas for the invasion of Indian Kashmir. When Clinton struck, the Paks thought he deliberately tried to sink the invasion–that he’d turned pro-India. Carlos’ visit threatened to out their secret plans, and uncover their direct involvement with the invasion force. Reason enough for assassination? And for a cover-up? A Western journalist openly murdered would require an investigation.
Why couldn’t Junger figure it out? Because it opened the way to the crime scene’s anomalies and scuttled his thesis. Here are some examples: The police forbade anyone to witness the autopsy. They rushed it and embalmed the body before outside experts could join in. In the hotel room, they pretended to find the offending syringe accidentally, twice, eight hours apart. They’d moved the body near the syringe each time. Three men were seen following Carlos around town. A local reporter wrote that three men visited Carlos in the hotel at the time of death. That reporter retired soon after. During our stay, he missed an appointment with us and dodged us for three weeks. He was "terrified," said one colleague. Other local reporters warned us of "great danger." The assistant manager and others remember three Pak intelligence men in the doorway at the scene. The manager who saw them too denied it to us fervently. He, like so many others, had changed his story. No gear was found for fixing up, and there was only one needle scar on the body–not the sign of a practicing addict.
This is the very short version. Carlos had used heroin, but according to his doctor hadn’t injected for 10 years. In sum, I can’t yet prove that Carlos was killed. I wasn’t allowed to. But I can say that Junger is a disgraceful journalist. His movie should be renamed The Perfect Crime. | <urn:uuid:fc41673d-1b79-4673-b333-24c31e0be415> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://circleof13.blogspot.com/2008/05/tribute-to-carlos-mavroleon.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981093 | 28,710 | 1.59375 | 2 |
The Best Way to Invest in Brazil’s Oil Boom
Soroush is a member of The Motley Fool Blog Network -- entries represent the personal opinion of the blogger and are not formally edited.
In 2006, a remarkable discovery was made in the seas off the coast of Brazil’s southeastern tip. Energy explorers searching for new deposits of ‘black gold’ found the world’s first major oil field below the pre-salt layer – a mineral patch found in the ocean between South America and Africa.
Named for one of the most influential ethnicities of the country, the Tupi Field is a 650-square mile area resting below 6,600 feet of water and 16,000 feet of salt rock. The oil giant Petroleo Brasileiro SA Petrobras (NYSE: PBR), which is primarily owned by the Brazilian government, holds a controlling interest in the fields in the region. With 6.5 billion barrels of proven reserves, Tupi holds enough oil to meet global demand for three months, though this unearthing was only the start of Brazil’s oil windfall.
One year later, the Carioca-Sugar Loaf field was discovered in the Santos Basin – the same area as the Tupi Field. The Carioca-Sugar Loaf is one of the largest and deepest oil fields in the world; it is estimated to contain upwards of 30 billion barrels at 30,000 feet below sea level. While this presents a mechanical challenge to drillers, Petrobras has committed $225 billion to develop the field over the next five years. Moreover, the Iara Oil Field, which was discovered in 2008, is expected to hold an additional 3 to 4 billion barrels of oil, though these estimates have not been confirmed.
Altogether, these three discoveries nearly triple the size of Brazil’s oil reserves, placing the nation on par with the United States and Saudi Arabia in terms of crude deposits.
Already the world’s 20th largest petro company in terms of proven reserves, Petrobras owns approximately 65 percent of the 40 billion-plus barrels mentioned above. These finds increase the company’s reserve total threefold, pushing it into the global top ten, ahead of well-known names like ExxonMobil (NYSE: XOM), Chevron (NYSE: CVX), BP PLC (NYSE: BP), the Chinese PetroChina and the Russian Gazprom. Due to its close relationship with the Brazilian government, Petrobras is in the best position to benefit from the country’s oil boom.
With drilling and production costs expected to average $40 a barrel, Petrobras is sitting on more than $1 trillion of oil profits; and that’s assuming that prices remain depressed at $80 a barrel. Now, costs are inherently higher in the Santos Basin region due to depth – Exxon and Chevron pay around $10 a barrel – though the sheer size of the deepwater deposits warrant investors’ optimism.
In fact, Petrobras has already been growing its top line at an exceptional rate since the recession, as its 3-year average revenue growth (7.3%) is superior to the industry average (1.6%), and competitors like XOM (0.6%), CVX (-2.4%), and BP (1.7%). While PBR has had difficulties translating this to the bottom line – earnings have declined by almost 20 percent over the same period – much of this can be attributed to increased research and development expenses. In 2011 alone, these outlays increased from $993 million to $4.08 billion, as the company cited a need for innovative solutions to its upcoming projects. PBR is partnering with International Business Machines, General Electric, and Schlumberger Ltd to develop a more cost-effective way to drill through the thick layer of salt that separates its oil from the ocean.
Shares of Petrobras look to be undervalued at the moment -- the company sports a P/E ratio (7.1X) that is below the industry average (8.1X) and its own 10-year historical average (11.2X). Moreover, the company’s earnings multiple is also below XOM (10.3X), CVX (7.6X), and PTR (11.8X). Over the past decade, Petrobras’ earnings have historically traded at a 34 percent discount to the S&P’s average. Inexplicably, they are cheaper this year, trading at a 50 percent discount. Coming off the heels of a better than expected earnings release last month, analysts are expecting PBR to end 2012 with an EPS of $2.72, while reaching $3.13 a share in 2013. Assuming consensus holds, fairly valued shares of Petrobras should eclipse $25 by next summer. The stock currently trades in the $19 range, making a return north of 30 percent a real possibility.
Going forward, Petrobras is insulated from the geopolitical shocks in the Middle East that have left others in the oil industry on shaky ground; this is perhaps the greatest reason to consider the company in your portfolio. Brazil’s economy has quadrupled in size since the start of the 21st century, and currently ranks as the world’s sixth largest with $2.4 trillion in GDP. GDP per capita, or standard of living, has grown from $7,400 in 2000 to over $11,000 this past year. These gains have a pronounced effect on domestic oil usage, as Brazilians continually have more Reals to spend on consumption.
From a global perspective, oil demand grew by 310.25 million barrels in 2011, and is expected to grow by nearly 800 million barrels over the next two years. Since May, oil prices have fallen by over 20 percent, though most of this movement looks to be a result of disappointing economic data and fears of a double-dip recession. Over the long term, oil is still a bullish commodity, and expected to rise above $115 a barrel by 2013.
Driven by the recent discoveries of immense crude oil reserves off the coast of Brazil, Petrobras will continue to emerge as a major player in the global oil industry over the next decade. Due to the relative stability of the Brazilian region, and PBR’s own persistent undervaluation, now looks like the best time to take a long position. WealthLift’s Sentiment Index rates Petrobras as a strong buy, with nearly 100 percent of investors placing an overperform rating on the stock.
For more trading ideas in a rocky market environment, check out WealthLift INSIDER today.
Fool blogger Jake Mann does not own shares in any of the companies mentioned in this article. The Motley Fool owns shares of ExxonMobil. Motley Fool newsletter services recommend Chevron and Petroleo Brasileiro S.A. (ADR). Try any of our Foolish newsletter services free for 30 days. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. If you have questions about this post or the Fool’s blog network, click here for information. | <urn:uuid:ac0144cc-ccba-4e1e-9101-3cdc674705c2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://beta.fool.com/wealthlift/2012/06/22/best-way-invest-brazils-oil-boom/6105/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944208 | 1,494 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Ron Crouch wrote:I know Nibs isn't a big fan of the VM, but I still root for Buddhaghosa, so I went and took a look at this passage in context, and it looks as if Nibs is right, there is some Abhidhamma stuff popping up there.
Of course there is Abhidhamma stuff in there. The Vism. relies heavily upon the Abhidhammapiṭaka.
Ron Crouch wrote:Essentially, those writing the VM were trying to sort out three distinct theories describing how the path-consiousness could be different for different people.
Buddhaghosa is relying on the path structure found in the Dhammasaṅgaṇī and the Paṭisambhidāmagga.
Ron Crouch wrote:The idea that the path moment itself is a kind of super-jhana is one that I'm not that familiar with, but has some merits.
It's standard Theravāda exegesis.
Ron Crouch wrote:One issue may be how we are using the term "path." I'm assuming that when you are talking about "path" you are not referring to the moment when one directly apprehends Nibbana - right?
Actually, that is precisely what I'm referring to.
Ron Crouch wrote:Because that is nothing on top of nothing and there really can't be any factors of anything in Nibbana. However, I think Nib is talking about a direct apprehension of Nibbana. Which might help distinguish why there is a disagreement...
Nibbāna is probably one of the most misunderstood terms in contemporary Buddhism. The noble paths and fruitions are always
cognitions arising with concomitant mental factors. Attaining a noble path entails the arising
of these supramundane saṅkhāras and the non-arising
(nirodha), and extinguishment
(nibbāna) of fetters, mental outflows, and underlying tendencies which are terminated by that particular path. And attaining the fruition of that path entails the full extinguishment (parinibbāna) of those same fetters, etc.
For example, when one attains the fruition of stream-entry then any saṅkhāras which would arise in the future for a worldling are completely terminated and cease forever. When one attains the fruition of a once-returner then any saṅkhāras which would arise in the future for a stream-entrant are completely terminated and cease forever. When one attains the fruition of a non-returner then any saṅkhāras which would arise in the future for a once-returner are completely terminated and cease forever. And finally, when one attains the arahant fruition then any saṅkhāras which would arise in the future for a non-returner are completely terminated and cease forever.
Why is this so? Because in each case the causes and conditions for future arising are eliminated with the fruition of each noble path. This is the whole point of conditioned arising (paṭiccasamuppāda) -- it occurs and ceases to occur due to specific conditionality (idappaccayatā). Phenomena arise according to specific conditionality:
When this is, that is.
From the arising of this comes the arising of that.
And phenomena cease according to specific conditionality:
When this isn’t, that isn’t.
From the cessation of this comes the cessation of that. | <urn:uuid:fed8aa62-3a7e-40dc-b1c0-f6a0fb93b8b9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.php?p=190468 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943216 | 749 | 1.554688 | 2 |
The new monthly jobs numbers are out and the United States added a paltry 80,000 jobs in June. That’s nowhere near the 100,000 to 125,000 per month we need to create to keep pace with economic need. So it’s not good for any side.
But pay attention in the news and you’ll see Republicans bragging, happy to have one more arrow in their quiver to fire at President Obama.
According to a recent poll, a plurality of Americans — and a majority of independent and moderate voters — believe that Republicans are actively sabotaging the United States economy in order to hurt President Obama’s re-election prospects in the fall. So don’t chock my sentiments up to liberal talking points. The American people believe that Republicans want our economy and working families to suffer so that their party can succeed.
Though President Obama poorly chose his words and timing when he said last month that the private sector is “doing fine”, the fact is that private sector job growth remains steady — not robust by any stretch of the imagination, but consistent with what we might hope in an economic recovery coming out of the hole we’ve been in. As of June, America created 4.3 million private sector jobs in 27 straight months. That’s nothing to sneeze at. BUT the fact is that public sector jobs have been slashed at record levels. In this chart, the Washington Post’s Ezra Klein looks at the rates of public sector employment during the last four major recessions in America. Note how much lower is is now:
Klein computed that if you restored the 600,000 public sector jobs cut by Republicans in the last four years, the unemployment rate today would be 7.8% instead of 8.2% it actually is. And if the country had added public sector jobs in the last four years at the same rate as when George W. Bush was president, the unemployment rate would fall to 7.3%.
Notably, June jobs numbers were just adjusted to clarify that while only 100,000 net jobs were created, 176,000 private sector jobs were generated. The lesser net jobs growth is mainly the result of public sector layoffs.
Republicans like to pretend that firefighters, police and teachers aren’t hardworking, middle class Americans who contribute to our communities and our economy but rather blood-sucking leeches taking advantage of the public teet. But even the Wall Street Journal agrees the biggest impediment to businesses hiring in America today is a lack of customer demand. And public sector workers don’t just put out wildfires, keep our streets safe and educate our children for the economy of the future. They also buy stuff and spur demand. Killing 600,000 public sector jobs hurts the economy.
Of course, it’s distinctly possible that Republicans believe that trickle-down economic policies that give more and more money and power to big business and the super-rich while starving public sector jobs and small businesses actually will rescue our economy, despite the overwhelming evidence that those policies got us into this mess in the first place. More likely, it seems to me, is that Republicans realize full well their attacks on public sector jobs and their stonewalling on every jobs proposal the President puts forward (including tax cuts!) are very deliberate and self-aware actions to tank the economy with the hopes that President Obama will suffer politically. The fact that our economy not to mention hundreds of thousands of hard working Americans and the small businesses that rely on them are also suffering doesn’t seem to trouble Republicans in Washington one bit.
Recently, Politico published an op-ed by a conservative arguing “Democrats have been virtually flawless in appointing reliable liberals to the court. Yet Republicans, more often than not, appoint justices who vote with the other side on critical decisions.” Politico’s Arena asked if that formulation makes sense.
Another reading of the so-called “defections” of judges appointed by Republicans is that fair jurisprudence actually leans center-left. Except for the most ardent ideologues willing to contort the Founder’s intent to serve a narrow agenda, even politically conservative judges know the Constitution is meant to confer rights and benefits, not restrict them. Perhaps the sour grapes on the Right come not from a few failed efforts at vetting but from the creeping realization that their whims are on the wrong side of justice.
If you wanna show me some love on Politico’s page, please do. And what do you think?
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While new Canadian parents are eligible for between 17 and 52 weeks of parental leave after a birth or adoption, and can generally claim up to 55 per cent of their family income to a maximum of $485 per week through employment insurance benefits, our neighbours to the south are not as well off, reports The Huffington Post.
The report ranks countries by the length of their maternity leave allowance and the wages new parents can claim, and at 12 weeks maternity leave, the United States falls to the bottom of the list.
"We're learning so much right now about how children develop and one of the things we're learning is how important the first two years of life are," says Dr. Chris Mackie, associate medical officer of health with the City of Hamilton's Public Health Department.
"The whole concept of early childhood development is really amazing and it shows the trajectory that we take for our life is not completely, but largely determined by how well kids are supported in the first two years of life, in particular up to six years."
Mackie goes on to say that attachment between a child and parent is critical to the child's emotional and physical well-being. "We're finding is that if a child can attach well to a mother in the first year or so, that helps them to develop emotionally for their life."
While the United States ranks among the lowest on the list, Scandinavian countries like Denmark and Sweden rank highest, with 52 weeks/100 per cent wages and 420 days/80 per cent wages respectively. New moms in the United Kingdom are probably pleased with their 52 weeks at 90 per cent wages and in Croatia new moms can also take a full year at 100 per cent of their wages.
In this context, Canada ranks high, but living on 55 per cent salary can still be a struggle for some. Mackie says it boils down to a governmental value judgment.
"If a woman wants to have a career and also be a mom, parental leave is absolutely necessary and so is early childhood care," he argues. "So if we don't have those things in place in our society, than what we're saying is that women should stay home and they shouldn't participate equally or equitably in the work force."
"If we value motherhood more highly, we would pay women to be on parental leave," he adds.
Watch the video below about the popular pregnancy book What To Expect When You are Expecting. | <urn:uuid:caef5b01-730a-4ee4-9903-487b673e4669> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://in.lifestyle.yahoo.com/blogs/team-mom/canada-ranks-among-worlds-best-countries-for-maternity-leave.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966548 | 493 | 1.828125 | 2 |
Hippotherapy (therapeutic riding) is a fun, freeing therapeutic way to strengthen muscles and improve balance. It also can improve concentration and build confidence while providing new freedom for the riders. Often, riding is the only activity where these riders are able to be mobile and in control.
These “Top Hands” personify strength and perseverance in a way that ensures there is never a dry eye in the house. Coaches, volunteers, family members and spectators realize they have witnessed an extraordinary event that can change the lives of everyone involved. The courage exhibited by superior riders who continually break barriers not only in the arena, but also in their lives, drives this unique experience.
The Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo Special Children's Committee works with established riding clubs. Participants are entered through these riding clubs.
The Top Hands Horse Show is open to the general public and admission is free. | <urn:uuid:8bf73991-0dcb-415e-a5d0-3ada8c08d951> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.hlsr.com/Events/TopHandsHorseShow.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947714 | 185 | 1.539063 | 2 |
With all the jitters and heartache in the world, reflected every time we tune in to "what is out there," one wonders how we can achieve some semblance of peace in our everyday lives. Since we cannot bury our heads in the sands like an ostrich, some part of us must face the music and the discordant cacophony of unadulterated noise and stuff. We also have no filter, so to speak, to winnow out the good and bad of the life symphony we are subjected to daily. Some of the music we write ourselves from the moment our toes hit the floor in the a.m. What would you think about a new regime and thought process to change attitude every morning, BEFORE your toes hit the floor? Emile Couie had a saying, "Everday in every way I am healthier and happier and more able to handle the daily exigencies that life will inevitably throw at me." Most of us do not take time to leisurely begin our day, more like being shot out cannon than a cocoon. Some people greet the dawn happily and start stirring around like happy little roosters in a chicken yard, scratching and chirping. Then there are the slugs like me who want a glass of orange juice, a gentle slow wake up, and no talking, please. In your relationships, you encounter adjustments of temperament and ingrained behavior when you live in close proximity. It is like two foreign countries sharing borders geographically, trying to adjust to each other and being invaded by a third country, conquered and having new languages, cuisines, and customs
I was thinking about being happy within yourself, of being a peaceful person, and that led to all the lonely people in the world. Simplicity is one of the hardest things to achieve on this earth. I don't care if it is art, music, cooking, educating, child rearing, taking a photograph, having a conversation, going to the grocery store, you name it. By the way, brace yourself and your wallet. Because we have experienced the worst drought in half a century, your food costs are going up! Told you so!
I would love to hear from you, my readers, what you have done to become a more "peaceful person"? This is a deep and complex question. I often marvel, even though I live smack dab in the middle of a tourist town, downtown, my place retains a serene air and is amazingly quiet. The gardens right now are lush like an Amazonian rain forest. I am still learning "how to garden at altitude with attitude after over 20 years." So suggestion number 1, digging in the dirt and eating snow peas off the vine are a good start to peace. Take time out to just mentally unplug and be quiet and still, no phones, no distractions. Writing down your thoughts and dreams and put them in a beautiful box, pulling them out periodically to see if you have made any of them come true? Give away hugs and laughter like you have too much to keep to yourself. How many books have you read lately? Or listened to music, really listened? Or cooked bread, or cookies. or sticky cinnamon rolls recently?
My corn is now tasselling and ears forming, which fills me with wonder. So what, I will probably only get a few ears of the sweetest corn ever eaten; it is mine and I know what went into its making. Call me or email me, bring your camera, take pictures of my small Eden in the middle of Ruidoso. It will fill you with hope, and perhaps you will again find that peace which you knew as a child. It is my sincere hope that Ruidoso continues to develop as a fully aware community filled with art and music and clear aims for brotherly love that people just talk about. Little Bear Fire, the floods of 2008, and other tragedies should remind us to be a part of Ruidoso, an integral part. Move here and turn your brain and community involvement self to zero, does not a community make. If you don't do it and volunteer, who will? Talent and human gifts wither when not used! Bloom where you are planted!
Barbara is a former opera singer, hosted "What's Cooking?" for PBS, founded the Ruidoso Arts & Film Commission and is director of the Miss Ruidoso pageant.
Contact her: [email protected] | <urn:uuid:be049bd2-75e4-494e-952e-d285f4f06d72> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ruidosonews.com/ruidoso-features/ci_21228343/peace-ourselves | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962245 | 904 | 1.625 | 2 |
College of Charleston President Emeritus Theodore Sanders Stern, known for transforming the College from a small private college into a nationally recognized institution of higher learning, passed away earlier today in Charleston, South Carolina.
He had recently celebrated his 100th birthday.
“Ted Stern’s legacy as a campus and community leader is difficult to overstate,” said George Benson, president of the College of Charleston. “We mourn Ted’s passing and we extend our heartfelt condolences to his family. We have lost a dear friend and a great human being.”
Stern served as president of the College of Charleston from 1968 to 1978. When he arrived at the College of Charleston there were 432 students enrolled and 28 faculty members. With the College of Charleston facing a financial crisis, Stern worked with the South Carolina General Assembly to ensure the future of the College by turning it into a public institution. By the end of his presidency, the College enrollment had grown to over 5,300 students and 181 faculty members.
He was also is credited for admitting the first African American students to the College of Charleston.
Under Stern’s leadership, the College acquired approximately 80 buildings and constructed many of its most important facilities, including the Robert Scott Small Building, Maybank Hall, Physicians Memorial Auditorium, Buist Rivers Residence Hall, Rita Liddy Hollings Science Center, Grice Marine Lab, the Stern Center, and the Albert Simons Center for the Arts.
Stern helped introduce the College’s first graduate programs and South Carolina’s Governor’s School. He is also responsible for closing College and Green streets and paving the College’s sidewalks with distinctive herringbone-patterned bricks.
In 1974, the College of Charleston honored Stern by naming the student union building after him.
The Ted Stern Cup, also named in his honor, is awarded annually to a graduating senior who exemplifies the character of the College of Charleston. The Stern Cup is one of the three highest awards that a student can achieve at the College.
“For decades, Ted Stern has been a friend and mentor to the entire College of Charleston community,” said Greg Padgett, chairman of the College’s Board of Trustees. “We will continue to honor and celebrate Ted’s legacy in the days and weeks ahead.”
Along with transforming the College of Charleston, Ted Stern also played a crucial role in shaping the City of Charleston. Through his leadership, he was instrumental in the development of the South Carolina Aquarium, Charleston Place, and the Coastal Community Foundation of South Carolina.
As the first president of the board for the Spoleto Festival USA, Stern guided Spoleto through its early years to become one of the nation’s premier arts festivals.
Stern grew up in New York City and was a top-notch swimmer who nearly competed in the Olympics. A 1934 graduate of John Hopkins University, Stern enlisted in the United States Navy after college and earned a Bronze Star, one of our nation’s most important military awards.
Funeral arrangements will be announced at a later time. | <urn:uuid:3e44ea66-55e3-42ac-b017-3544297fb79a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.moultrienews.com/article/20130118/MN01/130119796/1007/MN/former-college-of-charleston-president-ted-stern-passes-away-at-age-100 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962633 | 646 | 1.78125 | 2 |
For complete coverage of the Lisbon Treaty referendum, see RTÉ.ie/lisbon.
