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Teaching the next generation and keeping them healthy are essential to tomorrow's strong, vibrant societies. Mercy Corps works with communities to shelter and nurture children and youth through innovative education, sports and job training programs.
Through the power of sports, community service and vocational training, we empower young people to make smart life choices and find a productive place in the changing global economy.
Our signature Comfort for Kids program focuses on helping children process trauma after natural disasters and conflict. See our expert's recommendations for how parents and caregivers can help children through times of crisis ▸
All stories about Children & Youth
Indonesia: Growing with Kedai Balitaku May 11, 2010
I believe that helping people to sell nutritious foods for children is the best strategy to ensure sustainability.
Indonesia: From pushing a pedicab to steering a healthy food cart May 4, 2010
His name is Gunanto, or Gun for short. He's 32 years old with two school-aged children. His wife works as a laundry laborer in their Jakarta neighborhood and earns 150,000 Indonesian rupiah — about US$15 — per month.
West Bank and Gaza: Cash-for-work projects in Gaza – part three May 3, 2010
My last visit of the day is to a neighborhood after-school program, where Mercy Corps pays unemployed graduates to work in after-school centres, supporting the learning of school children from particularly vulnerable households that are performing most poorly at school.
Lebanon: A better translation April 22, 2010
Lebanese men pass their citizenship on to their children. Lebanese women, by law in Lebanon, cannot — unless they are married to a Lebanese man.
West Bank and Gaza: Helping Gaza's children lead ‘normal’ lives again April 21, 2010
Three-day training session in Chile brings mentors on board April 20, 2010
The Educacion Popular en Salud (EPES, Mercy Corps' local partner) Center is humming with activity.
Dispatch from Hualpén, Chile April 15, 2010
People are still living in tents 48 days after the earthquake in Chile. Fish is a source of income in Talcahuano, and many people lost their homes and they can’t go back to the sea for fishing. Boats are still in the main street — the tsunami destroyed their dreams.
"My Earthquake Story" — a story for everyone April 7, 2010
Healing the helpers April 7, 2010
The aftershocks continue night and day following Chile’s 8.8 earthquake on February 27, even though more than a month has passed. On Sunday night, a 4.8 tremor with an epicenter near Santiago set windows rattling and the overhead lamps swaying.
Indonesia: Kedai Balitaku provides employment March 31, 2010
Mrs. Anik joined Kedai Balitaku Aceh — Mercy Corps' Child Nutrition Program that helps vendors sell healthy foods to children — in December 2009. | <urn:uuid:3a07839a-1427-4cfc-93b2-256c05ce5ce2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mercycorps.org/children-youth?page=23&%2524Version=0&%2524Path=%252F&%2524Domain=.mercycorps.org%252C%2520%2524Version%253D0 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00072-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942849 | 616 | 2.140625 | 2 |
Christmas Is For Sinners
Many years ago my family and I had a wonderful time giving my grandfather a lump of coal for Christmas. Yes, that is all he got. No shiny present and no Christmas card. A lump of coal in a cardboard box! While he took it well and we all enjoyed the laugh, the idea of giving a lump of coal to someone for Christmas clearly shows that Christmas is not for them.
Have you ever thought about who Christmas is for? While the Santa Clause story teaches us that good ol’ Saint Nic comes for good boys and girls, the Gospel of Matthew speaks