Taoiseach Brian Cowen has said there will be sufficient, independently verified information about the Lisbon Treaty available to all the electorate to enable them to make a choice on 12 June.
Speaking on RTÉ Radio's News At One, Mr Cowen said he had not read the treaty cover to cover, but argued it was not an impenetrable document.
He said there was information available on what the treaty means and that people needed to know was what was being asked of them.
He said that voters were being asked to make the EU a more effective and efficient decision-making process.
The Taoiseach said there was nothing in the Lisbon Treaty that would lead to a change in Ireland's rate of corporation tax, adding that Ireland is a sovereign state in relation to tax levels.
He also said the best guarantee to help farming policies in Ireland is for farmers to vote Yes.
Meanwhile, Sinn Féin has accused two Government ministers of being unaware of key aspects of the Lisbon Treaty.
The party's Dublin MEP, Mary Lou McDonald, says former Enterprise Minister Micheál Martin has denied that Ireland will lose its veto over the outcome of the International Trade Agreement.
The MEP also says that the Defence Minister, Willie O'Dea, appears unaware that Ireland will be unable to block other EU states coming together to form mini military alliances.
Ms McDonald has said ministers should 'brush up' on the detail of the treaty document before continuing to pursue a Yes vote and slogan-driven campaign.
The MEP has also asked the Taoiseach to explain why he thinks the treaty is good for Ireland.
Referendum set for Thursday 12 June
Earlier today, 12 June was officially appointed as the polling day for the referendum by Environment Minister John Gormley.
Polling will take place between 7am and 10pm on that date, which is a Thursday.
The minister has appointed Maurice Coughlan, a Principal Officer in the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, to be the referendum returning officer.
Every Irish citizen who is included in the 2008/2009 register of electors is entitled to vote at the referendum. The total electorate currently stands at 3,051,278.
Those not on the register may be eligible to apply for inclusion on the supplement to the register. To be eligible, a person must be a citizen of Ireland, must be 18 years of age by polling day and must be ordinarily resident in the State.
An application for entry on the supplement can be obtained from city/county councils or downloaded at
Any applications must be made by 24 May.
Parties launch referendum campaigns
Fianna Fáil launched its Yes campaign for the EU Lisbon Reform Treaty today.
At the launch, Mr Cowen said he was confident all members of Government would be supporting a Yes vote.
He said all members of the Fianna Fáil party and parliamentary party, let alone the Cabinet, were fully supportive of the treaty.
He said the treaty was fundamental to what Fianna Fáil believes, how it thinks and where it was going as a party.
Mr Cowen said anyone who had a conscientious problem with the treaty would have to consider that issue outside the context of the parliamentary party.
Launching the Labour party's Yes campaign yesterday, Eamon Gilmore said the treaty would strengthen individual rights and those of Irish citizens at home.
He said the treaty provided for greater openness and accountability to European decision-making.
Meanwhile the Socialist Party is starting the final phase of its No campaign.
Over the weekend, an opinion poll showed a ten-point lead for the Yes side in the upcoming referendum.
But with the poll date a month away, more than a third of voters are still undecided.
Responding to the Red C poll in the Sunday Business Post, Sinn Féin said the No campaign is not a lost cause. | <urn:uuid:75b50a4c-4ebd-4cda-9384-287ae77eb3c8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0512/103157-eulisbon/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970396 | 819 | 1.726563 | 2 |
| maysay1 wrote:|
| jonesable wrote:|
Well there is a reason why ppl dont vote.
Poor ppl typically don't vote.
Also I need to look again but aren't our voting numbers getting better?
I expect a dip though in the next election
I gotta find the article again...but there was a great one comparing voting in the asian (includes korean, chinese, southeast asian, and pacific islander) community here in los angeles county vs. the black community. Apparently both communities have comparable numbers of people who can't vote (asians because of citizenship, blacks because of felony convictions). But the asian community is much smaller and still had much higher turnout even with the significant burden of language barriers. Which they were able to overcome because several asian-immigrant orgs worked in the communities for like a year before the election so that it wouldn't be an issue.
Black people, with no language barrier, and no citizenship barrier, basically just choose not to vote. It's shameful.
Idk there is a considerable amount of ppl who don't vote at all.
And even that number is improving.
2008 was the highest percentage of voter turnout since 1968 I believe.
2012 there was a decline of 13 million voters.
It's something that affects ppl everywhere.
Hell even places where voting is compulsory dont get 100 percent of the electorate.
But I have bigger issues with the candidates and the system we use to vet candidates and the institution itself than those who choose not to vote
Edited by jonesable - Jan 06 2013 at 3:40pm | <urn:uuid:84beb8b2-29cd-40ea-bba2-c7aa11e5430d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://forum.blackhairmedia.com/smmfh-the-black-community-is-finished-politically_topic352947_post10054017.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971891 | 341 | 1.664063 | 2 |
[Stackless] stackless python in a multicore environment
johanc at easypublisher.com
Fri Sep 21 20:28:56 CEST 2007
(I'm sending this back to the list if that's ok, I have trouble
remembering to reply-all)
> Johan Carlsson wrote:
> > What did you try to do with pp and stackless?
On 9/21/07, Chris Lee <c.j.lee at tnw.utwente.nl> wrote:
> I tried a number of things
> 1) Use tasklets to initiate pp jobs. This didn't work, but I suspect I
> could get it to work now that I am more familiar with pp
> 2) Use channels to communicated data between different pp jobs. This
> certainly won't work because pp sets up different python instances,
> though pickling the communication might get around this
> 3) Use channels and tasklets to efficiently switch between setting up
> jobs, starting jobs, and processing the results
Sounds like os threads might be more appropriate,
at least for the job management?
> The problem with this is that the tasklets tend to block while waiting
> for pp jobs to return so it runs as if you were using pp without
> stackless or threading.
Well since stackless threading is cooperative, if the calls to pp
block so will the tasklet.
Hence, that's why I think preemptive os threads would work better in
One thing you didn't try, which I would find more interesting is to run
the jobs with stackless, e.g. each process would have it's own schedule.
The issue of synchronization over process bounds is interesting.
I think you need to create a new type of channel class that can
synchronize with the remote processes.
I don't know much about pp, I haven't had the time for it yet,
but another framework comes to mind, the Spread framework.
Spread provides multicast to channel that are reliable and ordered.
The send of a spread multicast doesn't block, and the receive can be
made non-blocking by polling its status.
How is synchronization usually done in pp?
Colliberty Easy Publisher
More information about the Stackless | <urn:uuid:14cc0923-61f4-4fa0-baf3-387c840dce4d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.stackless.com/pipermail/stackless/2007-September/003068.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944852 | 485 | 1.710938 | 2 |
I must confess that I have not always been enthusiastic
about Gloriae Dei Cantores’ records in the past. Here, as on their
Christmas CD 'The Coming of Christ' their Schola is directed by
Dr. Mary Berry in a programme themed around the Life of Christ.
On this recording, the sound engineers have managed to strike
the right balance between clarity and sympathy. On previous recordings,
the group have been recorded rather closely, which brings big
advantages in terms of clarity, but means that the group is extremely
exposed when it comes to lack of unanimity in the vocal line.
But here, while clarity has been preserved, the choir are surrounded
by a sympathetic acoustic which adds to their sound immeasurably.
Under the direction of Dr. Mary Berry they produce a wonderfully
focused and flexible sound.
The 16-person Schola, based in Massachusetts,
sings both the daily Benedictine Offices and the Ordinary and
Propers of the mass. This routine familiarity with chant is a
great advantage and shows through in their commitment to all the
music and the meaning of its text. This latter is important, as
chant is nothing if it is not performed with a feeling for the
meaning of the texts.
Rather than doing a liturgical reconstruction, the group have
assembled the chant based on narrative themes. A previous CD covered
Christ's nativity. This CD starts with his baptism followed by
his journey into the desert with an antiphon to the Benedictus
canticle from Lauds for the First Sunday in Lent. But before the
chant starts, David Chalmers plays Gerald Near's organ paraphrase
of 'Ave Colendas Trinitas'. Near writes much sacred music and
it is good to hear some of it on CD, but no matter how well David
Chalmers plays it, I feel that it sits rather oddly with the remaining
The story then goes through the calling of his
disciples using Propers for the Fest of St. Andrew. His preaching
is represented by two Antiphons from the Common of Saints and
of Apostles and the Communion for the Feast of Corpus Christi
looks forward to the institution of the Eucharist.
The parable of the Wise Virgins is presented
via the Communion chant for the Common of Virgins along with a
parable about the Kingdom of Heaven from the Common of Religious.
The first miracle, the Wedding at Cana, is narrated
in the Communion chant from the Common of both male and female
saints. This is followed by a group of antiphons which presents
further miracles; the final one being the raising of Lazarus from
the Communion chant for the Fifth Sunday in Lent, which prefigures
the Resurrection from the dead of Christ himself.
Halfway through the recital we are brought up
short, by the inclusion of another organ piece by Gerald Near
based on 'O Sacrum Convivium'.
The organ piece is followed by an antiphon and
responsory for the Feast of the Transfiguration. The second half
of the recital thus echoes the revelation of Christ's divinity
at his Baptism from the opening of the recital. A group of antiphons
narrates the events leading up to Passion week, culminating in
the chants sung at the Palm Sunday procession. Chant from holy
week includes the lovely 'Ubi Caritas' along with Christ’s words
when instituting the Eucharist. This group concludes with the
'Pange Lingua', sung during the Procession to the Altar of Repose,
and finally two chants leading towards Christ's resurrection.
The recital ends, as it began, with another organ
piece. This time, Jean Langlais' organ paraphrase 'Mors et Resurrectio'.
Would that the disc had ended with some chant.
As on previous GDC records, the background to
the chant in the booklet emphasises the text at the expense of
the music, there is little in the way of musical background. The
chant is sung in the modern manner. This is Gregorian chant for
now rather than liturgical archaeology.
The majority of chant on this recording is quite
short, the longest (the 'Pange Lingua') lasting 3.37 and some
is inevitably very short. It would have been more satisfactory
if Dr. Berry could have included one or two rather longer chants.
But the recital has been put together with care and some flair.
The fact that it casts its narrative net over the whole of Christ's
life means that we get a generous selection from the church's
year. This is an imaginative solution to the problem of how to
organise a programme of chant. Under Dr. Mary Berry, Gloriae Dei
Cantores Schola give fine performances resonating with conviction. | <urn:uuid:84d6734b-2be7-4de9-98a3-3646a9d9726c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2003/Jun03/GDC_The_Beloved_Son.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934576 | 1,034 | 1.515625 | 2 |
The New Testament Gospel Without Paul
There is a movement today (mainly coming from the sacred name camp and law keepers) telling us that God did not choose Paul, and that his gospel is false. The reason they have arrived at this conclusion is because they are mostly law keepers who do not understand the covenants, nor understand the differences in the Mosaic and the new covenant based on the grace of God and the work of Yeshua (Jesus) on the cross.
There have always been attacks on the Bible and its acceptance. In the early church about A.D. 140, a man named Marcion instituted the first real controversy. He rejected the majority of the New Testament He believed God rejected Paul and accepted Peter. He threw out Matthew, Mark, and John and made a canon of his own consisting of Luke which he rewrote. There are others today who want to rewrite the Bible, add other books (Gnostic books) or reject some that we already have. There are at least 86,000 quotations from the early church records that believed Paul’s writings were part of Scripture. These are found in several thousand Lectionaries that are church-service books. After nearly 1900 years of the canon being established these rebels are causing a lot of confusion.
Does the Bible support the position that we are to keep the Old Testament law (which often includes the Feast days of Lev.23) and not concentrate on the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ as the gospel of grace to both Jew and Gentile. Is Paul not called of God and what He preached not the same as the others apostles? What does the Bible say on this? We must first go to Paul’s own epistles to see what He says and then coincide this with the book of Acts and the apostolic writers.
Galatians 1:1 “Paul, an apostle (not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father who raised Him from the dead)”
Romans 1:1 “Paul, a bondservant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated to the gospel of God
2 Timothy 1:1 Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God” This is repeated over and over in his epistles (1 Cor.1:1; 2 Cor.2:1; Eph. 1:1; Col.1:1; 2 Tim1:1.) If this is not true then the Scripture is not inspired by God and cannot be trusted anywhere as accurate.
Paul writes about after his conversion, Gal. 1:18-23 “Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and remained with him fifteen days. But I saw none of the other apostles except James, the Lord's brother. (Now concerning the things which I write to you, indeed, before God, I do not lie.) Afterward I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia. And I was unknown by face to the churches of Judea which were in Christ. But they were hearing only, “He who formerly persecuted us now preaches the faith which he once tried to destroy.”
There is no way to explain Paul’s conversion for if he feigned it, to take advantage of the church he put himself through the worst position that any of the apostles experienced; being jail, beaten several times, stoned and mocked. Saul was fine as Pharisee, why would anyone undergo this kind of persecution unless they had a true conversion? “ in labors more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequently, in deaths often. From the Jews five times I received forty stripes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods; once I was stoned; three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been in the deep; in journeys often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils of my own countrymen, in perils of the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; in weariness and toil, in sleeplessness often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness-- besides the other things…” (2 Cor. 11:23-280.
We find that the claims of this new anti-Paul cult are completely bogus. What Paul preached was not only the same as the other apostles, but was sanctioned by them because he was with them.
Gal. 2:1-2: “Then after fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, and also took Titus with me. And I went up by revelation, and communicated to them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but privately to those who were of reputation, lest by any means I might run, or had run, in vain.” V.9: “and when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that had been given to me, they gave me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised.”
At the church in Antioch, they fasted and prayed “ the Holy Spirit said, "Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them” (Acts 13:2-3).
On Paul and Barnabas’ missionary journey Acts 13:14: “But when they departed from Perga, they came to Antioch in Pisidia, and went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and sat down. And after the reading of the Law and the Prophets, the rulers of the synagogue sent to them, saying, “Men and brethren, if you have any word of exhortation for the people, say on.” Then Paul stood up, and motioning with his hand said, “Men of Israel, and you who fear God, listen: He then gives them their own history (similar to what Stephen said in Acts 7, which makes this significant since he was there at stoning when this transpired).
Acts 13:22-40: “And when He had removed him, He raised up for them David as king, to whom also He gave testimony and said, 'I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after My own heart, who will do all My will.' “From this man's seed, according to the promise, God raised up for Israel a Savior-- Jesus--”after John had first preached, before His coming, the baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel. “And as John was finishing his course, he said, 'Who do you think I am? I am not He. But behold, there comes One after me, the sandals of whose feet I am not worthy to loose.' “Men and brethren, sons of the family of Abraham, and those among you who fear God, to you the word of this salvation has been sent. “For those who dwell in Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they did not know Him, nor even the voices of the Prophets which are read every Sabbath, have fulfilled them in condemning Him. “And though they found no cause for death in Him, they asked Pilate that He should be put to death. “Now when they had fulfilled all that was written concerning Him, they took Him down from the tree and laid Him in a tomb. “But God raised Him from the dead. “He was seen for many days by those who came up with Him from Galilee to Jerusalem, who are His witnesses to the people. “And we declare to you glad tidings-- that promise which was made to the fathers. “God has fulfilled this for us their children, in that He has raised up Jesus. As it is also written in the second Psalm: 'You are My Son, today I have begotten You.' “And that He raised Him from the dead, no more to return to corruption, He has spoken thus: 'I will give you the sure mercies of David.' “Therefore He also says in another Psalm: 'You will not allow Your Holy One to see corruption.' “For David, after he had served his own generation by the will of God, fell asleep, was buried with his fathers, and saw corruption; “but He whom God raised up saw no corruption. “Therefore let it be known to you, brethren, that through this Man is preached to you the forgiveness of sins;” and by Him everyone who believes is justified from all things from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses.” Beware therefore, lest what has been spoken in the prophets come upon you”:
Before we conclude this I want to point out the similarity of What Peter said to Israel on Pentecost.
Acts 2:22-3:16 “Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a Man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs which God did through Him in your midst, as you yourselves also know-- “Him, being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of God, you have taken by lawless hands, have crucified, and put to death; “whom God raised up, having loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that He should be held by it. “For David says concerning Him: 'I foresaw the Lord always before my face, for He is at my right hand, that I may not be shaken. Therefore my heart rejoiced, and my tongue was glad; moreover my flesh also will rest in hope. For You will not leave my soul in Hades, nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption. You have made known to me the ways of life; you will make me full of joy in Your presence.' “Men and brethren, let me speak freely to you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. “Therefore, being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his body, according to the flesh, He would raise up the Christ to sit on his throne, “he, foreseeing this, spoke concerning the resurrection of the Christ, that His soul was not left in Hades, nor did His flesh see corruption. “This Jesus God has raised up, of which we are all witnesses. “Therefore being exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He poured out this which you now see and hear. “For David did not ascend into the heavens, but he says himself: 'The Lord said to my Lord, “Sit at My right hand, Till I make Your enemies Your footstool.” ' “Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.” Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Men and brethren, what shall we do?” Then Peter said to them, “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. “For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call.” And with many other words he testified and exhorted them, saying, “Be saved from this perverse generation.” Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them.And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers.
Both refer to David and both refer to Jesus crucifixion for heir sins will be forgiven.
The reaction to Paul and Barnabas- Acts 13:42-43 “So when the Jews went out of the synagogue, the Gentiles begged that these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath.Now when the congregation had broken up, many of the Jews and devout proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who, speaking to them, persuaded them to continue in the grace of God.”
Notice that Barnabas was with Paul when he spoke this gospel invitation. Barnabas as one of the apos accompanied Paul with his calling to the Gentiles. Acts 13:43-47: “Now when the congregation had broken up, many of the Jews and devout proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who, speaking to them, persuaded them to continue in the grace of God. On the next Sabbath almost the whole city came together to hear the word of God. But when the Jews saw the multitudes, they were filled with envy; and contradicting and blaspheming, they opposed the things spoken by Paul. Then Paul and Barnabas grew bold and said, “It was necessary that the word of God should be spoken to you first; but since you reject it, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, behold, we turn to the Gentiles. “For so the Lord has commanded us: 'I have set you as a light to the Gentiles, that you should be for salvation to the ends of the earth.'
Paul concentrated on the cross and the person of Christ in salvation. Maybe the people today are angry at Paul’s epistle to the Galatians when he spoke of the law keepers who came into the church to bring them into bondage. Gal. 2:4-5 “… false brethren secretly brought in (who came in by stealth to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage), to whom we did not yield submission even for an hour, that the truth of the gospel might continue with you. Gal. 3:10-11 “For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse; for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things which are written in the book of the law, to do them." But that no one is justified by the law in the sight of God is evident, for "the just shall live by faith.” These men were adding the Messiah to their law not understanding the new covenant made by Him. We read in Acts 15:1-6 “And certain men came down from Judea and taught the brethren, "Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved." Therefore, when Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and dispute with them, they determined that Paul and Barnabas and certain others of them should go up to Jerusalem, to the apostles and elders, about this question. So, being sent on their way by the church, they passed through Phoenicia and Samaria, describing the conversion of the Gentiles; and they caused great joy to all the brethren. And when they had come to Jerusalem, they were received by the church and the apostles and the elders; and they reported all things that God had done with them. But some of the sect of the Pharisees who believed rose up, saying, "It is necessary to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses." Now the apostles and elders came together to consider this matter.
Sound familiar, it is basically the same argument we are hearing today in various forms. Paul’s conclusion to the Galatian church- Gal. 2:21: “I do not set aside the grace of God; for if righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died in vain.” There is no good news without Christ dying and being the “ the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes” (Rom 10:4).
Paul contended for the truth as he rebuked those persuaded by the law keepers- “O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you that you should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed among you as crucified? This only I want to learn from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now being made perfect by the flesh? (Gal 3:1-3) They began with the gospel and received the Holy Spirit by believing in it, not by what the Judaizers were offering through the law. Paul spoke the t same truth by the other apostles.
This infiltration had to be dealt with in the church as it caused a great controversy and was hindering their evangelism. Acts 15:7-38 “And when there had been much dispute, Peter rose up and said to them: “Men and brethren, you know that a good while ago God chose among us, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. “So God, who knows the heart, acknowledged them by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as He did to us, “and made no distinction between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. “Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear “But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved in the same manner as they.”
Peter is referring to Acts 10:38-11:18 when he first preached the gospel to the Gentiles (Cornelius and his house) “how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him. “And we are witnesses of all things which He did both in the land of the Jews and in Jerusalem, whom they killed by hanging on a tree. “Him God raised up on the third day, and showed Him openly, “not to all the people, but to witnesses chosen before by God, even to us who ate and drank with Him after He arose from the dead.“And He commanded us to preach to the people, and to testify that it is He who was ordained by God to be Judge of the living and the dead. “To Him all the prophets witness that, through His name, whoever believes in Him will receive remission of sins.” While Peter was still speaking these words, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who heard the word And those of the circumcision who believed were astonished, as many as came with Peter, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out on the Gentiles also. For they heard them speak with tongues and magnify God. Then Peter answered, “Can anyone forbid water, that these should not be baptized who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?” And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord..”
How did the original apostles and Jews receive the Holy Spirit? In Acts 10:43-48, vs. 43 “... through His name, whoever believes in Him will receive forgiveness of sins. In vs. 44, we see the Holy Spirit falling on the Gentiles. In vs. 46, they manifested a gift of the Spirit after they heard the Gospel.
Acts 15:8 “God seeing their hearts acknowledged them by giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did us. And making no distinction between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith.” Vs. 11 “We believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus we shall be saved in the SAME MANNER as they.” The consistent teaching in the book of Acts and the rest of scripture is by God’s grace through faith. God gave then the Holy Spirit because He saw their faith that was in their heart. Peter makes the explicit point that they got saved the SAME WAY.
Peter repeats this again in Acts 11:15-18 “And as I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell upon them, as upon us at the beginning.“Then I remembered the word of the Lord, how He said, 'John indeed baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit.' “If therefore God gave them the same gift as He gave us when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could withstand God?”
When they heard these things they became silent; and they glorified God, saying, “Then God has also granted to the Gentiles repentance to life.”
They concluded with this, Acts 15:22 “Then it pleased the apostles and elders, with the whole church, to send chosen men of their own company to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas, namely, Judas who was also named Barsabas, and Silas, leading men among the brethren. They wrote this letter by them: The apostles, the elders, and the brethren, To the brethren who are of the Gentiles in Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia: Greetings. Since we have heard that some who went out from us have troubled you with words, unsettling your souls, saying, 'You must be circumcised and keep the law'-- to whom we gave no such commandment-- it seemed good to us, being assembled with one accord, to send chosen men to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. We have therefore sent Judas and Silas, who will also report the same things by word of mouth. For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things: that you abstain from things offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell.
For one to deny Paul they must deny the record contained in the Book of Acts (which is accurately called the Acts of the apostles) and all of early church history. Justin Martyr quotes Paul (100-16 ad). Polycarp quotes Paul. Iranaeus who was a disciple of Polycarp quotes Paul over 200 times.
We must remember that it is Luke who put the book of Acts together with all the information available, though it starts with Peter and John he does show the succession to Paul and Barnabas sent out to bring the gospel to the Gentiles (non Jews) throughout the known world.
Acts 23:9-14 “Then there arose a loud outcry. And the scribes of the Pharisees' party arose and protested, saying, “We find no evil in this man; but if a spirit or an angel has spoken to him, let us not fight against God.” Now when there arose a great dissension, the commander, fearing lest Paul might be pulled to pieces by them, commanded the soldiers to go down and take him by force from among them, and bring him into the barracks. But the following night the Lord stood by him and said, “Be of good cheer, Paul; for as you have testified for Me in Jerusalem, so you must also bear witness at Rome.”And when it was day, some of the Jews banded together and bound themselves under an oath, saying that they would neither eat nor drink till they had killed Paul. Now there were more than forty who had formed this conspiracy.They came to the chief priests and elders, and said, “We have bound ourselves under a great oath that we will eat nothing until we have killed Paul.
Notice the hatred of Paul; we can see the same from those today that refuse to accept his gospel as the same as the other apostles. They remind me of Paul’s conversation with Agrippa. “King Agrippa, do you believe the prophets? I know that you do believe.” Then Agrippa said to Paul, “You almost persuade me to become a Christian.” (Acts 26:27-28). A Christian- most do not want to be called that name but something else, to be unique.
Peter had great respect for Paul; even after he was rebuked by his in front of others for being hypocritical with eating with the Gentiles.
2 Peter 3:15-16: “and account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation-- as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you, as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures” Notice that Peter equates Paul’s letters as Scripture.
John bears witness to Paul being an apostle as he writes the words of Jesus- Revelation 2:2: “I know your works, your labor, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil. And you have tested those who say they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars.” The Ephesus church was watched over by Paul, he was not found to be a liar, but a true apostle.
Acts 20:29, 32, 34 it was Paul who warned the Ephesians before he left “For I know this, that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock.”… “So now, brethren, I commend you to God and to the word of His grace, which is able to build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified.”
This is not an in depth look into Paul’s participation with the apostles and church but should be sufficient to dismantle any of the arguments. Paul taught “For you are all children of God by faith in Christ Jesus.” Ephesians 2:8-10 tells us that it is by grace through faith that we are saved, not because Paul wrote it but because this is indeed the gospel. This is the means that is used to become a child of God. There is no other way. “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast” (Eph. 2:8-9).
Paul understood the difference and was happy to live in and by the new covenant instead of his old life by the law. Philippians 3:9: “And being found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is of the law but that through faith in Christ the righteousness which is of God by faith.”
“It pleased God through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe” (1 Cor. 1:21) What was that message? A few verses before He tells us, v. 18 “For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” SAVED (past tense). How? Through faith! The cross is sufficient because it is Christ’s work for us- the gospel is grace through faith
“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes” (Rom. 1:16).
If you reject what Paul wrote then you are ashamed of the gospel that Jesus Christ the Messiah gave.
Books one can read on how the canon was assembled in the history of the early church:
F.F. Bruce- The Books and the Parchments
L. Berkhof- The History of Christian Doctrines
Harry Bettenson- Documents of the Christian Church
L. Gaussen- Theopnesustia
N. Geisler and W. E. Nix-General Introduction to the Bible
J. Harrell- The Bible its origin and growth
Howard Clark Kee- Understanding the New Testament
Herbert Lockyer- All the Apostles of the Bible
J.N. D. Kelly- Early Christian Doctrines
Josh McDowell- Evidence that demands a Verdict pt.1 and 2
J.P. Lange- Commentary on the Holy Scriptures
C. Leupold- Exposition of Ecclesiastes
B. B. Warfield- The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible | <urn:uuid:6f7be6c2-e471-4322-9539-693df43cfba9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.letusreason.org/Doct63.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981223 | 5,986 | 1.734375 | 2 |
UT Veterans Invited to Commemorate Veterans Day Nov. 12
Faculty, staff, and students who are also military veterans are invited to sign a board commemorating Veterans Day. The board will be displayed on campus during the National Day of Remembrance on November 12 and other times throughout the year.
The project is a joint effort of Veterans at UTK, the student group for veterans; the Center for the Study of War and Society; and the Office of Veterans Affairs, part of the Office of the University Registrar.
The board will be displayed during the all-day ceremony on November 12, when the names of fallen service men and women will be read.
To sign the board, visit 209 Student Services Building anytime between 7:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, October 30, through Friday, November 9.
Last year, UT joined in the National Day of Remembrance Project started by Eastern Kentucky University by having campus volunteers read the names of the more than 6,300 veterans who have died since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. This year, members of the community are invited to join in the reading of names—and to add the names of their loved ones who have died while serving in the military at any time in history.
Anyone interested in reading names and/or adding the name of a loved one who died while serving in the military is asked to e-mail Regina Lewellyn at [email protected].
C O N T A C T :
Regina Lewellyn, Veterans Affairs Assistant (865- 974-1500, [email protected]) | <urn:uuid:c5175b45-835d-4c02-b376-4970b0b5b760> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.utk.edu/tntoday/2012/10/29/veterans-day-2012/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966598 | 342 | 1.5 | 2 |
Weltevreden Community Development Centre
Of particular concern in this community are lack of facilities
for the elderly and the large number of refugees who have found a
the community is poor in many respects, one thing they are not short
of is willing hands!
Volunteers have been mobilised to help set up
an inter-generational support group, which aims
to reintegrate the elderly into the community, through interacting
with the younger generation in a positive way.
Another project is a communal vegetable garden, to provide fresh
nutritious food for the community food kitchen.
Refugees are encouraged to make use of counselling services at the
Centre which provide much needed emotional and physical support,
as well as helping to integrate them into the community. | <urn:uuid:9c99c6fb-2ea0-45b0-bc0b-efea0cea0dcb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cwd.org.za/weltevreden.asp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951907 | 162 | 1.671875 | 2 |
Clarissa Lee is the most recent alum of the Oregon State University Libraries Resident Scholar Program, having completed her stay in Corvallis in early January. Lee is a Ph.D. candidate in the Program in Literature at Duke University.
The focus of Lee’s research and writing is the notion of speculation in contemporary quantum theory; or, more generally, “speculative physics.” While at OSU, Lee dug deeply into the History of Science rare book collection, the History of Atomic Energy Collection and the Ava Helen and Linus Pauling Papers in support of her dissertation.
Lee’s Resident Scholar presentation, “Experiments, Fictions, and the Question of Science-Modeling in Speculative Physics,” gave a glimpse into her ambitious research agenda as it is currently evolving. From the abstract of her talk
In trying to work out what speculation entails, I have returned to the prehistory of particle physics, to earlier chains of physical epistemological developments in areas such as electricity, radioactivity and nuclear physics, especially in terms of their experimental-instrumental design and the formalistic developments that drive them forward….I will also explore the relationship of specific developments in particle physics to astrophysics and cosmology (with a nod towards the space science of the 1960s) especially over questions of space-time and locality of extra-terrestrial objects (as well as their relationship to String theory and hidden dimensions.)
According to Lee, her time at OSU
helped me shape…the arguments I am making about the freedom and constraints involved in physics speculation, especially through some of the physics problems faced by scientists in moving between theoretical prediction and experiment.
Lee’s research “is also interested in theorizing and constructing models of fiction…through the use of speculative science fiction as well as speculative science fact, for the purpose of extending the imaginative realm of the scientific real.”
To this end, Lee made extensive use of Linus Pauling’s collection of Analog: Science Fact and Fiction paperback periodicals. Along with detective stories and the occasional walk, reading science fiction was Pauling’s favorite leisure activity, and his papers include thousands of dog-eared science fiction monthlies – a much-needed escape for Pauling from the unrelenting pressures that surrounded him for much of his life.
For Lee, sources like Pauling’s Analogs are useful in
trying to formulate some preliminary ideas concerning how fictionalizing can be used as a way for creatively modeling existing scientific ideas, theories and facts that aid scientists in pondering about more speculative areas of science, while also using scientific material to deal imaginatively with interdisciplinary studies of science and the humanities.
The Resident Scholar Program, now in it sixth year, offers research stipends of up to $2,500 in support of researchers wishing to make extensive use of materials held in the OSU Libraries Special Collections & Archives Research Center. More information about the program, including the application form, is available here. The deadline for 2013 applicants is April 30th. | <urn:uuid:821951dd-ade7-424d-a336-0e44ffbac0ed> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://paulingblog.wordpress.com/2013/02/13/clarissa-lee-resident-scholar/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942998 | 631 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Lat: N 66
Long: W 168
We are currently positioned just off the coast of Wales (Alaska).
After a welcome speech at the end of breakfast, the Captain sounded the 'Abandon Ship' Emergency Signal. Everyone practiced the lifeboat drill which was completed sucessfully. Straight after the drill everyone was into their work and concentrating on their tasks.
At the moment they are recovering the first 3 moorings which have been in the water for 1 year. From these 3 moorings they will collect data about currents, temperature, salinity and nutrients. After the data is collected, these moorings will be fully recharged and deployed again. This process will keep everyone focussed and busy for the rest of the day. | <urn:uuid:8635b219-6777-40ef-9d5c-7514b4ecc715> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://heritage-expeditions.com/captains-blog/first-day-scientific-charter/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97376 | 154 | 1.734375 | 2 |
Volume 19, Issue 3 (May 1991)
Prediction of the Strength of Ceramic Tubular Components: Part I—Analysis
The objective of this paper is to develop the analytical background for test methodologies that will enable accurate prediction of the strength distribution of ceramic tubular components from the strength distributions of simple specimens. Four simple specimen configurations and two tubular configurations were selected for this purpose. The simple specimen configurations were (1) four-point bend, (2) C-ring tested in compression, (3) C-ring tested in tension, and (4) O-ring tested in diametral compression. In addition, a short tube tested by axially compressing rubber inside the tube and a long tube subjected to internal pressure were analyzed. These specimen configurations were for the most part selected in a tubular shape in order to simulate the shape of tubular structural components. The prediction of the strength distribution of one specimen from that of another was based on Weibull statistical theory. Effective volume and area expressions, necessary for failure prediction, were derived for these specimen configurations. | <urn:uuid:5daedcc1-9780-4df7-a42d-eee318dc8444> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.astm.org/DIGITAL_LIBRARY/JOURNALS/TESTEVAL/PAGES/JTE12555J.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943352 | 219 | 1.820313 | 2 |
The Ridenhour Courage Prize
- Courage Prize
- Book Prize
- Prize for Truth-Telling
- Documentary Film Prize
- Prize for Reportorial Distinction
Courage Prize Recipients
Bob Herbert joined The New York Times as an Op-Ed columnist in June 1993. He writes about politics, urban affairs and social trends in a twice-weekly column. The champion of the under-reported story, Herbert brings moral clarity and a sense of outrage to his ongoing depiction of injustice. Whether he is exposing abuses of power, complacency in the face of urgent need or the enduring racial divide, Herbert's columns form the moral center of American journalism.
From January 1991 to May 1993, Herbert was a national correspondent for NBC, reporting regularly on The Today Show and NBC Nightly News.
A founding panelist of Sunday Edition, a weekly discussion program on WCBS-TV, he was also the host of Hotline, a weekly hour-long issues program on WNYC-TV, both beginning in 1990.
Previously, Herbert worked at The Daily News, beginning in 1976. His positions at The Daily News included general assignment reporter, national correspondent, consumer affairs editor, city hall bureau chief and city editor. In 1985, he became a columnist and a member of the Editorial Board. His column continued to appear in The Daily News until February 1993.
His career began in 1970 as a reporter, then night city editor in 1973, of The Star-Ledger in Newark, NJ.
Born in Brooklyn, Herbert earned a Bachelor of Science degree in journalism from the State University of New York (Empire State College). He has taught journalism at Brooklyn College and the Columbia University School of Journalism.
He has won numerous awards, including the Meyer Berger Award for coverage of New York City, the American Society of Newspaper Editors award for distinguished newspaper writing, and the David Nyhan Prize from the Shorenstein Center at Harvard University for excellence in political reporting.
Herbert is the author of Promises Betrayed: Waking Up from the American Dream.
2009 Courage Prize Speeches
On April 16, 2009, New York Times Op-Ed columnist Bob Herbert accepted the Ridenhour Courage Prize from The Nation Institute and the Fertel Foundation. You can watch his remarks in the video below.
Text of the speech given by Bob Herbert in 2009
It's a wonderful honor to receive this award and to be on the same program with the other recipients this year. I'm getting chills, actually. And it's fantastic to be in this room, because I am so seldom in the company of so many people that I admire. Trust me. You travel around this country and you can spend some time with some weirdos.
Special thanks go to Ham Fish and The Nation Institute and to Randy Fertel and the Fertel Foundation and to the members of the Ridenhour family who are here. It's a fantastic honor. And also with the state of the newspaper business right now probably came just in time. If you wait a week it could be over.
I want to talk for just a few minutes about two wrong headed ideas that are held by a very large percentage and maybe a majority of Americans.
I've noticed over the past few years, along with many other reporters, that many people feel a sense of powerlessness when it comes to the government policies and corporate practices that have such a great effect on their lives.
I've noticed that this feeling is widespread, and I noticed it especially during the presidential campaign. And it's a feeling that is both disheartening and self fulfilling.
Right now, in the midst of a terrible recession, a lot of people are hoping that President Obama will be able to do something to turn things around. But they don't feel that there's anything that they themselves can do. People vote but they don't have a real sense that they have clout, that they can affect the decisions made in the White House or on Capitol Hill or in the boardrooms of great corporations.
During the presidential campaign, I asked a woman in a Detroit suburb if she had any thoughts about what might help bolster the economy and create jobs? "Get rid of Bush," she said. But when I persisted she said: "Are you kidding? Who would listen to me?" I believe that this notion that ordinary people are powerless is wrong but it is widely held.
The other widely held idea that I think is wrong is the widespread belief among people that they bear no responsibility for the policies and events that often have such a dramatic effect on the society and on their lives.
According to this view they were in no way responsible for the debacles in Iraq, in Afghanistan or the crazy doings on Wall Street and the corporate sector that wrecked the economy.
They weren't responsible for the egregious failures of the society to develop a first rate public school system for all of its kids or for the sorry state of the nation's infrastructure. All of that was somebody else's doing.
Both of these notions that Americans are basically powerless to intervene in their own fate and that they bear no responsibility for the important events of their time are wrong, and not only are they wrong, they're dangerous.
They're wrong because ordinary Americans actually have tremendous power to shape the policies and practices that affect their lives. If they're willing to make the big effort and take the risks inherent in trying to make substantial changes in the society.
We've seen it. We saw it most dramatically in the civil rights movement, which changed the face of this nation. And, again, in the women's movement. We saw it long ago in the labor movement. And later in the fight for a cleaner environment.
It's tough. It can be dangerous. It requires courage. It can take a long, long time, but it can be done.
It's also wrong for ordinary people to fall back on the comforting illusion that they bear no responsibility for the events swirling all around them. My response to that kind of thinking is: Where were you for the past 30 years?
Either you bought into the greed and the excessive tax cuts and the trickle down absurdities and the labor bashing and the election highjacking, curtailment of civil liberties and exportation of jobs and the market mania and torture policies and shock and awe and wars without end. I could go on and on. Either you bought into all of that stuff that had such a deleterious effect on people across the board in this country, or you didn't raise your voice loudly enough against it.
One way or another you had some responsibility. If you didn't understand during the fight over welfare reform, for example, when millionaires on the senate floor stood up and cheered the withdrawal of benefits from poor children, if you didn't understand then that when they finished tearing up the safety net for the poor that they would soon be coming after the middle class, you bear some responsibility.
It wasn't long before they were going after Social Security. We're all responsible for the state of our society. But the point I want to stress here is that these two notions of powerlessness and failure to acknowledge responsibility are particularly dangerous because they prevent ordinary people from seeing the landscapes of their lives clearly and from taking the necessary steps to improve that landscape.
The society's problems are always, according to this way of thinking, somebody else's fault. And the person who feels powerless looks to somebody else, most often a president, to come along and fix these things.
That turns the average American citizen into some kind of helpless, hapless figure. The polar opposite of an informed, involved citizen.
If you don't think you can do anything about the conditions of the society, then you won't even make the effort to clearly understand the issues. What would be the point?
And we've seen what happens. You start to think crazy thoughts. Like there may be something to this trickle down after all. And the logical next step is to believe that the best thing for you and your family is to make sure that the people up at the top have lots and lots of money so there will be plenty to eventually trickle down to you.
Suddenly you feel strongly about getting rid of the inheritance tax.
You don't mind those payroll taxes. But that death tax has to go. After a while, with the imbalance of wealth and power increasing step by step, year after year, you don't even have a good sense of how unfair the system has become, you're anxious. Maybe even frightened, but you have no clear idea of what is going on.
All you want to do is keep your job, protect your little bit of mortgage turf, just survive. Now, of course, even that's a problem. For all the talk of change in the last election, and obviously the Obama era is a big change from the Bush years, but for all the talk of change and for all the silly how long about socialism from the republicans, we're not even close to making the kind of fundamental changes in this society that I think are necessary.
What we need, of course, are steps to bring about a fairer apportionment of the nation's wealth and resources and that won't happen without a sustained demand amounting to a campaign by ordinary Americans that the government and corporate elites stop stomping all over the interests of working people and the poor and begin to seriously address their concerns.
Full employment. A world class education system. Health coverage for all Americans. Protection of the environment. If the United States, with all its wealth and freedoms and technological genius is not capable of bringing those things about, then it means that this great experiment in democracy that we claim to be so proud of has failed.
For 30 years or more working people, when I talk about working people, I'm including the so called broad middle class, everybody who has to work in order to make it from month to month. For 30 years working people have been ceding wealth and power to people at the top. Men who are now in their 30s, the prime age for raising families, earn less money than members of their father's generation did at the same age. The median income for men in their 30s in 1974, using today's inflation adjusted dollars, was about $40,000.
Now it's approximately $35,000. If you adjust for inflation, from 1980, when Ronald Reagan was elected president, to the mid point of the current decade, the average income for the vast majority of Americans actually declined.
The peak income year for most individual American taxpayers, believe it or not, was way back in 1973. Standards of living for most American families were maintained or improved over the decade since then, because women went into the workplace in droves, and because we mortgaged ourselves up to our eyeballs.
So a realignment of the wealth and resources of our society is in order. But that won't come from the White House or Congress, not even with the democrats in control.
The banks, the great corporations, are always pressing their case in the corridors of power whether the democrats are in power or the republicans are in power, no matter what. But who was pounding the table for working people day in and day out? Who was their advocate? Who was the advocate for working people who has the ear of Obama the way Larry Summers has the ear of Obama?
I love the quote from Leo Gerard, president of the Steel Workers Union who said Washington will bail out those who shower before work but not those who shower afterwards.
A fairer, more just, more equitable distribution of the nation's resources won't come about unless and until the ordinary working men and women of this society become less passive, less quiescent, until they realize that they have to raise their voices and take much more direct responsibility for bringing about the changes necessary to improve their lives and the lives of their children.
A fair shake is all I'm talking about. A fair shake for those who are not already rich and powerful. The media's role in this effort is the same as it always is. To dig out the stories and provide accurate information and informed commentary about what is really going on in this society.
But what the progressive media especially could do that would be helpful would be to encourage greater participation by everybody in the civic and political life of the nation.
Today's version of Plato's cave is the American living room where so many people sit with remote in hand watching the flickering image of a flat screen TV.
We won't get the kind of change that I'm talking about, a transformative change, to a more just and equitable society, until ordinary Americans step away from their televisions and look outside the door at the real world to see clearly and unmistakably the unfairness in the way that they've been treated.
And even then they'd have to marshal the courage to take big risks as so many did in the early days of labor and in the civil rights movement to fight for their interests, which I contend are identical to the national interests. They'd have to demand that we stop fighting debilitating unwinnable wars. That we make employment a true top priority, give it more than just lip service. That we stop squandering the potential of the young and instead go to the mat to see that they are given a first class education and so on.
If such a movement were to get started, trust me, leaders would emerge. The talent and the intelligence are out there.
But without that kind of commitment, the most we can look forward to is the eventual passing of this recession and that a long period of what will most likely be a lower standard of living and an expansion of the ranks of the poor.
Do I think that this kind of real change transformational change is possible? I know it's possible. Time and again during the course of my life I've seen what was believed to have been impossible come to pass.
Not to be flip, but a black man has been elected President of the United States.
And I'm standing here the recipient of this wonderful award when my father could not have held any of the jobs that I've had in my career, not one of them.
So that's a big change in just one generation. When I came into the newspaper business, we worked with, pains me to say this when I came into the newspaper business we worked with typewriters and carbon paper. I know kids who don't know what carbon paper is.
And everybody in the newsroom smoked. And a fair number of them drank.
You should have seen the Daily News newsroom, the guys with the hats and the drawer and the jug.
And women reporters for the most part were confined to the feature pages. So change is possible. But Frederick Douglas knew way back in 1857 that power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did, he said, and it never will. Thank you very much. | <urn:uuid:a8dfbcb6-11bf-4ce0-a31f-3e17f1c735f3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ridenhour.org/prizes_courage_2009.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972969 | 3,069 | 1.78125 | 2 |
Most Active Stories
Tue January 22, 2013
Brrr! 'Dead Of Winter' Sets In; Coldest Air In Nearly Two Years
Originally published on Tue January 22, 2013 9:57 am
It felt like -51 degrees Fahrenheit in Langdon, N.D., on Monday and brutal wind chills like that are going to continue across northern states as winter really sets in.
Even in the "warmer" places, it's not going to feel like it's much above zero for the next few days. And "lake effect" snows are expected to pile up around the Great Lakes.
Weather Underground's Jeff Masters says this big freeze is bringing some of the coldest temperatures the nation has seen in nearly two years. And the low, low readings will continue through the week from the upper Plains to New England and down into the mid-Atlantic.
The Weather Channel puts on its Mom hat to tell folks that "scarves, stocking caps, long underwear — all of it will come in handy for millions of you this week."
National Weather Service meteorologist Jon Hitchcock tells The Buffalo News that "we're finally back to the dead of winter, and it looks like it's going to last for a while. This probably will be the coldest we've seen in a couple of years."
At 6:15 a.m. ET today in Cleveland it was 11 degrees and with the wind it felt like -14, The Plain Dealer reports. Schools across Northeast Ohio (and in many other places in the grip of this cold snap) are closed today because of the weather.
Feel free to answer that classic question — "How cold was it?" — in the comments thread.
By the way, it's pretty cold in Europe this week too.
Update at 11:55 a.m. ET. Most Liked Quip So Far:
Commenter "Fred Flintstone" offered an old classic — "It was so cold that I saw a lawyer with his hands in his own pockets!" — that's so far been "voted up" 45 times.
Can anyone beat that? | <urn:uuid:97591787-bf1a-4309-904f-2eb3cbb44ce4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kenw.org/post/brrr-dead-winter-sets-coldest-air-nearly-two-years | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968923 | 432 | 1.539063 | 2 |
Not sure if this a good place to ask this question.
I am working on a J2EE application in production environment. In my j2ee websphere applicaiton server i have deployed a ear file.
I have a clustered environemnt where i have three websphere application
servers set up in cluster.The three applcation servers are named server1, server2, and server3. All three application servers have their own jvm and all three application servers use a common database. now say there is a common record in database which is accessed by three users user1, user2 and user3 and the three users are served by server1 , server2 and server3 respectively. After user1, user2 and user3 have accessed the record, if user1 updates the record, i want user2 and user3 to be able to see the updated record (as updated by user1).
Can anyone tell me what could be a solution to this problem.
I think it doesn't really matter that these are web applications, does it? Your question is mainly about how, after one user updates a record, other users can find out about that and see the updated version, right? So let's move it over to the JDBC forum. | <urn:uuid:73834a07-dff5-41d8-b03c-b68f41ce3e66> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.coderanch.com/t/305625/JDBC/databases/EE-application-production-environment | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946769 | 261 | 1.546875 | 2 |
CIPE Launches Responsible Business Guide in Pakistan
Lahore, Pakistan – As Pakistan’s businesses become increasingly sophisticated and integrated into the global economy, they must further enhance their transparency, accountability, and integrity. In late 2010, in Lahore, Pakistan, CIPE, the Responsible Business Initiative (RBI), and the Association of Certified Chartered Accountants (ACCA) launched a new tool to encourage just that – the Responsible Business Guide: A Toolkit for Winning Companies. The Guide is a new element in CIPE’s emerging focus on corporate citizenship, which represents a move from philanthropy and corporate social responsibility to a deeper understanding of the commitment of companies to society.
The publication is the result of years of research, roundtables, focus group discussions, and drafting guided by a working group including leading Pakistani firms, business associations and chambers of commerce, the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan, and others. CIPE Executive Director John D. Sullivan explained in his opening remarks that the guide is a roadmap for companies to “embrace and demonstrate ethical business practices,” allowing them to “create jobs, strengthen civil institutions, combat corruption, and promote growth.” The Guide focuses on six practical areas: governance and management, principles and values, compliance and disclosure, stakeholder involvement and social investment, product integrity and customer focus, and financial viability and capitalization.
At the event, a panel discussion pointed out the difference between corporate philanthropy and corporate citizenship. Giving charitable donations can be a part of being a good corporate citizen, but it is not the whole picture. One panelist described responsible businesses as “islands of excellence,” oriented toward sustainable growth, using resources wisely, and taking into account the interests of a wide range of stakeholders.
Responsible business encourages long-run economic growth, an effect which functions in two key ways. First, entrepreneurs who conduct their business in a fair, transparent, responsible and accountable manner, recognize that with increasing profits comes increasing responsibility to all stakeholders. This helps the business to grow faster and increases earnings. Second, companies that voluntarily adopt and adhere to ethical principles can head off attempts by politicians to mandate the same behavior through regulation. Excess regulation drives up costs, so responsible business helps firms unleash the economic potential of the private sector for the benefit of the whole society.
Instituting responsible business practices remains a challenge for many Pakistani firms, but these firms are recognizing the need to keep up with international trends. To continue building on this initiative, the audience and panelists sketched out some ideas for further activities, including more research, advocacy and education, training firms to implement responsible practices, and greater coordination among interested stakeholders. CIPE and its partners plan to continue engaging on the issues of corporate citizenship, including through tools such as the new Guide, not just in Pakistan, but in countries around the world. .
>> Return to main page | <urn:uuid:7a282d15-b3a4-49f3-9433-394910abfbe2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cipe.org/democracyInAction/050211/articles/pakistan.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943087 | 603 | 1.820313 | 2 |
Quotation added by staff
Through spontaneity we are re-formed into ourselves. It creates an explosion that for the moment frees us from handed-down frames of reference, memory choked with old facts and information and undigested theories and techniques of other people's findings. Spontaneity is the moment of personal freedom when we are faced with reality, and see it, explore it and act accordingly. In this reality the bits and pieces of ourselves function as an organic whole. It is the time of discovery, of experiencing, of creative expression.Spolin, Viola
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Public Papers - 1992 - October
Presidential Debate in East Lansing, Michigan
Jim Lehrer. Good evening. Welcome to this third and final debate among the three major candidates for President of the United States: Governor Bill Clinton, the Democratic nominee; President George Bush, the Republican nominee; and independent candidate Ross Perot.
I am Jim Lehrer, of ``The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour'' on PBS. I will be the moderator for this debate, which is being sponsored by the Commission on Presidential Debates. It will be 90 minutes long. It is happening before an audience on the campus of Michigan State University in East Lansing.
The format was conceived by and agreed to by representatives of the Bush and Clinton campaigns. And it is somewhat different than those used in the earlier debates. I will ask questions for the first half under rules that permit followups. A panel of three other journalists will ask questions in the second half under rules that do not. As always, each candidate will have 2 minutes, up to 2 minutes, to make a closing statement. The order of those as well as that for the formal questioning were all determined by a drawing.
Gentlemen, again, welcome. And again, good evening.
It seems, from what some of those voters said at your Richmond debate and from polling and other data, that each of you, fairly or not, faces serious voter concerns about the underlying credibility and believability of what each of you says you would do as President in the next 4 years.
Governor Clinton, in accordance with the draw, those concerns about you are first. You are promising to create jobs, reduce the deficit, reform the health care system, rebuild the infrastructure, guarantee college education for everyone who is qualified, among many other things, all with financial pain only for the very rich. Some people are having trouble, apparently, believing that is possible. Should they have that concern?
Governor Clinton. No. There are many people who believe that the only way we can get this country turned around is to tax the middle class more and punish them more. But the truth is that middle class Americans are basically the only group of Americans who have been taxed more in the 1980's and during the last 12 years even though their incomes have gone down. The wealthiest Americans have been taxed much less even though their incomes have gone up.
Middle class people will have their fair share of changing to do and many challenges to face, including the challenge of becoming constantly reeducated. But my plan is a departure from trickle-down economics, just cutting taxes on the wealthiest Americans and getting out of the way. It's also a departure from tax-and-spend economics because you can't tax and divide an economy that isn't growing.
I propose an American version of what works in other countries. I think we can do it better: invest and grow. I believe we can increase investment and reduce the deficit at the same time if we not only ask the wealthiest Americans and foreign corporations to pay their fair share, we also provide over 0 billion in tax relief in terms of incentives for new plants, new small businesses, new technologies, new housing, and for middle class families, and we have 0 billion of spending cuts.
Invest and grow: raise some more money; spend the money on tax incentives to have growth in the private sector; take the money from the defense cuts and reinvest it in new transportation and communications and environmental cleanup systems. This will work.
On this, as on so many other issues, I have a fundamental difference from the present administration. I don't believe trickle-down economics will work. Unemployment is up. Most people are working harder for less money than they were making 10 years ago. I think we can do better if we have the courage to change.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. President, a response.
President Bush. Do I have one minute? Just the ground rules here.
Mr. Lehrer. Well, you have roughly one minute. We can loosen that up a little bit. But go ahead.
President Bush. He doesn't like trickle-down Government, but hey, I think he's talking about the Reagan-Bush years where we created 15 million jobs. The rich are paying a bigger percent of the total tax burden. What I don't like is trickle-down Government. I think Governor Clinton keeps talking about trickle-down, trickle-down, and he's still talking about spending more and taxing more.
Government, he says, invest Government, grow Government. Government doesn't create jobs. If they do, they're make-work jobs. It's the private sector that creates jobs. And yes, we've got too many taxes on the American people, and we're spending too much. That's why I want to get the deficit down by controlling the growth of mandatory spending.
It won't be painless. I think Mr. Perot put his finger on something there. It won't be painless, but we've got to get the job done. But not by raising taxes.
Mr. and Mrs. America, when you hear him say we're going to tax only the rich, watch your wallet, because his figures don't add up, and he's going to sock it right to the middle class taxpayer and lower if he's going to pay for all the spending programs he's proposed. So we have a big difference on this trickle-down theory. I do not want any more trickle-down Government. It's gotten too big. I want to do something about that.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. Perot, what do you think of the Governor's approach, what he just laid out?
Mr. Perot. Well, the basic problem with it is it doesn't balance the budget. If you forecast it out, you still will have a significant deficit under each of their plans, as I understand them. Our challenge is to stop the financial bleeding. If you take a patient into a hospital that's bleeding arterially, step one is to stop the bleeding. And we are bleeding arterially.
There's only one way out of this, and that is to stop the deterioration of our job base, to have a growing, expanding job base to give us the tax base. See, balancing the budget is not nearly as difficult as paying off the trillion debt and leaving our children the American dream intact. We have spent their money. We have got to pay it back. This is going to take fair-shared sacrifice.
My plan balances the budget within 6 years. We didn't do it faster than that because we didn't want to disrupt the economy. We gave it off to a slow start and a fast finish to give the economy time to recover. But we faced it, and we did it. And we believe it's fair-shared sacrifice.
The one thing I have done is lay it squarely on the table in front of the American people. You've had a number of occasions to see in detail what the plan is and at least you'll understand it. I think that's fundamental in our country that you know what you're getting into.
Mr. Lehrer. Governor, the word ``pain,'' one of the other leadership things that's put on you is that you don't speak of pain, that you speak of all things -- nobody's going to really have to suffer under your plan. You've heard what Mr. Perot has said. He said to do the things you want to do, you can't do it by just taking the money from the rich. That's what the President says as well. How do you respond to that? The numbers don't add up.
Governor Clinton. I disagree with both of them. Let me just follow up here. I disagree with Mr. Perot that the answer is to put a 50-cent gas tax on the middle class and raise more taxes on the middle class and the working poor than on the wealthy. His own analysis says that unemployment will be slightly higher in 1995 under his plan than it is today. As far as what Mr. Bush says, he is the person who raised taxes on the middle class after saying he wouldn't. Just this year Mr. Bush vetoed a tax increase on the wealthy that gave middle class tax relief. He vetoed middle class tax relief this year.
Furthermore, under this administration, spending has increased more than it has in the last 20 years, and he asked Congress to spend more money than it actually spent. Now, it's hard to outspend Congress, but he tried to for the last 3 years.
So my view is the middle class is the -- they've been suffering, Jim. Now, should people pay more for Medicare if they can? Yes. Should they pay more for Social Security if they get more out of it than they've paid in and they're upper income people? Yes. But look what's happened to the middle class. Middle class Americans are working harder for less money than they were making 10 years ago, and they're paying higher taxes. The tax burden on them has not gone down; it has gone up.
I don't think the answer is to slow the economy down more, drive unemployment up more, and undermine the health of the private sector. The answer is to invest and grow this economy. That's what works in other countries, and that's what will work here.
Mr. Lehrer. As a practical matter, Mr. President, do you agree with the Governor when he says that the middle class -- the taxes on the middle class -- do your numbers agree that the taxes on the middle class have gone up during the last -- --
President Bush. I think everybody is paying too much taxes. He refers to one tax increase. Let me remind you it was a Democratic tax increase. I didn't want to do it, and I went along with it. I said I made a mistake. If I make a mistake, I admit it. That's quite different than some. But I think that's the American way.
I think everyone is paying too much. But I think this idea that you can go out and -- then he hits me for vetoing a tax bill. Yes, I did, and the American taxpayer ought to be glad they have a President to stand up to a spending Congress. We remember what it was like when we had a spending President and a spending Congress and interest rates -- who remembers that -- they were 21.5 percent under Jimmy Carter, and inflation was 15. We don't want to go back to that. So yes, everybody's taxed too much, and I want to get the taxes down, but not by signing a tax bill that's going to raise taxes on people.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. President, when you said just then that you admit your mistakes, and you looked at Governor Clinton and said -- what mistake is it that you want him to admit to?
President Bush. Well, the record in Arkansas. I mean, look at it. And that's what we're asking America to have? Now, look, he says Arkansas's a poor State. They are. But in almost every category, they're lagging. I'll give you an example.
He talks about all the jobs he's created in 1 or 2 years. Over the last 10 years since he's been Governor, they're 30 percent behind. They're 30 percent of the national average. On pay for teachers, on all these categories, Arkansas is right near the very bottom.
You haven't heard me mention this before, but we're getting close now, and I think it's about time I start putting things in perspective. I'm going to do that. It's not dirty campaigning, because he's been talking about my record for half a year here, 11 months here, and so we've got to do that. I've got to get it in perspective.
What's his mistake? Admit it, that Arkansas is doing very, very badly against any standard: environment, support for police officers, whatever it is.
Mr. Lehrer. Governor, is that true?
Governor Clinton. Mr. Bush's Bureau of Labor Statistics says that Arkansas ranks first in the country in the growth of new jobs this year, first -- --
President Bush. This year.
Governor Clinton. -- -- fourth in manufacturing jobs; fourth in the reduction of poverty; fourth in income increase. Over the last 10 years we've created manufacturing jobs much more rapidly than the national average. Over the last 5 years our income has grown more rapidly than the national average. We are second in tax burden, the second lowest tax burden in the country. We have the lowest per capita State and local spending in the country.
We are low-spending, low tax burden. We've dramatically increased investment and our jobs are growing. I wish America had that kind of record, and I think most people looking at us tonight would like it if we had more jobs and a lower spending burden on the Government.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. Perot, if you were sitting at home now and just heard this exchange about Arkansas, who would you believe?
Mr. Perot. I grew up five blocks from Arkansas. [Laughter] Let's put it in perspective. It's a beautiful State. It's a fairly rural State. It has a population less than Chicago or Los Angeles, about the size of Dallas and Fort Worth combined. So I think probably we're making a mistake night after night after night to cast the Nation's future on a unit that small.
Mr. Lehrer. Why is that a mistake?
Mr. Perot. It's irrelevant. [Laughter]
Mr. Lehrer. What he did as Governor of Arkansas -- --
Mr. Perot. No, no, no. But you can't -- I could say that I ran a small grocery store on the corner, therefore, I extrapolate that into the fact that I could run Wal-Mart. That's not true. I carefully picked an Arkansas company, you notice there, Governor.
Mr. Lehrer. Governor?
Governor Clinton. Mr. Perot, with all respect, I think it is highly relevant, and I think that a billion budget in State and Federal funds is not all that small. I think the fact that I took a State that was one of the poorest States in the country and had been for 153 years and tried my best to modernize its economy and to make the kind of changes that have generated support from people like the presidents of Apple Computer and Hewlett-Packard and some of the biggest companies in this country, 24 retired generals and admirals, and hundreds of business executives are highly relevant.
And you know, I'm frankly amazed that since you grew up five blocks from there you would think that what goes on in that State is irrelevant. I think it's been pretty impressive.
Mr. Perot. It's not -- --
Governor Clinton. And the people who have jobs and educations and opportunities that didn't have them 10 years ago don't think it's irrelevant at all. They think it's highly relevant and wish the rest of the country -- --
President Bush. I don't have a dog in this fight, but I'd like to get in on it.
Governor Clinton. You think it's relevant.
President Bush. Governor Clinton has to operate under a balanced budget amendment. He has to do it. That is the law. I'd like to see a balanced budget amendment for America, to protect the American taxpayers. Then that would discipline not only the executive branch but the spending Congress, the Congress that's been in control of one party, his party, for 38 years. We almost had it done. And that institution, the House of Representatives -- everyone's yelling ``Clean House!'' One of the reasons is we almost had it done, and the Speaker, very able, decent fellow, I might add, but he twisted the arms of some of the sponsors of that legislation and had them change their vote.
What's relevant here is that tool, that discipline that he has to live by in Arkansas. And I'd like it for the American people. I want the line-item veto. I want a check-off so if the Congress can't do it, let people check off their income tax, 10 percent of it, to compel the Government to cut spending. If they can't do it, if the Congress can't do it, let them then have to do it across the board. That's what we call a sequester. That's the discipline we need. And I'm working for that to protect the American taxpayer against the big spenders.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. President, let's move to some of the leadership concerns that have been voiced about you. They relate to something you said in your closing statement in Richmond the other night about the President being the manager of crises, and that relates to an earlier criticism that you began to focus on the economy, on health care, on racial divisions in this country only after they became crises. Is that a fair criticism?
President Bush. Jim, I don't think that's a fair shot. I hear it. I hear it echoed by political opponents, but I don't think it's fair. I think we've been fighting from day one to do something about the inner cities. I'm for enterprise zones. I have had it in every single proposal I've sent to the Congress. Now we hear a lot of talk, ``Oh, well, we all want enterprise zones.'' Yet the House and the Senate can't send it down without loading it up with a lot of these Christmas tree ornaments they put on the legislation.
I don't think in racial harmony that I'm a laggard on that. I've been speaking out since day one. We've gotten the Americans for Disabilities Act, which I think is one of the foremost pieces of civil rights legislation. And yes, it took me to veto two civil rights quota bills, because I don't believe in quotas, and I don't think the American people believe in quotas. I beat back the Congress on that, and then we passed a decent civil rights bill that offers guarantees against discrimination in employment, and that is good. I've spoken out over and over again against anti-Semitism and racism, and I think my record as a Member of Congress speaks for itself on that.
What was the other part of it?
Mr. Lehrer. Well, it's just that -- you've spoken to it, I mean, but the idea -- not so much in specifics -- --
President Bush. Yes.
Mr. Lehrer. -- -- but that it has to be a crisis before it gets your attention.
President Bush. I don't think that's true at all. I don't think that's true. But, you know, let others fire away on it.
Mr. Lehrer. Do you think that's true, Mr. Perot?
Mr. Perot. I'd like to just talk about issues, and so -- --
Mr. Lehrer. You don't think this is an issue?
Mr. Perot. Well, no. But the point is that's a subjective thing. The subjective thing is when does President Bush react. It would be very difficult for me to answer that in any short period of time.
Mr. Lehrer. Well, then, I'll phrase it differently then. He said the other night in his closing words in Richmond that one of the key things that he believes the American people should decide among the three of you, is who they want in charge if this country gets to a crisis. Now, that's what he said. And the rap on the President is that it's only crisis time that he focuses on some of these things. So my question to you -- we're going to talk about you in a minute.
Mr. Perot. I thought you'd forgotten I was here. [Laughter]
Mr. Lehrer. No, no, no. No, no. But my question to you is -- so, if you have nothing to say about it, fine. I'll go to Governor Clinton. But -- --
Mr. Perot. I will let the American people decide that. I would rather not critique the two candidates.
Mr. Lehrer. All right.
Governor, what do you think?
Governor Clinton. The only thing I would say about that is I think that on the economy, Mr. Bush said for a long time there was no recession and then said it would be better to do nothing than to have a compromise effort with the Congress. He really didn't have a new economic program until over 1,300 days into his Presidency and not all of his health care initiative has been presented to the Congress even now.
I think it's important to elect a President who is committed to getting this economy going again and who realizes we have to abandon trickle-down economics and put the American people first again and who will send programs to the Congress in the first 100 days to deal with the critical issues that America's crying out for leadership on: jobs, incomes, the health care crisis, the need to control the economy. Those things deserve to be dealt with from day one. I will deal with them from day one. They will be my first priority, not my election year concerns.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. President.
President Bush. Well, I think you're overlooking that we have had major accomplishments in the first term. But if you're talking about protecting the taxpayer against his friends in the United States Congress, go back to what it was like when you had a Democratic President and a Democratic Congress. You don't have to go back to Herbert Hoover. Go back to Jimmy Carter. Interest rates were 21 percent. Inflation was 15 percent. The ``misery index,'' unemployment, inflation added together, it was invented by the Democrats, went right through the roof. We've cut it in half, and all you hear about is how bad things are.
You know, you remember the question, ``Are you better off?'' Well, is a homebuyer better off who can refinance the home because interest rates are down? Is a senior citizen better off because inflation is not wiping out their family savings? I think they are. Is the guy out of work better off? Of course he's not. But he's not going to be better off if we grow the Government, if we invest, as Governor Clinton says, invest in more Government.
You've got to free up the private sector. You've got to let small business have more incentives. For 3 months -- three quarters I've been fighting, three quarters, been fighting to get the Congress to pass some incentives for small business, capital gains, investment tax allowance, credit for first-time homebuyers, and it's blocked by the Congress. Then if a little of it comes my way, they load it up with Christmas trees and tax increases. And I have to stand up in favor of the taxpayer.
Staying the Course
Mr. Lehrer. We have to talk about Ross Perot now, or he'll get me, I'm sure.
Mr. Perot, on this issue that I have raised at the very beginning and we've been talking about, which is leadership as President of the United States, the concerns -- my reading of it, at least -- my concerns about you, as expressed by folks in the polls and other places, it goes like this: You've got a problem with General Motors. You took over 0 million, and you left. You had a problem in the spring and summer about some personal hits that you took as a potential candidate for President of the United States, and you walked out. Does that say anything relevant to how you would function as President of the United States?
Mr. Perot. I think the General Motors thing is very relevant. I did everything I could to get General Motors to face its problems in the mid-eighties while it was still financially strong. They just wouldn't do it. Everybody now knows the terrible price they're paying by waiting until it's obvious to the brain dead that they have problems. [Laughter]
Now, hundreds, thousands of good, decent people, whole cities up here in this State are adversely impacted because they would not move in a timely way. Our Government is at that point now. The thing that I am in this race for is to tap the American people on the shoulder and to say to every single one of you: Fix it while we're still relatively strong. If you have a heart problem, you don't wait until the heart attack to address it.
So the General Motors experience is relevant. At the point when I could not get them to address those problems, I had created so much stress in the board, who wanted just to keep the Lawrence Welk music going, that they asked to buy my remaining shares. I sold them my remaining shares. They went their way; I went my way, because it was obvious we had a complete disagreement about what should be done with the company.
But let's take my life in perspective. Again and again on complex, difficult tasks, I have stayed the course. When I was asked by our Government to do the POW project, within a year the Vietnamese had sent people into Canada to make arrangements to have me and my family killed. And I had five small children. And my family and I decided we would stay the course, and we lived with that problem for 3 years.
Then I got into the Texans' war on drugs program, and the big-time drug dealers got all upset. Then when I had two people imprisoned in Iran, I could have left them there. I could have rationalized it. We went over, we got them out, and we brought them back home. And since then, for years, I have lived with the burden of the Middle East, where it's eye-for-an-eye and tooth-for-a-tooth country, in terms of their unhappiness with the fact that I was successful in that effort.
Again and again and again, in the middle of the night, 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning, my Government has called me to take extraordinary steps for Americans in distress. And again and again and again, I have responded. And I didn't wilt, and I didn't quit.
Now, what happened in July we've covered again and again and again. But I think in terms of the American people's concern about my commitment -- and I'm here tonight, folks. I've never quit supporting you as you put me on the ballot in the other 26 States. When you asked me to come back in, I came back in. And talk about not quitting, I'm spending my money on this campaign. The two parties are spending your money, taxpayer money. I've put my wallet on the table for you and your children. Over million at least will go into this campaign to leave the American dream to you and your children, to get this country straightened out, because if anybody owes it to you, I do. I've lived the American dream. I'd like for your children to be able to live it, too.
Mr. Lehrer. Governor, do you have a response to the staying the course question about Mr. Perot?
Governor Clinton. I don't have any criticism of Mr. Perot. I think what I'd like to talk about a minute is, since you asked him the question, was the General Motors issue. I don't think there's any question that the automobile executives made some errors in the 1980's, but I also think we should look at how much productivity has increased lately, how much labor has done to increase productivity, and how much management has done. We're still losing a lot of auto jobs, in my judgment, because we don't have a national economic strategy that would build the industrial base of this country.
Just today, I met with the presidents and the vice presidents of the Willow Run union near here. They both said they were Vietnam veterans supporting me because I had an economic program that put them back to work. We need an investment incentive to modernize plant and equipment. We've got to control the health care costs for those people. Otherwise we can't keep the manufacturing jobs here. We need a tough trade policy that is fair, that insists on open markets in return for open markets. We ought to have a strategy that will build the economic and industrial base.
So I think Mr. Perot was right in questioning the management practices. But they didn't have much of a partner in Government here as compared with the policies the Germans and the Japanese followed. I believe we can do better. That's one of the things I want to change. I know that we can grow manufacturing jobs. We did it in my State, and we can do it nationally.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. President, do you have a response?
President Bush. To this?
Mr. Lehrer. Yes.
President Bush. Well, I wondered when Governor Clinton was talking to the autoworkers whether he talked about his and Senator Gore's favoring CAFE standards, those are fuel efficiency standards, of 40 miles per gallon. That would break the auto industry and throw a lot of people out of work.
As regarding Mr. Perot, I take back something I said about him. I once said in a frivolous moment when he got out of the race, if you can't stand the heat, buy an air conditioning company. I take it back because I think he said he made a mistake. The thing I find is if I make a mistake, I admit it. I've never heard Governor Clinton make a mistake.
But one mistake he's made is fuel efficiency standards at 40 to 45 miles per gallon will throw many autoworkers out of work, and you can't have it both ways. There's a pattern here of appealing to the autoworkers and then trying to appeal to the spotted owl crowd or the extremes in the environmental movement. You can't do it as President. You can't have a pattern of one side of the issue one day and another the next.
So my argument is not with Ross Perot; it is more with Governor Clinton.
Mr. Lehrer. Governor, what about that charge that you want it both ways on this issue?
Governor Clinton. Let's just talk about the CAFE standards.
Mr. Lehrer. All right.
Governor Clinton. That's the fuel efficiency standards. They're now 27.5 miles per gallon per automobile fleet. I never said, and I defy you to find where I said -- I gave an extensive environment speech in April. I said that we ought to have a goal of raising the fuel efficiency standards to 40 miles a gallon. I think that should be a goal. I never said we should write it into law if there is evidence that that goal cannot be achieved. The National Science Foundation did a study which said it would be difficult for us to reach fuel efficiency standards in excess of 37 miles per gallon by the year 2000.
I think we should try to raise the fuel efficiency. And let me say this: I think we ought to have incentives to do it. I think we ought to push to do it. That doesn't mean we have to write it into the law.
Look, I am a job creator, not a job destroyer. It is the Bush administration that has had no new jobs in the private sector in the last 4 years. In my State we're leading the country in private sector job growth. But it is good for America to improve fuel efficiency.
We also ought to convert more vehicles to compressed natural gas. That's another way to improve the environment.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. Perot, based on your experience at General Motors, where do you come down on this? This has been thrown about, back and forth during this campaign from the very beginning about jobs and CAFE standards.
Mr. Perot. Well, everybody's nibbling around the edges. Let's go to the center of the bull's eye to the core problem. Believe me, everybody on the factory floor all over this country knows it. You implement that NAFTA, the Mexican trade agreement, where they pay people an hour, have no health care, no retirement, no pollution controls, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, and you're going to hear a giant sucking sound of jobs being pulled out of this country right at a time when we need the tax base to pay the debt and pay down the interest on the debt and get our house back in order. We have got to proceed very carefully on that.
See, there's a lot I don't understand. I do understand business. I do understand creating jobs. I do understand how to make things work. And I've got a long history of doing that. Now, if you want to go to the core problem that faces everybody in manufacturing in this country, it's that agreement that's about to be put into practice.
But here, very simply, everybody says it will create jobs. Yes, it will create bubble jobs. Now, watch this. Listen very carefully to this: One-time surge while we build factories and ship machine tools and equipment down there. Then year after year for decades they will have jobs. And I finally thought I didn't understand it. I called all the experts, and they said, ``Oh, it will be disruptive for 12 to 15 years.'' We haven't got 12 days, folks. We cannot lose those jobs. They were saying Mexican jobs will eventually come to .50 an hour and ours will eventually go down to .50 an hour. It makes you feel real good to hear that, right?
Let's think it through, here. Let's be careful. I'm for free trade philosophically, but I have studied these trade agreements until the world has gone flat, and we don't have good trade agreements across the world. I hope we'll have a chance to get into that tonight, because I can get right to the center of the bull's eye and tell you why we're losing whole industries in this country. Excuse me.
Mr. Lehrer. Just for the record, though, Mr. Perot, I take it then for your answer you do not have a position on whether or not enforcing the CAFE standards will cost jobs in the auto industry.
Mr. Perot. Oh, no. It will cost jobs. But that's not -- let me say this: I'd rather, if you gave me two bad choices -- --
Mr. Lehrer. Okay.
Mr. Perot. I'd rather have some jobs left here than just see everything head south, see?
Mr. Lehrer. So that means no -- [laughter] -- in other words, you agree with President Bush, is that right?
Mr. Perot. No, I'm saying our principal need now is to stabilize the tax base, which is the job base, and create a growing, dynamic base. Now, please, folks, if you don't hear anything else I say, remember millions of people at work are our tax base. One quick point: If you confiscate the Forbes 400 wealth, take it all, you cannot balance the budget this year. Kind of gets your head straight about where the taxes year-in and year-out have got to come from. Millions and millions of people at work.
Mr. Lehrer. I wanted -- yes, sir.
President Bush. Well, I'm caught in the middle of NAFTA. Ross says, with great conviction, he opposes the North American free trade agreement. I am for the North American free trade agreement. My problem with Governor Clinton, once again, is that one time he's going to make up his mind, he will see some merit in it. But then he sees a lot of things wrong with it. And then the other day, he says he's for it; however, then we've got to pass other legislation. When you're President of the United States, you cannot have this pattern of saying, ``Well, I'm for it, but I'm on the other side of it.'' And it's true on this, and it's true on CAFE.
Look, if Ross were right and we get a free trade agreement with Mexico, why wouldn't they have gone down there now? You have a differential in wages right now. I just have an honest philosophical difference. I think free trade is going to expand our job opportunity. I think it is exports that have saved us when we're in a global slowdown, a connected, global slowdown, a recession in some countries. It's free trade, fair trade that needs to be our hallmark, and we need more free trade agreements, not fewer.
Mr. Lehrer. Governor, a quick answer on trade, and I want to go on to something else.
Governor Clinton. I'd like to respond to that. You know, Mr. Bush was very grateful when I was among the Democrats who said he ought to have the authority to negotiate an agreement with Mexico. Neither I nor anybody else, as far as I know, agreed to give him our proxy to say that whatever he did was fine for the workers of this country and for the interests of this country.
I am the one who is in the middle on this. Mr. Perot says it's a bad deal. Mr. Bush says it's a hunky-dory deal. I say, on balance, it does more good than harm if we could get some protection for the environment so that the Mexicans have to follow their own environmental standards, their own labor law standards, and if we have a genuine commitment to reeducate and retrain the American workers who lose their jobs and reinvest in this economy.
I have a realistic approach to trade. I want more trade. I know there are some good things in that agreement, but it can sure be made better.
Let me just point out, just today in the Los Angeles Times, Clyde Prestowitz, who was one of President Reagan's leading trade advisers, and a lifelong conservative Republican, endorsed my candidacy because he knows that I'll have a free and fair trade policy, a hard-headed realistic policy, and not get caught up in rubber-stamping everything the Bush administration did. If I wanted to do that, why would I run for President, Jim? Anybody else can run the middle class down and run the economy in a ditch. I want to change it.
President Bush. I think he made my case. On the one hand, it's a good deal, but on the other hand, I'd make it better. You can't do that as President. You can't do it on the war, where he says, ``Well, I was with the minority, but I guess I would have voted with the majority.''
This is my point tonight: We're talking about 2 weeks from now you've got to decide who is going to be President. And there is this pattern that has plagued him in the primaries and now about trying to have it both ways on all these issues. You can't do that. If you make a mistake, say you made a mistake and go on about your business, trying to serve the American people.
Right now we heard it. Ross is against it. I am for it. He says, ``On the one hand, I'm for it, and on the other hand, I may be against it.''
Mr. Lehrer. Governor -- --
Governor Clinton. That's what's wrong with Mr. Bush. His whole deal is, you've got to be for it or against it, and you can't make it better. I believe we can be better. I think the American people are sick and tired of either-or solutions, people being pushed in the corner, polarized to extremes. I think they want somebody with common sense, who can do what's best for the American people. I'd be happy to discuss these other issues, but I can't believe he is accusing me of getting on both sides.
He said trickle-down economics was voodoo economics. Now, he's its biggest practitioner. Let me just say -- --
President Bush. I've always said trickle-down Government is bad.
Governor Clinton. I could run this string out a long time, but remember this, Jim: Those 209 Americans last Thursday night in Richmond told us they wanted us to stop talking about each other and start talking about Americans and their problems and their promises. I think we ought to get back to that. I'll be glad to answer any question you have, but this election ought to be about the American people.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. Perot?
Mr. Perot. Is there an equal time rule here tonight?
President Bush. Yes.
Mr. Perot. Or do you just keep lunging in at will? I thought we were going to have equal time, but maybe I just have to interrupt the other two. Is that the way it works this -- --
Mr. Lehrer. No. Mr. Perot, you're doing fine. Go ahead. Whatever you want to say, say it.
Mr. Perot. Now that we've talked all around the problem about free trade, let's go again to the center of the bull's eye.
Mr. Lehrer. Wait a minute. I was going to ask -- I thought you wanted to respond to what we were talking about.
Mr. Perot. I do. I do. I just want to make -- these foreign lobbyists, this whole thing. Our country has sold out to foreign lobbyists. We don't have free trade. Both parties have foreign lobbyists on leave in key roles in their campaigns. If there's anything more unwise than that, I don't know what it is. Every debate, I bring this up, and nobody ever addresses it.
I would like for them to look you in the eye and tell you why they have people representing foreign countries working on their campaigns. And you know, you've seen the list; I've seen the list. We won't go into the names. But no wonder they -- if I had those people around me all day every day telling me it was fair and free, I might believe it. But if I look at the facts as a businessman, it's so tilted. The first thing you ought to do is just say, ``Guys, if you like these deals so well, we'll give you the deal you gave us.'' Now, Japanese couldn't unload the cars in this country if they had the same restrictions we had, and on and on and on and on and on.
I suggest to you that the core problem -- one country spent 0 million lobbying in 1988 -- our country. And it goes on and on. And you look at a Who's Who in these campaigns around the two candidates. They're foreign lobbyists taking leaves. What do you think they're going to do when the campaign's over? Go back to work at 30,000 bucks a month representing some other country. I don't believe that's in the American people's interest.
I don't have a one of them, and I haven't taken a penny of foreign money, and I never will.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. President, how do you respond to that? Mr. Perot has made that charge several times, the fact that you have people working in your campaign who are paid foreign lobbyists.
President Bush. Most people that are lobbying are lobbying the Congress. I don't think there's anything wrong with an honest person who happens to represent an interest of another country for making his case. That's the American way. What you're assuming is that that makes the recipient of the lobbying corrupt or the lobbyists themselves corrupt. I don't agree with that.
But if I found somebody that had a conflict of interest that would try to illegally do something as a foreign registered lobby, the laws cover this. I don't know why -- I've never understood quite why Mr. Perot was so upset about it, because one of the guys he used to have working for him, I believe, had foreign accounts. Could be wrong, but I think so.
Mr. Perot. Soon as I found it out, he went out the door, too.
President Bush. Well, I think you've got to look at the integrity and the honor of the people that are being lobbied and those that are lobbyists. The laws protect the American taxpayer in this regard. If the laws are violated so much -- but to suggest if somebody represents a foreign country on anything, that makes him corrupt or against the taxpayer, I don't agree with it.
Mr. Perot. One quick relevant specific. We're getting ready to dismantle the airlines industry in our country, and none of you know it. I doubt, in all candor, if the President knows it. But this deal that we're doing with BAC and USAir and KLM and Northwest -- now, guess who is on the President's campaign big time? A guy from Northwest. This deal is terribly destructive to the U.S. airline industry. One of the largest industries in the world is the travel and tourist business. We won't be making airplanes in this country 10 years from now if we let deals like this go through.
If the press has any interest tonight, I'll detail it to you. I won't take 10 minutes tonight; all these things take a few minutes. But that's happening as we sit here today. We hammerlock the American companies, American Airlines, Delta, the last few great we have, because we're trying to do this deal with these two European companies. Never forget, they've got Airbus over there, and it's a government-owned, privately owned consortium across Europe. They're dying to get the commercial airline business. Japan is trying to get the commercial airline business. I don't think there are any villains inside Government on this issue, but there sure are a lot of people who don't understand business. And maybe you need somebody up there who understands when you're getting your pocket picked.
Mr. Lehrer. Governor, I'm sorry, but that concludes my time with -- --
Governor Clinton. Boy, I had a great response to that.
Mr. Lehrer. All right. Go ahead, quickly. Just very briefly.
Governor Clinton. I think Ross is right and that we do need some more restrictions on lobbyists. We ought to make them disclose the people they've given money to when they're testifying before congressional committees. We ought to close the lawyers' loophole; they ought to have to disclose when they're really lobbying. We ought to have a much longer period of time, about 5 years, between the time when people can leave executive branch offices and then go out and start lobbying for foreign interest. I agree with that.
We've wrecked the airline industry already because there's all these leveraged buyouts and all these terrible things that have happened to the airline industry. We're going to have a hard time rebuilding it. But the real thing we've got to have is a competitive economic strategy. Look what's happening to McDonnell Douglas. Even Boeing is losing market share because we let the Europeans spend 25 to 40 billion dollars on Airbus without an appropriate competitive response.
What I want America to do is to trade more, but to compete and win by investing in competitive ways. And we're in real trouble on that.
Mr. Lehrer. I'm going to be in real trouble if I don't bring out -- it's about time -- --
President Bush. I promise it's less than 10 seconds.
Mr. Lehrer. Okay.
President Bush. I heard Governor Clinton congratulate us on one thing. First time he said something pleasant about this administration. Productivity in this country is up. It is way up. Productivity is up, and that's a good thing. There are many other good ones, but I was glad he acknowledged that.
Mr. Perot. I've volunteered -- now, look, I'm just kind of a, you know, cur dog here. I was put on the ballot by the people, not special interest, so I have to stand up for myself. Now, Jim, let me net it out. On the second debate, I offered, since both sides want the enterprise zones but can't get together, I said I'll take a few days off and go to Washington and hold hands with you, and we'll get it done. I'll take a few days off, hold hands with you, and get this airline thing straightened out, because that's important to this country.
That's kind of pathetic I have to do it, and nobody's called me yet to come up, I might mention -- [laughter] -- but if they do, if they do, it's easy to fix. If you all want the enterprise zones, why don't we pass the dang thing and do it? Right?
Mr. Lehrer. All right. Now we're going to bring in three other journalists to ask questions. They are Susan Rook of CNN, Gene Gibbons of Reuters, and Helen Thomas of United Press International.
You thought you'd never get in here, didn't you?
President Bush. Uh-oh.
Mr. Lehrer. Okay, we are going to continue on the subject of leadership, and the first question goes to Governor Clinton for a 2-minute answer. It will be asked by Helen Thomas. Helen?
The Draft Issue
Helen Thomas. Governor Clinton, your credibility has come into question because of your different responses on the Vietnam draft. If you had to do it over again, would you put on the Nation's uniform? And, if elected, could you, in good conscience, send someone to war?
Governor Clinton. If I had to do it over again, I might answer the questions a little better. You know, I had been in public life a long time and no one had ever questioned my role, and so I was asked a lot of questions about the things that happened a long time ago. I don't think I answered them as well as I could have.
Going back 23 years, I don't know, Helen. I was opposed to the war. I couldn't help that. I felt very strongly about it, and I didn't want to go at the time. It's easy to say in retrospect I would have done something differently.
President Lincoln opposed the war, and there were people who said maybe he shouldn't be President. But I think he made us a pretty good President in wartime. We've got a lot of other Presidents who didn't wear their country's uniform and had to order our young soldiers into battle, including President Wilson and President Roosevelt. So the answer is, I could do that. I wouldn't relish doing it, but I wouldn't shrink from it.
I think that the President has to be prepared to use the power of the Nation when our vital interests are threatened, when our treaty commitments are at stake, when we know that something has to be done that is in the national interest. And that is a part of being President. Could I do it? Yes, I could.
Mr. Lehrer. A reminder now, we're back on the St. Louis rules, which means that the Governor had his answer, and then each of you will have one minute to respond.
President Bush. Well, I've expressed my heartfelt difference with Governor Clinton on organizing demonstrations while in a foreign land against your country when young ghetto kids have been drafted and are dying.
My argument with him on -- the question was about the draft is that there is this same pattern. In New Hampshire, Senator Kerry said you ought to level, you ought to tell the truth about it. And April 17th, he said he'd bring out all the records on the draft. They have not been forthcoming. He got a deferment, or he didn't. He got a notice, or he didn't. I think it's this pattern that troubles me more than the draft. A lot of decent, honorable people felt as he did on the draft. But it is this pattern.
And again, you might be able to make amendments all the time, Governor, but as President, you can't be on all these different sides, and you can't have this pattern of saying, well, I did this, or I didn't. Then the facts come out, and you change it. That's my big difference with him on the draft. It wasn't failing to serve.
Mr. Lehrer. Your minute is up, sir.
Mr. Perot, one minute.
Mr. Perot. I've spent my whole adult life very close to the military; feel very strongly about the people who go into battle for our country; appreciate their idealism, their sacrifices; appreciate the sacrifices their families make. That's been displayed again and again in a very tangible way.
I look on this as history. I don't look on it, personally, as relevant. I consider it really a waste of time tonight when you consider the issues that face our country right now.
Mr. Lehrer. All right. The next question goes to President Bush, and Gene Gibbons will ask it.
1990 Budget Agreement
Gene Gibbons. Mr. President, you keep saying that you made a mistake in agreeing to a tax increase to get the 1990 budget deal with Congress. But if you hadn't gotten that deal you would have either had to get repeal of the Gramm-Rudman deficit control act or cut defense spending drastically at a time when the country was building up for the Gulf war and decimate domestic discretionary spending, including such things as air traffic control. If you had it to do all over again, sir, which of those alternatives would you choose?
President Bush. I wouldn't have taken any of the alternatives. I believe I made a mistake. I did it for the very reasons you say. There was one good thing that came out of that budget agreement, and that is we put a cap on discretionary spending. One-third of the President's budget is at the President's discretion, or really, the Congress', since they appropriate every dime and tell the President how to spend every dime. We've put a cap on the growth of all that spending, and that's good. And that's helped. But I was wrong because I thought the tax compromise, going along with one Democratic tax increase, would help the economy. I see no evidence that it has done it.
So what would I have done, what should I have done? I should have held out for a better deal that would have protected the taxpayer and not ended up doing what we had to do or what I thought at the time would help.
So I made a mistake. You know, the difference, I think, is that I knew at the time I was going to take a lot of political flak. I knew we'd have somebody out there yelling, ``Read my lips.'' And I did it because I thought it was right. And I made a mistake. That's quite different than taking a position where you know it's best for you. That wasn't best for me, and I knew it in the very beginning. I thought it would be better for the country than it was. So there we are.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. Perot, one minute.
Mr. Perot. The 101 in leadership is be accountable for what you do. Let's go back to the tax and budget summit briefly. Nobody ever told the American people that we increased spending .83 for every dollar of taxes raised. That's absolutely unconscionable. Both parties carry a huge blame for that on their shoulders. This was not a way to pay on the deficit. This was a trick on the American people. That's not leadership.
Let's go back in terms of accepting responsibilities for your actions. To create Saddam Hussein over a 10-year period, using billions of dollars of U.S. taxpayer money, step up to the plate and say it was a mistake. To create Noriega using taxpayer money, step up to the plate and say it was a mistake. If you can't get your act together to pick him up one day when a Panamanian major has kidnaped him, a special forces team is 400 yards away and it's a stroll across the park to get him, and if you can't get your act together, at least pick up the Panamanian major who they then killed, step up to the plate and admit it was a mistake. That's leadership, folks.
Now, leaders will always make mistakes. And I'm not aiming at any one person here. I'm aiming at our Government. Nobody takes responsibility for anything. We've got to change that.
Mr. Lehrer. I'll take responsibility for saying your time is up.
Mr. Perot. I'm watching the light.
Mr. Lehrer. All right.
Governor Clinton, one minute, sir.
Governor Clinton. The mistake that was made was making the ``read my lips'' promise in the first place just to get elected, knowing what the size of the deficit was, knowing there was no plan to control health care costs, and knowing that we did not have a strategy to get real economic growth back into this economy. The choices were not good then.
I think at the time the mistake that was made was signing off on the deal late on Saturday night in the middle of the night. That's just what the President did when he vetoed the family leave act. I think what he should have done is gone before the American people on the front end and said, ``Listen, I made a commitment, and it was wrong. I made a mistake because I couldn't have foreseen these circumstances. And this is the best deal we can work out at the time.''
He said it was in the public interest at the time, and most everybody who was involved in it, I guess, thought it was. The real mistake was the ``read my lips'' promise in the first place. You just can't promise something like that just to get elected if you know there's a good chance that circumstances may overtake you.
Mr. Lehrer. All right, Mr. Perot, the question is for you. You have a 2-minute answer, and it will be asked by Susan Rook.
Susan Rook. Mr. Perot, you've talked about going to Washington to do what the people who run this country want you to do. But it is the President's duty to lead and often lead alone. How can you lead if you are forever seeking consensus before you act?
Mr. Perot. Let's talk about two different subjects. In order to lead, you first have to use the White House as a bully pulpit and lead. Then you have to develop consensus, or you can't get anything done. That's where we are now. We can't get anything done. How do you get anything done when you've got all of these political action committees, all of these thousands of registered lobbyists, 40,000 registered lobbyists, 23,000 special interest groups, and the list goes on and on and on, and the average citizen out here just working hard every day. You've got to go to the people. I just love the fact that everybody, particularly in the media, goes bonkers over the town hall. I guess it's because you will lose your right to tell them what to think. [Laughter] The point is, they'll get to decide what to think.
President Bush. Hey, you've got something there.
Mr. Perot. I love the fact that people will listen to a guy with a bad accent and a poor presentation manner talking about flip charts for 30 minutes, because they want the details. See, all the folks up there at the top said, people, ``The attention span of the American people is no more than 5 minutes. They won't watch it.'' They're thirsty for it.
You want to have a new program in this country? If you get grassroots America excited about it and if they tap Congress on the shoulder and say, ``Do it, Charlie,'' it will happen. That's a whole lot different from these fellows running up and down the halls whispering in their ears now and promising campaign funds for the next election if they do it.
Now, I think that's going back to where we started. That's having a Government from the people. I think that's the essence of leadership, rather than cutting deals in dark rooms in Washington.
Mr. Lehrer. Governor Clinton, one minute.
Governor Clinton. Well, I believe in the town hall meetings. They started with my campaign in New Hampshire. I think Ross Perot has done a good job in having them. And I, as you know, pushed for the debate to include 209 American citizens who were part of it in Richmond a few days ago. I've done a lot of them, and I'll continue to do them as President.
But I'd also like to point out that I haven't been part of what we're criticizing in Washington tonight. Of the three of us, I have balanced a government budget 12 times. I have offered and passed campaign finance reform; offered, pushed for, and passed in public referendum lobbyist restrictions; done the kinds of things you have to do to get legislators together, not only to establish consensus but to challenge them to change. In 12 years as Governor, I guess I've taken on every interest group there was in my State at one time or another to fight for change. It can be done. That's why I've tried to be so specific in this campaign: to have a mandate, if elected, so that Congress will know what the American people have voted for.
Mr. Lehrer. President Bush, one minute.
President Bush. I would like the record to show the panelists that Ross Perot took the first shot at the press. My favorite bumper sticker, though, is ``Annoy the Media. Reelect President Bush.'' [Laughter] I just had to work that in. Sorry, Helen. I'm going to pay for this later on.
Look, you have to build a consensus, but in some things -- Ross mentioned Saddam Hussein. Yes, we tried, and yes, we failed to bring him into the family of nations. He had the fourth largest army. But then when he moved against Kuwait I said, this will not stand. And it's hard to build a consensus. We went to the U.N. We made historic resolutions up there. The whole world was united. Our Congress was dragging its feet. Governor Clinton said, ``Well, I might have been with the minority, let sanctions work. But I guess I would have voted with the majority.''
A President can't do that. Sometimes he has to act. In this case, I'm glad we did, because if we'd have let sanctions work and had tried to build a consensus on that, Saddam Hussein today would be in Saudi Arabia controlling the world's oil supply, and he would be there maybe with a nuclear weapon. We busted the fourth largest army, and we did it through leadership.
Mr. Lehrer. All right, we're going to go on to another subject now, and the subject is priorities. And the first question goes to you, President Bush, and Susan will ask it.
Ms. Rook. President Bush, gentlemen, I acknowledge that all of you have women and ethnic minorities working for you and working with you. But when we look at the circle of the key people closest to you, your inner circle of advisers, we see white men only. Why, and when will that change?
President Bush. You don't see Margaret Tutwiler sitting in there with me today?
Ms. Rook. The key people, President Bush.
President Bush. What?
Ms. Rook. The key people, the people beyond the glass ceiling.
President Bush. I happen to think she's a key person. I think our Cabinet members are key people. I think the woman that works with me, Rose Zamaria, is about as tough as a boot out there and makes some discipline and protects the taxpayer. Look at our Cabinet. You talk about somebody strong, look at Carla Hills. Look at Lynn Martin, who's fighting against this glass ceiling and doing a first-class job on it. Look at our Surgeon General, Dr. Novello. You can look all around and you'll see first-class, strong women.
Jim Baker's a man. Yes, I plead guilty to that. [Laughter] But look who's around with him there. I mean, this is a little defensive on your part, Susan, to be honest with you. We've got a very good record appointing women to high positions and positions of trust. And I'm not defensive at all about it.
What we've got to do is keep working, as the Labor Department is doing a first-class job on, to break down discrimination, to break down the glass ceiling. I am not apologetic at all about our record with women. You think about women in Government. I think about women in business. Why not try to help them with my small business program to build some incentives into the system?
I think we're making progress here. You've got a lot of women running for office. As I said the other night, I hope a lot of them lose, because they're liberal Democrats, and we don't need more of them in the Senate or more of them in the House. But nevertheless, they're out there. And we've got some very good Republican women running. So we're making dramatic progress.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. Perot, one minute.
Mr. Perot. Well, I've come from the computer business, and everybody knows women are more talented than the men. So we have a long history of having a lot of talented women. One of our first officers was a woman, a chief financial officer. She was a director. And it was so far back, it was considered so odd. And even though we were a tiny little company at the time, it made all the national magazines.
But in terms of being influenced by women and being a minority, there they are right out there, my wife and my four beautiful daughters. And I just have one son. So he and I are surrounded by women telling us what to do all the time. [Laughter]
For the rest of my minute, I want to make a very brief comment here in terms of Saddam Hussein. We told him that we wouldn't get involved with this border dispute, and we've never revealed those papers that were given to Ambassador Glaspie on July 25. I suggest, in the sense of taking responsibility for your actions, we lay those papers on the table. They're not the secrets to the nuclear bomb.
Secondly, we got upset when he took the whole thing, but to the ordinary American out there who doesn't know where the oilfields are in Kuwait, they're near the border. We told him he could take the northern part of Kuwait, and when he took the whole thing, we went nuts. And if we didn't tell him that, why won't we even let the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the Senate Intelligence Committee see the written instructions for Ambassador Glaspie?
President Bush. I'd like to reply on that. That gets to the national honor. We did not say to Saddam Hussein, Ross, ``You can take the northern part of Kuwait.'' That is absolutely absurd. Glaspie has testified -- --
Mr. Perot. Where are the papers?
President Bush. -- -- and Glaspie's papers have been presented to the United States Senate. So please -- --
Mr. Perot. If you have time, go through NEXIS and LEXIS, pull all the old news articles. Look at what Ambassador Glaspie said all through the fall and what have you, and then look at what she and Kelly and all the others in State said at the end when they were trying to clean it up. And talk to any head of any of those key committees in the Senate. They will not let them see the written instructions given to Ambassador Glaspie. And I suggest that in a free society owned by the people, the American people ought to know what we told Ambassador Glaspie to tell Saddam Hussein. Because we spent a lot of money and risked lives and lost lives in that effort, and did not accomplish most of our objectives. We got Kuwait back to the Amir; but he still got his nuclear, his chemical, his bacteriological, and he's still over there, right? I'd like to see those written instructions. Sorry.
Mr. Lehrer. Mr. President, when you -- just make sure that everybody knows what's going on here. When you responded directly to Mr. Perot then -- --
President Bush. Yes.
Mr. Lehrer. -- -- you violated the rule, your rules. Now, I'm willing -- --
President Bush. I apologize. When I make a mistake, I say -- [laughter].
Mr. Lehrer. No, no, no. I just want to make sure that everybody understands. If you all want to change the rules, we can do it.
President Bush. No, I don't. I apologize for it. But that one got right to the national honor.
Mr. Lehrer. All right. Okay.
President Bush. And I'm sorry.
Mr. Lehrer. Okay. But Governor Clinton, you have a minute.
Governor Clinton. Susan, I don't agree that there are no women and minorities in important positions in my campaign. There are many. But I think even more relevant is my record at home. For most of my time as Governor, a woman was my chief of staff, an African American was my chief cabinet officer, an African American was my chief economic development officer.
It was interesting, there was a story either today or yesterday in the Washington Post about my economic programs. My chief budget officer and my chief economic officer were both African Americans, even though the Post didn't mention that, which I think is a sign of progress. The National Women's Political Caucus gave me an award, one of their good guy awards, for my involvement of women in high levels of gover | <urn:uuid:8cf13e44-80b2-46dd-ab06-9daec32a2e13> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/research/public_papers.php?id=4967&year=1992&month=10 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981567 | 14,668 | 1.570313 | 2 |
The MIT Glass Lab is administratively co-sponsored by the Materials Processing Center and the Department of Materials Science and Engineering.
Thank you to everyone who works to keeps MIT running smoothly 24/7!
Current MIT students discuss how they asked for help, and got it, at the Institute.
MIT Sailing sailing.mit.edu/videos
The Tech is really easy to rig once you've done it a few times. This video will show you how to properly rig the Tech and give you pointers to some common newbie predicaments. MIT Sailing sailing.mit.edu/videos
The annual State of the Institute event, which took place a 11 a.m. on Tuesday, October 2, 2007.
Sophie Ni invites you to go green! Discover all the things you can do to create a sustainable future for MIT.
Learn about the medical resources that are available to you at MIT, as well as the medical insurance that MIT provides to students.
Robin Baughman discusses the things you need to live on campus at MIT.
Heather McCann and Ellen Duranceau talk about MIT's five libraries, MIT's online collection, and how to find, check-out, and order books and other resources both in person and online.
The Transportation Office provides you with a wealth of resources for getting to where you need to go. Larry Brutti talks about charter shuttles, airport transportation, the MIT shuttle, parking your own car, Zipcar, rail services and more.
The Mentor Advocate Partnership (MAP) is a volunteer mentoring program for MIT students seeking to foster their holistic development along both academic and nonacademic dimensions. Run by the Office of Minority Education, the MAP program is designed to help first-year ...
Donna Denoncourt, Director of MIT Residential Life Programs, discusses the history of the department. This is part of a series of presentations by Division of Student Life staff about the history of student life at MIT.
The Graduate Student Council's jobs are to represent students, program extracurricular activities, organize the graduate orientation, and provide a means of communication amongst students and faculty. But these are just the basics; GSC President Alex Evans introduces ...
Alexandra German, Richard Zhang, and GSC President Alex Evans welcome you to the Institute. Over graduate orientation, you will get to know MIT, the city of Cambridge, Boston, and the surrounding areas, as well as the people who make up this dynamic and diverse community. Watch as Dean ... | <urn:uuid:1e67489e-f687-489d-b2b0-e2b9e66e99b0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://video.mit.edu/tagged/campus-services/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945159 | 514 | 1.523438 | 2 |
LOC: Leaders in Oncology Care
95 Harley Street
London, W1G 6AF
The Living Well programme is a recent initiative from LOC. The aim is to support patients above, beyond and after their treatment.
Listening to you… setting up the Living Well Programme
“Is that it?”
These were the words of an LOC patient on completing treatment recently.
For the majority of patients, completing treatment brings mixed emotions. There is relief to have made it through the experience. Sometimes there is anxiety about whom to turn to, and often a sense of uncertainty and vulnerability. Many patients look for ways to alleviate any physical, psychological or practical problems which arose during treatment. Other concerns may occur as time goes by – overwhelming fatigue, for example. Many of you say “I just want life to return to normal”. There may have to be a new normal, at least for the time being.
For some, there is a sense of worry. This can be brought on by overly focusing on statistics, such as five-year survival and cure rates, for example.
Creating a programme of follow-up care, to make your life easier and address your concerns, is now our focus.
“What else can I do? Are there other options and can I take some control over my care?”
Over the past few years, we have been developing our programme, primarily focusing on post-treatment care. As we evolve, we have been guided by your comments. We appreciate there is much we can do to help you through treatment. Meditation may help you through chemotherapy. Or you may like to think about exercise classes or healthy eating early on. Our aim is to make your experience seamless and to prevent unnecessary problems arising later on.
“Survivorship” is an umbrella term coined in the USA to describe follow-up care.
The UK now has a national survivorship initiative. However, the overwhelming consensus from patients and professionals at LOC has been to reject the term. It has connotations of battle and struggle. So although we are embracing this ethos of care, we have named our own programme “Living Well.” After all, living well is what really counts.
The aim is to anticipate and address any effects of cancer and its treatments, above all focusing on living well. The positive impact on the lives of patients and their families is manifest. This was all too apparent during our training visits to various American cancer centres specialising in this area. The simple message is: patients feel more in control, care is better co-ordinated, and professionals are relieved by specialist support.
“Not only did I get a lot out of it – I was blown away by everyone’s enthusiasm, commitment, honesty and faith” | <urn:uuid:92b41a6d-45ea-4907-a2ca-2e18a1091580> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.theloc.com/living-well/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964301 | 573 | 1.515625 | 2 |
Iran finds Saudi official's remarks 'unfounded'
15 February 2013 [11:12] - TODAY.AZ
Iran’s Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast has rejected the recent remarks by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal that Tehran is trying to build a nuclear bomb.
“Under the NPT (Non-Proliferation Treaty), the Islamic Republic of Iran is committed to all international obligations and there is no room for concern in this regard,” Mehmanparast said.
During a joint press conference with Austrian Foreign Minister Michael Spindelegger in Riyadh on Tuesday, Faisal claimed that Iran had the intention to make a nuclear bomb in violation of the international laws on the prevention of the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
Mehmanparast described the remarks by the Saudi official as surprising and “unfounded” and stressed the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear energy program.
The United States, the Israeli regime and some of their allies have falsely accused Iran of pursuing non-civilian objectives in its nuclear energy program.
Iran has vehemently rejected the allegation, arguing that as a committed signatory to the NPT and a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), it is entitled to use nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.
In addition, the IAEA has conducted numerous inspections of Iran’s nuclear facilities but has never found any evidence showing that Tehran’s nuclear energy program has been diverted toward non-civilian objectives.
Connect with us. Get latest news and updates. | <urn:uuid:63290340-d433-47af-8536-d2e9946bf12d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.today.az/news/regions/119131.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940079 | 324 | 1.539063 | 2 |
By Arshad Mohammed and Khaled Yacoub Oweis
ROME (Reuters) - Western powers pledged aid for Syrian rebels on Thursday but stopped short of offering them weapons, disappointing opponents of President Bashar al-Assad clamoring for more arms.
More than 70,000 Syrians have been killed in a fierce conflict that began with peaceful anti-Assad protests nearly two years ago.
Washington has given $385 million in humanitarian aid for Syria but U.S. President Barack Obama has so far refused to give arms, arguing it is difficult to prevent them from falling into the hands of militants who could use them on Western targets.
The United States said it would for the first time give non-lethal aid to the rebels and would more than double its support to Syria's civilian opposition, casting it as a way to bolster the rebels' popular support.
The help will include medical supplies, food for rebel fighters and $60 million to help the civil opposition provide basic services like security, education and sanitation.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry announced the new steps after a meeting of 11 mostly European and Arab nations within the "Friends of Syria" group.
The European Union, acting on a decision this month to send direct aid to the rebels, said it had amended sanctions on Syria to permit the supply of armored vehicles, non-lethal military equipment and technical aid, provided they were intended to protect civilians.
If the provision of non-lethal assistance goes smoothly, it could conceivably offer a model for providing weaponry should Western governments ultimately decide to do so.
The aid offered for now did not appear to entirely satisfy the Syrian National Council opposition, a fractious Cairo-based group that has struggled to gain traction inside Syria, especially among disparate rebel forces.
"Many sides ... focus (more) on the length of the rebel fighter's beard than they do on the blood of the children being killed," Syrian National Coalition President Moaz Alkhatib said at an appearance with Kerry and Italian Foreign Minister Giulio Terzi.
A rebel commander in Aleppo, Syria's second city left devastated by several months of heavy fighting, said the lack of arms was the main obstacle to victory for his forces.
"We hope ... that weapons will flow and things will change but we are not waiting for them - we are going ahead with our fighting plans on the ground," the commander, Abdel-Jabbar Oqaidi, told Reuters by Skype.
He estimated that four fifths of the city was now under rebel control and the insurgents had taken over Aleppo's historic Umayyad mosque and the Palace of Justice. The claim could not immediately be verified.
A picture posted on the Internet showed what activists said was a rebel fighter prostrate in prayer in the Umayyad mosque's courtyard, its blackened archways still bearing signs of a fire which damaged the 13th century complex last year.
The rebels were still fighting for control of three airports in the Aleppo region, Oqaidi said.
In what analysts described as a sign of disappointment at the West's reluctance to send arms, Syria's political opposition postponed talks to choose the leader of a provisional government, two opposition sources told Reuters in Beirut.
Opposition leaders hoped a Saturday meeting in Istanbul would elect a prime minister to operate in rebel-controlled areas of Syria, threatened by a slide into chaos as the conflict between Assad's forces and insurgents nears its second anniversary.
While one source said the meeting might happen later in the week, a second source said it had been put off because the three most likely candidates for prime minister had reservations about taking the role without more concrete international support.
"The opposition has been increasingly signaling that it is tired of waiting and no one serious will agree to be head of a government without real political and logistical support," said Syrian political commentator Hassan Bali, who lives in Germany.
Bali said the United States and other members of the core "Friends of Syria" nations appeared intent "on raising the ante against Assad but are not sure how."
A final communiqué said participants would "coordinate their efforts closely so as to best empower the Syrian people and support the Supreme Military Command of the (rebel) Free Syrian Army in its efforts to help them exercise self-defense".
Kerry said the United States would for the first time provide assistance - in the form of medical supplies and the standard U.S. military ration known as Meals Ready to Eat, or MREs - to the fighters.
A U.S. official told reporters it would give the aid only to carefully vetted fighters, adding that the United States was worried that "extremists" opposed to democracy, human rights and tolerance were gaining ground in the country.
"Those members of the opposition who support our shared values ... need to set an example of a Syria where daily life is governed neither by the brutality of the Assad regime nor by the agenda of al Qaeda affiliated extremists," the official said.
REBELS WANT ANTI-TANK, ANTI-AIRCRAFT WEAPONS
The continued U.S. refusal to send weapons may compound the frustration that prompted the coalition to say last week it would shun the Rome talks. It attended only under U.S. pressure.
Many in the coalition say Western reluctance to arm rebels only plays into the hands of Islamist militants now widely seen as the most effective forces in the struggle to topple Assad.
With fighting raging on largely sectarian lines, French President Francois Hollande said at a Moscow summit that new partners were needed to broker talks on ending the crisis, winning guarded support from Russian President Vladimir Putin.
"We think that this dialogue must find a new form so that it speaks to all parties," said Hollande, giving few details of his proposal.
Putin said Russia - one of Assad's staunchest allies - would look at Hollande's proposal, "which I think we could consider with all our partners and try to carry out."
Russia has said Assad's departure must not be a precondition for talks and a political solution, while the West has sided with Syria's opposition in demanding his removal from power.
Kerry's offer of medical aid and food rations fell far short of rebel demands for sophisticated anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons to help turn the tables against Assad's mostly Russian-supplied forces.
It also stopped short of providing other forms of non-lethal assistance such as bullet-proof vests, armored personnel vehicles and military training to the insurgents.
Last week the European Union opened the way for direct aid to Syrian rebels, but did not lift an arms embargo on Syria.
Kerry said the U.S. role should not be judged in isolation but in the context of what other nations will do.
"What we are doing ... is part of a whole," he said. "I am absolutely confident ... that the totality of this effort is going to have an impact of the ability of the Syrian opposition to accomplish its goals."
(Additional reporting by Mariam Karouny; Writing by Alistair Lyon; Editing by Roger Atwood and Tom Pfeiffer) | <urn:uuid:4c01ef4d-9dbd-46e0-b30a-1d974d2fd00f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ktwb.com/news/articles/2013/feb/28/us-will-give-syrian-rebels-medical-food-aid-not-arms/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972291 | 1,464 | 1.5625 | 2 |
You must spend hours with a person, getting to know them, learning how they interact with other people, how they process information, and even how they smile. Once you've got all the nuances down, you can start to ask them questions, and judge the way they react, ponder, and answer. Eventually you'll want to sleep next to them, to get a feel for how their mind works - for the human mind relaxes and opens up during the sleep cycle. Sex is also very helpful, but not always practical.
Think of it as learning another language, completely from scratch to fluency, with each new person that you wish to read. Only when you've mastered the language do you hope to be able to hold complex conversations with a native speaker, and only when you've mastered another person's mind can you attempt to read it.
And you must be in very close proximity to the person you're attempting to read. Touching is best, but when sitting within arms length it's possible.
With enough practice, and a lot of finger crossing, you can literally transport your psychic essence into the other person's brain, and reside there along with their psychic essence. You can share their body.
You can't control them. Or at least, I can't. I've spoken with at least two other telepaths who claim to be able to either influence the actions of their host, or directly affect them. I've never managed it though.
While in another person's mind, you are privy to their thoughts, their wishes, their daydreams, and their nightmares.
You don't have to know a person to read their minds or transport into their body. You can get there by reading things they've written. You can get inside the mind of a very good author, provided that he's written diversified and numerous volumes.
The key is that you should read things that the author has poured his heart and soul into. Journals and diaries are gold. A philosophical writer is easiest, a novelist isn't too hard either. A person who writes textbooks is virtually impossible.
And here we come to the point of this jumble of words on page: What if the person whose writings you're reading is dead? Why then, you can transport into their mind at a random point before their death. Most often at the time that they wrote the last thing that you read.
I have a collegue who delved into Anne Frank's diary, transported, and came back shaking. He didn't stop shaking for a week, and refuses to talk about what he experienced.
Another collegue decided to try Hitler, with the hopes of influencing his actions and stopping the Holocaust. He never came back. My only conclusion is that Hitler, with his very strong will, sensed my friend and either killed his spirit or trapped him within his own mind.
I talk of transporting and coming back. Let me explain how it's done. It's hard to explain, easier to show. Thus, I stand little chance of conveying my meaning to you on page, but I'll do my best.
When you've acquired enough of a person's essence to attempt to go into their mind, you lay down and concentrate with all of your will upon that person. If all is in order, eventually you will pass into a trance (easily mistaken for a coma) and seem to 'awaken' within that person's mind. You are a visitor only, you cannot control the host body.
You have all five senses - you can see out of your host's eyes, hear with their ears, taste what they eat or drink, smell the air they breathe, and feel what they touch. You can read their mind in this state, and sometimes, if you concentrate enough, force your thoughts into their brains.
Have you ever had a sudden thought, quite unlike yourself? A feeling that you should do something, but you don't know why? That is what it is like - perhaps you've even had a telepath in your mind at one point.
I have yet to meet anyone who has actually, literally, communicated with their host. As far as I know, no host (who was unaware of the attempt to enter their mind) has ever realized that they were indeed a host for another conciousness. Except, peryhaps, for Hitler.
When you're in another's mind, your mundane body appears to be in a coma. Without medical attention, you can only visit for 3 days, before needing to return to your body to take nourishment. However, the Institute has a doctor on staff who will supply liquids and nutrients via IV to anyone who requests it. This way, we can remain in stasis indefinatly.
Attempting to connect is extremely difficult. You fail 90% of the time, and must rest between attempts. Mindwork is a grueling exercise. | <urn:uuid:687c17b8-416f-4f0d-af8b-eb726033f96b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.booksie.com/science_fiction/miscellaneous/cheyjade/excerpt-from-a-diary-found-in-government-institution | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982774 | 1,002 | 1.640625 | 2 |
About Living Cities
Founded in 1991, Living Cities is an innovative philanthropic collaborative of 22 of the world's largest foundations and financial institutions. Our members are not simply funders. They participate at the senior management level on the Living Cities Board of Directors and contribute the time of 80+ expert staff toward crafting and implementing our agenda, which is focused on improving the lives of low-income people and the urban areas in which they live.
What We Do
Historically, challenges faced by our nation's cities have been addressed using a "squeaky wheel" approach—moving from one critical issue to another but never addressing the whole. Today there is a general recognition that we need to treat our cities' problems comprehensively. We must take an integrative approach, simultaneously strengthening neighborhood institutions from the bottom up and reengineering, from the top down, the public systems that fail to create adequate opportunities. We must align local, state and federal policies to effectively address the issues surrounding jobs, housing, climate change, asset building and health care. We must leverage the collective power of the public, private and philanthropic sectors especially through new and innovative ways of aggregating capital. Over the past 18 years, Living Cities' members have collectively invested over $600 million which has, in turn, leveraged more than $16 billion in tangible community assets—a remarkable leverage ratio of 29:1. Our funding has helped build homes, stores, schools, child care, health care and job-training centers and other community assets. | <urn:uuid:ef70f399-b3f3-452e-8e61-3d2e1b74c718> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://homeless.samhsa.gov/(S(xb1wd0jpn5zqvo451xjyi2y2))/Organization/Living-Cities-418.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944961 | 306 | 1.671875 | 2 |
Today’s Republicans are more radical than ever before. I keep questioning why any working American would vote for the current Republicans. The last Republican that I could vote for was Dwight D. Eisenhower, who warned the people of the military/industrial complex.
The current House Republicans are pursuing the most comprehensive and radical assault on woman’s health, reproductive freedom, Medicare, and retirement benefits, than any before them. They adopted a budget that calls for the privatization of Medicare, the elimination of Medicaid, food stamps and many other people benefits, including the right to establish and join an union. Along with all the cuts in benefits for the people, they plan to cut more corporate taxes and taxes for all the extremely wealthy.
If you study history you find that President G.W. Bush did exactly what the Harding/Hoover administration did to cause the Great Depression. I know this because I am an ex-history teacher, and the details are in my history book.
I read one report that stated that 1,470 people who made more than $1 million in 2009, paid zero in federal taxes. I also read where at least 83 if the top 100 traded corporations have addresses in the Cayman Islands. It stated that in one five-story building, these companies are nothing but a post office box in order to evade U.S. taxes. It also stated that to cover the tax shortfall last year, the average American taxpayer would have to pay an extra $426. I have received another report stating that Mitt Romney and his wife have seven overseas bank accounts to avoid paying taxes.
At one time the taxes for the very rich was at 91 percent after deductions, and the economy was good. They should pay their fair share and quit evading paying them.
GEORGE M. KESSELRING | <urn:uuid:feac8078-1641-46c3-b9e6-09c71440e738> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://muskogeephoenix.com/opinion/x1710457146/THE-PEOPLE-SPEAK-Current-Republicans-not-worth-a-vote | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976942 | 369 | 1.5625 | 2 |
Noted neuroscience writer Jonah Lehrer’s best-selling new book Imagine: How Creativity Works, an exploration of the intersection between neuroscience and creativity, contains fabricated passages and has been pulled by his publisher.
Tablet Magazine’s Michael C. Moynihan investigated discrepancies within a chapter on Bob Dylan. Once he started pulling at the thread, Lehrer’s dishonesty revealed itself.
When I asked about aspects of his interactions with Rosen, Lehrer provided a sketchy timeframe and contradictory specifics—he first told me that he had personally exchanged emails with Rosen, then attributed this supposed email exchange to his literary agent—then further claimed that Dylan’s management had approved the chapter after being sent a copy of Imagine. He added that Dylan’s management didn’t want their cooperation sourced in the book. But when I contacted Dylan’s management, they told me that they were unfamiliar with Lehrer, had never read his book, there was no bobdylan.com headquarters, and, to the best of their recollection, no one there had screened outtakes from No Direction Home for Lehrer. Confronted with this, Lehrer admitted that he had invented it.
Lehrer has since resigned from The New Yorker. A shame, too, because, I’ve obviously been a huge fan of his work. | <urn:uuid:4fbde153-2fc2-440c-b519-c286fd4b2f6a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://slyoyster.tumblr.com/post/28410733571/jonah-lehrer-makes-shit-up | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97951 | 280 | 1.8125 | 2 |
To see "Beloved," all two hours and 52 minutes of it, is to understand at once all its confounding contradictions. Visible is both why it took 10 years to reach the screen and why star and driving force Oprah Winfrey would not, could not rest until it happened. Visible as well are the difficulties of translating a spectacular work of fiction into film and the bounty that can be gained by those determined to persevere.
Directed by Jonathan Demme, "Beloved" is ungainly and hard to follow at times, like the proverbial giant not quite sure how to best use its strength. But that power exists, present and undeniable, and once this film gets its bearings, the unsentimental fierceness of its vision brushes obstacles and quibbles from its path.
Already a modern classic, "Beloved" the novel was awarded the Pulitzer Prize and was critical to author Toni Morrison's receiving the Nobel Prize in literature. Set just before and just after the Civil War and telling the story of Sethe(Winfrey), the survivor of an unspeakable hell for whom "the future was a matter of keeping the past at bay," it deals as potently as only fiction can with the nightmare legacy of slavery and the deadly, terrifying weight of the past.
Yet as devastating as the book is, its use of a multilayered narrative, its complete acceptance of the supernatural plus its exceptional way with language add up to a story that seems to be too large and too poetic to fit comfortably into a film of any length.
"Beloved" is director Demme's first feature since 1993's "Philadelphia" and only his second since 1991's Oscar-winning "The Silence of the Lambs," and in some ways this film combines the social consciousness of the former with the facility for horror (and by extension the supernatural) of the latter. The work that has resulted, strange, troubling and powerfully imagined, is rough going at first, but the more time you spend with it the more the strength of the underlying material exerts its will.
"Beloved's" screenplay (credited to Akosua Busia and Richard LaGravenese and Adam Brooks) takes the sane way out, paring the book down to its essential events, most of which take place in 1873 in and around a small house on the outskirts of Cincinnati. What's been sacrificed is the book's extended look at life at Sweet Home, the ironically named Kentucky plantation where the horrors begin, though the flashbacks that are shown (shot by longtime Demme cinematographer Tak Fujimoto on special, deliberately grainy film stock) are critical to the film's impact.
All this, however, takes awhile to unfold. Initially, almost from its opening "Poltergeist, the Early Years" sequence--a chaotic, demonic night when a tormented dog called Here Boy gets tossed around, mirrors break and two young brothers flee for their lives--"Beloved" comes across as a film that knows its source so well it underestimates how confusing its events are to nonreaders.
The next scene reintroduces Sethe and her daughter Denver (Kimberly Elise) on a sunny day in 1873, eight years later. Coming up the road is a man Sethe hasn't seen in 18 years, Paul D (Danny Glover), a friend from the prewar days at Sweet Home and an intimate of Halle, Sethe's husband and Denver's father, whom Sethe also hasn't seen since the day in 1855 she precipitously fled the plantation.
Invited into their house, Paul D is unnerved to find a room filled with undulating, vibrating red light. It is, Sethe tells him matter-of-factly, the sad but not evil ghost of her baby daughter who died at the age of 2. It's the same ghost that drove her two sons away eight years ago, the ghost that keeps neighbors from coming over and relieving the bleak isolation these women live in.
Paul D's presence does two things. It precipitates a physical struggle with Baby Ghost, as Denver calls it, who apparently leaves, though Denver does say, "I think the baby ain't gone, I think the baby got plans." And having Paul D around leads Sethe to relive, and us to see in flashback, the agonies of her final night at Sweet Home.
What happens at Sweet Home, the multiple tortures inflicted on Sethe by the white men who run things, are painful, deeply difficult to watch even in the brief shards of flashback we're given, and aesthetically problematical. What we see on screen, perhaps to protect our sensibilities, is shown in short, often frenzied bursts. When that frantic tone combines with the film's determination to give its actors accurate accents, past events end up rushing by in a not completely comprehensible blur. In fact, to read Morrison's novel after seeing the film is to frequently say, "So that's what that was all about." | <urn:uuid:69ed0c75-1384-4098-bcc9-67f8a763ac49> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://articles.latimes.com/1998/oct/16/entertainment/ca-32890 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972214 | 1,029 | 1.757813 | 2 |
This just in from the current issue of New England Historic Genealogical Society's eNews, Vol. 8, No. 3, Whole #254, January 18, 2006
Edited by Michael J. Leclerc and Valerie Beaudrault
All inquiries should be addressed to: [email protected]
Index to Boston births registered 1800-1849 http://www.newenglandancestors.org/research/database/BostonBirths/default.asp
"An Index to Boston Births Registered 1800-1849 – on deposit at the Boston City Hall Archives – has been transcribed by Robert J. Dunkle and Ann S. Lainhart for this database.
Births registered in the City of Boston for the period 1809 to 1849 have never been published. Furthermore, the City of Boston did not come into full compliance with state registration of vital records until 1849, so that the state copy of records between 1841 and 1849 conspicuously lacks Boston vital events. It should be noted that the 4,350 births registered is but a fraction of those that must have occurred inBoston over the first five decades of the nineteenth century. Many births went unrecorded or have been lost. Researchers should also consult baptismal records in Boston-area church records for birth information during this period."
NOTE FROM MYRT: If you try to access this database, HisGen will give you the following caveat:
"This area is one of the benefits of membership in the New England Historic Genealogical Society. If you are a member of NEHGS, please sign on using the login link to your top right to view this section.
If you are not currently a member of NEHGS, you can access this area by joining us now. Take advantage of all the benefits of NEHGS membership, including use of NewEnglandAncestors.org, The New England Historical and Genealogical Register, New England Ancestors magazine, and much more." | <urn:uuid:daf90692-9b79-4807-96c3-1c760a14a069> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.dearmyrtle.com/2006/01/across-my-desk-boston-births.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934611 | 407 | 1.828125 | 2 |
This is a draft excerpt from the upcoming book, What’s Your Green Goldfish? Beyond Dollars: 15 Ways to Create Employee Loyalty and Reinforce Culture:
1st inch - Onboarding
4th inch - Recognition
5th inch – Team Building
The sixth INCH
The sixth inch on the 9 INCH journey to the heart of your employees involves Flexibility.
Flexibility is about control and everyone wants flex. According to the Center for Talent Innovation’s research, if there’s one work perk that rises above the rest, it’s flexible work arrangements. The CTI study showed that 87% of Boomers, 79% of Gen X’ers, and 89% of Millennials cite flex as important. (Source: CTI)
Why be flexible? The bottom line benefit for companies is increased productivity and job satisfaction. According to Sylvia Ann Hewlett,
Companies that treat time as currency — through remote work options, staggered hours, and reduced-hour arrangements — are also more likely to attract and retain high-caliber employees. Work/life balance has always been prized by working women juggling the demands of family and high-powered jobs, and now these moms are being seconded by incoming Millennials, who consider it a basic entitlement to play as hard as they work.” (Source: hbr.org)
A Changing Workplace
By some estimates perhaps one-quarter of all US jobs could be performed remotely, and in a 2011 survey of 2,000 US businesses, one-quarter of them said they planned to use more remote workers in the future. (Source: McKinsey) Forty percent of U.S. workers have jobs that could be done from home at least part of the time. (Source: Telework Research Network) It’s already happening. Eighty to 90 percent of Cisco and Accenture employees are regular telecommuters. Many tech experts are convinced we won’t even need offices as we know them in the future. (Source: Fortune)
Workshifting by the Numbers
Citrix has pioneered the concept of Work·shift·ing. Work·shift·ing is using the web to get work done anytime, anywhere — outside the traditional office space. It produces savings for employees, employers and the environment:
• Workplace flexibility can save employers up to $20,000 per employee per year.
• Workshifters save between $4,000 and $21,000 per year in travel and work-related costs.
• 80% of employers say workshifting options help recruit talent.
• Companies with telework policies realize an 18% savings in real estate, electricity and office expenses.
• Half-time telecommuting nationwide would spare the environment the equivalent of taking 10 million cars permanently off the road.
Increasing business performance and employee satisfaction
• Workshifters are 55% more engaged than non-workshifters.
• When telework policies are introduced, companies report a 25% reduction in employee attrition.
• Workshifting increases productivity by 27%.
• 72% of employees say flexible work arrangements would cause them to choose one job over another.
• The expected turnover rate for employees who do not have the flexibility is almost twice the rate of those who do. (Source: Citrix)
Let’s look at a Baker’s Dozen of companies who push the limits of Flexibility:
Patagonia Inc., (#35) based in Ventura, Calif., attracts outdoorsy types with its athletic clothing brand and laser-like focus on work-life balance. Time away from the office isn’t just tolerated here, it’s required, says Rob BonDurant, Patagonia’s vice president of marketing and de facto culture guide. Its 1,300 employees enjoy what the company calls “Let My People Go Surfing” time — a period during any work day where employees can head outdoors to get their creative juices flowing. Of course, they can’t abandon their duties or ditch a meeting, but popping out for an impromptu climb or bike ride is encouraged. Patagonia’s flex-time policies — which originated from Yvon Chouinard, an outdoor enthusiast who founded the company in 1974 — are good for employee morale and invaluable to the company.
In the words of Rob BonDurant,
The time we spend outside the office helps us manage the storytelling process around our products. We’re designing ski and surfing apparel, we need to be traveling and trying things out.” (Source: Entreprenuer.com)
Patagonia (#188) also gives employees two weeks of full-paid leave to work for the green nonprofit of their choice. (Source: Inc.com)
Control of Hours / Schedule
Managers struggle to judge employees on outcomes, not hours, since defining clear goals and determining reasonable time lines are difficult.
According to JetBlue’s VP of Talent Bonny Simi,
Bosses need to just relax. They don’t have to see the employee for the work to get done. That’s the hardest shift in mind-set for some managers. They [employees] don’t want to work 9 to 5 … and it doesn’t matter to me if they work better from six at night until three in the morning or if they can do the work in six hours instead of eight.”
Work schedule flexibility is a major reason employees prefer working at Busch Gardens (#364). It has helped make the Tampa Bay theme park a go-to employer. According to David Bode, VP of Human Resources,
We learned how to be very flexible because we employ a lot of students with strange hours and people who rely on us for second jobs. Plus our work demand varies so much.”
Busch needs a minimum of 1,500 people to keep the place open seven days a week. They bulk the staff up to 4,500 for the peak summer and winter seasons between Christmas and Easter. But needs vary dramatically with weather, the day of the week, the time of day and attendance projections, so the park has made schedule juggling an art form.
It’s great,” said Chris Noyce, a 21-year-old USF environmental sciences major in his third year as a ride operator. “When you work is almost up to you.”
Employees post their availability on a company website. Shifts are pared down to work units of four to six hours. The computer matches available employees to attendance projections and work demands two weeks ahead of time. The supervisors then fine-tune and juggle the actual work assignments — even down to the same day. (Source: Tampa Bay Tribune)
At Brand Learning (#333) directors are trusted to manage their time and way of working, within reason, and there are reduced work options of 2½, three and four-day weeks. (Source: The Sunday Times)
Believe it or not, Point B (#279), a Portland management consulting company offers its employees no paid vacation time or holidays — and the employees seem to love it. That’s because this company believes so firmly in flexibility that associates get paid only for the time they work, so there is no arbitrary limit to how much time off they can take. “I’ve never worked anywhere that was as committed to helping employees realize what the work-life balance means to them individually,” says one employee. (Source: Oregon Business)
The furniture retailer IKEA (#603) offers a range of alternative work options to help employees balance work-life commitments, including flexible hours, shortened and compressed work week options and job-sharing arrangements.
Lori Ames at ThePRFreelancer.com (#773) has a small business with 2 employees. In her words,
One of my employees is dating a New York City police officer, who works 5 days on, 2 days off, 5 days on, 3 days off. I’ve structured her schedule so that she works the same days as he does, and is off for 2 days each time he’s off. Sometimes her weekend is M & T, sometimes S & SU; but it’s made for a very happy employee.” (Source: Lori Ames)
Up and Down Pay at Semco (#785). If an employees is going through a phase in which they would rather work less and accept lowering their pay accordingly, the company is committed to do its best to adapt.
All employees at Fulcrum Inquiry (#222) receive a laptop computer and related remote access to all of the firm’s technology & files. Every employee can work remotely if their particular assignment at that time makes this practical. All employees occasionally work remotely. A few employees extensively work from home and during non-standard hours. Workers also boast a Flexible Schedule. Consultants own their schedule based on the client needs. (Source: Los Angeles Business Journal)
Flexibility is the norm at this accounting firm. PwC (#233), with more than 160,000 employees operating in 154 countries, has one of the highest percentages of telecommuters — with 70 percent of employees working from home at least 20 percent of the time. (Source: Atlanta Business Chronicle)
ROWE, ROWE, ROWE Your Office
At most companies, going AWOL during daylight hours would be grounds for a pink slip. Not at Best Buy (#13). The nation’s leading electronics retailer has embarked on a radical–if risky–experiment to transform a culture once known for killer hours and herd-riding bosses. The endeavor, called ROWE, for “results-only work environment,” seeks to demolish decades-old business dogma that equates physical presence with productivity. The goal at Best Buy is to judge performance on output instead of hours. Hence workers pulling into the company’s amenity-packed headquarters at 2 p.m. aren’t considered late. Nor are those pulling out at 2 p.m. seen as leaving early. There are no schedules. No mandatory meetings. No impression-management hustles. Work is no longer a place where you go, but something you do. (Source: Business Week)
Netflix believes that “Hard Work is Not Relevant.” According to CEO Reed Hastings,
We don’t measure people by how many hours they work or how much they are in the office. We do care about accomplishing great work. Sustained B-level performance, despite “A” for effort, generates a generous severance package, with respect. Sustained A-level performance, despite minimal effort, is rewarded with more responsibility and great pay.”
Jeff Gunther, CEO of the Charlottesville Meddius (#182), VA-based software company Meddius, decided he would change the way his staff works by instituting a results-only working environment. Meddius employees can work any time from any place in any way, as long as they get their work done. Gunther has found that by giving employees the trust and autonomy they need, they’ve actually been more productive and loyal to the company. (Source: Inc.com)
Edmunds.com (#203) boasts an innovative corporate culture, highlighted by a rollout of a Results-Only Work Environment (ROWE) in 2012. Under ROWE, Edmunds.com employees are offered the freedom to work at any time from any location where they can most effectively deliver their expected results.
In the words of Matthew DiGeronimo, Principal at Smith Floyd (#772)
I enforce NO work hours. Performance driven – not hours logged driven. Employees can even attend staff meetings from home (via Skype) if they desire.” (Source: Smith Floyd)
Perks / Concierge
At S.C. Johnson (#200), 12,000 employees have access to a concierge service that will take care of just about any chore: from returning overdue library books to making sure your dry cleaning gets picked up on time. The Racine, Wisc., company is in the business of cleaning products, after all. (Source: The Fiscal Times)
During the firm’s busy season, a “perk” plan is offered at RBZ, LLP (#212). Weekly manicures, massage therapy, daily catered dinners, nightly office-wide Trivial Pursuit games, espresso cart and free hotel stays nearby. A full-time concierge runs errands, and a free house cleaning each three month season rounds out this incredible benefit. (Source: Los Angeles Business Journal)
Benefits are first class at Counterpart International Inc. (#722). In addition to health insurance and a 403(b) fund, the organization offers three lifestyle benefits (employees are allowed to choose one): gym membership, a $125 public transportation benefit, or paid parking in the building’s garage. (Source: PR News Online)
Employees at MERS/Missouri Goodwill Industries (#329) can try on various positions for the best fit. (Source: St. Louis Business Journal)
“Orionites,” as they call themselves at Orion Trading (#742), don’t like to stay in one place. The company encourages employees to try different jobs from time to time, moving in and out of marketing, sales, client services or media investment. The goal is to grow employees skills, which Orion has found increases everyone’s output. (Source: Advertising Age)
From a post by Jay Baer at Convince & Convert:
Mid-way on a Southwest Airlines (#521) flight home from a speaking engagement in Ft. Lauderdale, I looked up from my laptop to find Becky the flight attendant standing at the front of plane with a boy of about 9.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I’m sorry to disturb you, but I just thought you should know that we have a celebrity on the plane today. Well, perhaps not a celebrity today, but someday this young man will be a famous artist. Abraham has drawn us a marvelous picture. It’s quite wonderful, and I’ll be displaying it up here so we all can enjoy his great picture.”
The kid was absolutely BEAMING with pride and accomplishment and happiness and honor. Abraham returned to his seat. Becky broke out the medical kit, ripped open a band-aid and used it as ersatz tape to post the picture on the wall.
A few minutes later, Abraham was back with a second picture. A landscape this time, Becky again made an announcement and grabbed another band-aid.
When I talk about focusing on BEING social, rather than focusing on DOING social media, this is what I mean.
Social business isn’t about tools and technology. It’s about giving Becky the freedom to work off-script. It’s about cultural DNA that values moments of delight. It’s about treating customers as humans, not transactions. It’s about winning hearts and minds one planeload at a time with a personal, shared experience.
And it’s about building loyalty and triggering word-of-mouth by doing it well. Will Abraham’s parents ever fly any other airline? Will he? Will I? Or you?
For companies that are social at their core, social media just lets the rich get richer. For companies that don’t truly believe in the primacy of the customer, all the Twitter and Facebook and blogs and YouTube in the world won’t change their fortunes.
Social is foremost a philosophy, not a set of behaviors. And actions speak louder than words.” (Source: ConvinceandConvert.com)
Flexibility with Kids
Schools Financial Credit Union (#103) allows any of its employees to bring their newborns to work until the children are six months old. According to the vice president of marketing at the company, the babies cause little distraction, and since the parents can continue performing most of their work duties, the company doesn’t have to hire temps or train new people. (Source: Quality Logo Products) SFCU (#766) also supports a program called School Activities Leave. Employees may take up to 40 hours per year off for participation in a child’s school activity.
Flexibility with Pay and Benefits
All employees at Darden (#86) Restaurants (Red Lobster, Olive Garden, LongHorn Steakhouse, The Capital Grille, Bahama Breeze, Seasons 52, Eddie V’s) are eligible for health insurance and disability coverage from the first day of employment, which is highly unusual in the restaurant business. In addition, Darden pays employees on a weekly basis, rather than bi-weekly – even though it costs them more to do so – because they recognize the economic needs of their workers.
Flexible with Travel
Unlike many technology and management consulting companies, Jabian Consulting (#245) focuses on local client engagements, meaning its consultants do not endure the typically grueling travel demands that often come with consulting work.
Flexible Dress Code
Several winning workplaces stress the importance of the right atmosphere. At BBS Technologies (#802), that means striving to replicate a college campus’s freedom and intellectual excitement.
The dress code? ”You must wear clothes,” CEO Rick Pleczko said.
Otherwise, Pleczko said he wants everyone to feel comfortable at the software company as he tries to combine a casual atmosphere with a professional environment,
“We care what you produce and deliver, but not so much how you look,” (Source: Houston Chronicle)
Today’s Lagniappe (a little something extra thrown in for good measure) – Here’s a great YouTube video on ROWE by the U. of Minnesota:
All of the examples in this post were taken from the Green Goldfish Project. The Project is a quest to find 1,001 examples of marketing lagniappe for employees. Green goldfish are the little signature extras given to employees. They help differentiate a company, reinforce culture, increase retention and drive positive WoM. The book, “What’s Your Green Goldfish?” will be published on March 29, 2013. | <urn:uuid:47e5a015-51e3-4ca8-939f-9c2749b23735> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.9inchmarketing.com/2013/01/24/outcomes-not-hours-flexibility-is-becoming-a-mandate-for-employee-engagement/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94797 | 3,840 | 1.648438 | 2 |
PARKERSBURG - A Wood County Schools director says Wednesday's two-hour delay gave teachers valuable time to work on classroom strategies and goals , which will be evaluated on the next delay day in January.'
Judy Johnson, director of curriculum and instruction for Wood County Schools, said Wednesday's collaboration will have a direct impact on the classroom, and teachers and administrators will be tracking and reporting the results Jan. 30 during the next two-hour delay.
"We wanted them to set a focus, to begin using the data they had," Johnson said. "They were asked to set goals, what they want to improve by Jan. 30. They will look at those things, whether it's in test results or student work, and decide if they met their goals."
Johnson said the idea of spacing out the four two-hour delay collaborative times throughout the year was to give teachers more bite-sized periods in which to track achievement and adjust their classroom strategies.
"We didn't want to wait until the end of the year to find out if something wasn't working," she said.
Johnson said the middle schools were able to use recently released test results from the national ACT Explore, administered to all eighth-graders, and the ACT Plan, administered to all 10th-graders.
"The schools were using those test scores to help set their goals. They were asking 'Am I teaching what these students are expected to know to be successful?' " she said. "This is a national exam, so we know how our students are performing nationally. The timing was just perfect because the results had just come in."
Johnson said many schools did "vertical teaming," where they assembled teachers from multiple grades and multiple disciplines to share steps they all can take within their classrooms.
"Then they broke into smaller teams, either based on grade levels or departments, to work on specific classroom strategies," she said.
For example, at Edison Middle School related arts teachers began assembling lists of math and science vocabulary words to work into art and music lessons.
"They can reinforce what students need to know by using a common vocabulary," Johnson said.
Central office administrators visited schools throughout the morning, monitoring the collaboration time.
"The office staff were very pleased with what they saw," Johnson said.
Sue Woodward, assistant superintendent of school services, said the district saw few bus issues even though it still ran gifted routes, something that does not happen on weather delay days.
"The buses ran well. Attendance was good. Collaboration went well," she said. "Overall it was a good day." | <urn:uuid:5ee482e4-081c-439b-9000-ca3a735929b1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.newsandsentinel.com/page/content.detail/id/568264/Officials--Delay-day-went-well.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.986539 | 532 | 1.828125 | 2 |
In this case it looks like a swarm of insects. They do not give the frame rate and exposure time of the camera, but with long exposure and short transfer one can have this effect. At a first sight, the length of the rods correspond well with the frame rate: When you see the rods frame by frame, where the rod begins in one frame is almost where it finishes in the next frame. Have to watch frame by frame to confirm this observation.
Edit: if the distance traveled by the objects during a number of frames is a multiple of the rod length, then it may be insects in long exposure. | <urn:uuid:b2b8d20e-555e-42ac-bd7f-0459b0c54ef4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php/topic,11086.msg343109.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936302 | 124 | 1.515625 | 2 |
This was the text message I received from @kaththecrapout yesterday.
I meant to reply to her via text or Facebook but decided to share what little I know about street photography in the hopes of inspiring others to try it as well (and maybe convince even a single person to pick up a film camera).
Before anything else, please take note that I am an amateur and am not pretending to be an expert in any way. This is my personal view on street photography and may not be the same as anyone else’s. Comments would be welcome though as long as they are courteous and done in good taste. Or, you know, this is the Internet so whatever…
STREET PHOTOGRAPHY - A (LOOSE) DEFINITION
First off, what is street photography really? An extensive Google search will show that the term itself has been dealt with different interpretations and meanings. For me, personally, street photography is a visual documentation of everyday lives of people, their society, and/or the surrounding environment prevailing at the moment and place of capture (not necessarily in the “street” per se) that may otherwise be seen to be normal but given a much deeper meaning by a photographer through a simple act of candidly highlighting them in either a single or a series of photographs.
THE HURDLES OF STREET PHOTOGRAPHY IN THE MODERN ERA
For photographers who are deeply rooted in the digital era, shooting street can definitely be an imposing challenge. Street photography goes against every bad habit that digital camera technology instills into a photographer. What’s good about it is it helps the photographer unlearn these bad habits.
Out in the street, you can’t just shoot and shoot and shoot until your batteries run out. You have to observe, anticipate, and pre-visualize everything around you. You can’t also chimp—the act of looking at the LCD preview of every shot you take—as you might miss a moment each time you do so. These two things alone can make a digital photographer uncomfortable as he is taken out of his comfort zone.
Then there’s the problem of trying not to get noticed or agitate your subjects. There’s actually two schools of thoughts on this: one that advocates stealth and shuns influencing a scene in any way; while the other promotes seeking permission before taking a photograph and thus taking away the “candidness” of the shot.
These two schools have sprouted many more conflicting street photography ideologies (i.e. prime vs. zoom, wide-angle vs. telephoto, monochrome vs. color, street portraiture vs. photographing with or without—or with minimal—human elements). You can read more about them in books and throughout the Internet.
I believe there’s no right or wrong approach in street photography. It’s a matter of preference and how it fits your personality and the culture of the people around you. You can even mix and match techniques depending on the situation you’re in. As long as you are not purposely exploiting anyone or breaking any law, whatever you do should be fine.
Okay, so you’ve chosen the path you want to take on the street, being either the street ninja or the congenial photographer. Then comes the technical aspects: framing, choosing the aperture and shutter speed, selective focusing, placing yourself at the perfect distance from the subject… All these minuscule decisions and you have to make them in literally a fraction of a second because if you don’t, you just might end up missing famed street photographer Cartier-Bresson’s proverbial “decisive moment.”
IT’S REALLY, REALLY HARD
Having said all these, we may all agree that street photography really is hard. I mean if it isn’t, I wouldn’t be doing it. Yeah, I’m kind of a masochist.
But really, that’s the beauty of the street. It’s tough but that’s what makes you value each photograph you take. Sometimes, you even learn to appreciate your bad shots in the same way you do with the good ones. In case you still haven’t noticed, having everything easy in life makes you take things for granted.
Street photography is a challenge that one should never back down from because, I tell you, the rewards are too damn good.
So that’s established, street photography is so damn hard. But that doesn’t mean we can’t ease a burden for a teeny weeny bit, does it?
STREET PHOTOGRAPHY: THE ATTITUDE
Expect to Fail But Strive to Succeed
First things first, let’s correct your attitude. Never come out into the streets thinking that you will get your photos right every time. No, siree. Seldom does that happen. I’ve heard hardcore street photographers say that they only get one “keeper” in every five rolls or so of film they spent. That’s one in every 180 shots they take. These are very seasoned photographers, mind you. What more for amateurs like us?
Okay, given that these people have pretty high criteria for what makes a “keeper” photograph (I am more lenient with myself as I choose 2-3 keepers per roll of film), but still… The point is never be disappointed if you come up with nothing during a whole day of shooting in the street. But that doesn’t mean you will not strive to come up with THAT one photograph everyone is trying to find. Within yourself, have that drive to get it right every time but don’t sulk if you don’t. Learn, embrace and value your mistakes as they are proof that you are trying.
The Person You Should Shoot For
Most likely, you are not getting paid to shoot the streets. No one is forcing you to go out there and take photographs of everything that’s happening. Heck, you can’t even profit from portraits you take of strangers without them signing a legally binding model release form.
So shoot for yourself, not for anyone else. Shoot to your heart’s content. Shoot what you want. Shoot what you like. Shoot what delights you. Shoot to please yourself, only yourself.
Enjoy shooting the streets because, no matter how hard it is, it should always be fun. That one great photograph you may eventually capture should only come as a bonus.
More than anything else, street photography is about the experience of life. So go ahead and EXPERIENCE: eat local delicacies, ride a chariot, flirt with some of the cuties even. A photograph is merely a physical record of an experience, yet it will never come close to being the actual person with that experience. BUT NEVER FORGET TO HAVE YOUR CAMERA LOCKED AND LOADED AT ALL TIMES.
The Street as a Honing Ground
Ask a professional photographer why he shoots the street and more often than not, he will tell you that street photography helps develop his skills for his job as a photographer for events, fashion, sports, news, etc.
Still some of them will say that the money they earn from being a professional photographer funds their street photography.
Street photography hones the skills while professional photography pays the bills. Yep, I just came up with that on my own.
STREET PHOTOGRAPHY: THE GEAR
Is the Film Rangefinder the Perfect Camera?
Stop being lazy and do a Google search on what a rangefinder camera is. I won’t be discussing that here.
The fact that most people don’t know what a rangefinder is, much less seen one, makes a street photographer less of a threat to the people of the street. Add to that the compact size of this camera compared to a dSLR and the unique placement of its viewfinder relative to the lens, it is an ideal tool for being stealthy.
Shooting film in the street takes out the habit of chimping. It also helps you slow down. Digital technology has so far forced us to always get what we want immediately. It has a plethora of perks, yes. But sometimes, we need to take our foot off the accelerator.
Film does that. It develops in someone a kind of patience that digital technology has taken away. It will teach you to be more observant of the things around you, to have a feel of what has happened, what is happening, and what is bound to happen.
I’m not even kidding. There had been a few times when I’ve had in the back of my mind this lingering thought that this subject I’m keeping my eyes on might do this or that. And surely, after waiting (sometimes even for more than an hour if I feel particularly patient), the subject will perform my “prophecy.”
Film also teaches us the virtue of delayed gratification. With it comes the value of detaching personal emotion from your photographs. Read more about this on Eric Kim’s blog.
So, is a film rangefinder camera the perfect tool for street photography?
That’s a big “NO.”
Again, this is where your personal preference kicks in. Film and rangefinders each have their disadvantages (parallax error, not being able to change ISO, etc.).
Some people use dSLRs, some SLRS, still others TLRs or digital rangefinders, some shoot with point & shoots. I’ve also seen photobloggers shoot with the massive Mamiya RB67. But from what I’ve observed, most street photographers shoot with a film rangefinder.
I encourage you to try shooting with a rangefinder and see if you like it. Most compact, fixed-lens film rangefinders come in cheap, ranging from Php 1K-5K (~USD 25-125). Look for the Yashicas, the Canon G-IIIs, Olympuses, etc. More on rangefinders here.
I personally have recently been shooting with a 1950’s Contax IIa rangefinder body + 2000’s Voigtlander SC-Skopar 35mm 1:2.5 lens combo. (Yep, a modern lens made for a vintage body. How cool is that?) I load it up with Fuji Neopan ASA 400 film shot at either box speed or pushed to ISO 1600.
I also have the Canon GIII QL17 as a backup body. I have shot with a Yashica Electro 35 GSN, several Yashica/Contax film SLRs, film point & shoot compacts and a Yashica TLR. A rare Yashica Electro 35 CC from a friend (more on this in the future) and a couple of Polaroid bodies are currently on their way and I intend to use them in the street too.
Again, this is my personal preference. Whatever you choose to shoot with, it’s all up to you.
The Digital SLR and Street Photography
The dSLR is so recognizable that people tend to equate it to professional photography. Needless to say, it intimidates a potential subject. Also, it easily attracts robbers. These, as well as other things, pose a big problem for an aspiring street photographer.
Fret not, dSLR owners. With the proper technique and attitude, you can use the dSLR in street photography. May I offer a couple or more of my unsolicited advice? Some of these apply for non-dSLR photographers too.
- Gaffer’s tape! Cover any logo on your camera with it and be amazed at how your dSLR suddenly disappears like a ninja.
- Wear something casual and comfortable. You don’t want to attract attention and you’ll be doing a lot of walking and standing around. Try to blend in with the crowd.
- For Pete’s sake, don’t use flash.
- Act like you know what you’re doing. Don’t do anything that might be perceived as stalker-ish.
- Street photography doesn’t necessarily require you to be always on the move. You can just stay still and let the scenes unfold around you.
- Shoot with a buddy or a group. Strength in numbers. It wards away the robbers.
- Smile! Smile! Smile! A simple smile of acknowledgement can do wonders to help ease an agitated subject.
- When in the face of danger, walk away.
- Choose a location with a sizeable amount of crowd. Better if there are law enforcement officers around.
- Turn off your LCD preview. Not only does it simulate the experience of shooting with film. It also keeps your eyes dead set on your surroundings, either to pounce on a great scene or to watch out for dangers that may threaten you.
- Use a wide angle lens. The wide angle of view can help you point the camera a few inches away from your subject while still keeping them near the edge of the frame. You get your shot, the subject won’t notice. Again, there are people who are against this approach. Or…
- Use a telephoto. The distance will be less intimidating to subjects. You gotta admit though, it’s kind of a creepy way to do things. Or…
- You can ask for one’s permission to photograph him or her.
STREET PHOTOGRAPHY: FINAL THOUGHTS
What I’ve discussed here is but a fraction of what street photography is. I encourage you to read a lot about it, its history, the master street photographers, the cameras, the techniques, the ideologies. There’s a wealth of knowledge out there. The Internet is your best friend.
One thing I love about photography in general is you will never stop learning something new.
I wanted to discuss some techniques here but the post has gotten too long. Maybe next time. Let me give you another suggestion instead.
A pretty good technique you can learn next is focusing without even looking through the viewfinder. Look these up: zone focusing, depth of field, pre-focusing and hyperfocal focusing. Try them out and watch the magic unfold.
I guess that’s it for now. Live life, shoot street! | <urn:uuid:282b566f-e261-4645-9f9f-7e993e3f23bb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ibleedfilm.com/post/30711034521/doing-street-photography-is-hard | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944107 | 3,029 | 1.515625 | 2 |
By Theodore Shoebat
With Al Gore’s Current TV now sold to Al Jazeera, Woodstock and Mecca now unite, and Allah and Mother Earth are joined together in marriage. The purchase brings us to a much deeper topic, and that is that the ideology of Islam coincides with much of what the environmentalists uphold. Al Gore claims to be a Christian, but in fact would rather praise Islam than subscribe to any Christian ideals. Gore actually once wrote:
Islam, for example, offers familiar themes. The prophet Muhammad said, “The world is green and beautiful and God has appointed you His stewards over it.” The central concepts of Islam taught by the Qur’ân – Tawheed (unity), khalifa (trusteeship), akharah (accountability) – also serve as the pil- lars of the Islamic environmental ethic. The earth is the sacred cre- ation of Allah…The Qur’ân declares that “we have created everything from water.” In the Lotus ‘Sutra,’ Buddha is presented metaphorically as a “rain cloud,” covering, permeating, fertilizing, and enriching “all parched living beings, to free them from their misery to attain the joy of peace, joy of the present world and joy of Nirvana…”
Islam really is rooted in naturism. Allah is a product of the Venus goddess Athtar, and is the male counterpart to the earth goddess Allat. The Blackstone itself, the holiest idol in Islam, was originally a fertility symbol, being still place in a frame shaped in the form of a vulva.
The result of wholly accepting environmentalism is the exalting of animals and the belittling of man. Hence why the Quran says that humans are of lesser value than is creation: “the heavens and the earth is greater than the creation of man; but most people know not.” (Q 40:57) Even the animal kingdom is on par with humans: “No creature is there on earth nor a bird flying with its wings but they are nations like you.” (Q 6:38) Abdul Haseeb Ansari, in Islamic Law, explaining the significance of this verse warns against arrogance that the believers (Muslims) are “no better than other creatures.” (p. 34) This reminds me of when Ingrid Newkirk, the president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals declared, said: “When it comes to feelings, a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy. There is no rational basis for saying that a human being has special rights.”
The result of disrespecting human life is collectivism, since the individual is trampled upon and made no better than a herd servile to the state. Human life does not belong to God, but to the government. This is exactly what Thomas Malthus, the father of modern human population paranoia, wanted when he wrote:
“All children born, beyond what would be required to keep up the population to a desired level, must necessarily perish, unless room is made for them by the deaths of grown persons. We should facilitate, instead of foolishly and vainly endeavoring to impede, the operations of nature in producing this mortality.”
To deem human life as no better than an animal, leads to actions such what these Syrian jihadists who open fire on innocent people driving in their car:
Or to purely evil practices such as burning human beings alive simply for being Christians:
Christianity is the greatest foe to the demeaning of human life, and to the anti-human movement found in both environmentalism and Islam.
It is no of no marvel, then, why Paul Ehrlich, a proponent of human population control, wrote that in order to dramatically decrease the population in America, the country needs to replace its Judeo-Christian roots with Animism – a religion which only exists predominantly in third world nations:
Somehow we’ve got to change from a growth-oriented, exploitative system to one focused on stability and conservation. Our entire system of orienting to nature must undergo a revolution. And that revolution is going to be extremely dif- ficult to pull off, since the attitudes of Western culture toward nature are deeply rooted in Judeo-Christian tradition. Unlike people in many other cultures, we see man’s basic role as that of dominating nature, rather than as living in harmony with it. Professor Lynn White, Jr., has elegantly discussed this entire problem in Science magazine. He points out, for instance, that before the Christian era trees, springs, hills, streams, and other objects of nature had guardian spirits. These spirits had to be approached and placated before one could safely invade their territory. As White says, ‘By destroying pagan animism, Christianity made it possible to exploit nature in a mood of indiffer- ence to the feelings of natural objects… Both our present science and our present technology are so tinctured with orthodox Christian arrogance toward nature that no solution for our ecological crisis can be expected from them alone. Since the roots of our trouble are so largely religious, the remedy must also be essentially religious, whether we call it that or not.
Islam too wants to replace Christianity with its cult of Mecca and the Blackstone. Any country which has taken by Islam looses its respect for human life. Where Christianity is, life is honoured, where Islam or Leftism prevails, humanity is lost.
Theodore Shoebat is the author of the book, For God or For Tyranny. | <urn:uuid:bfd38d60-848a-4190-97d8-64150885f2d3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://shoebat.com/2013/01/06/islam-and-environmentalism-are-both-antihuman/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951864 | 1,162 | 1.726563 | 2 |
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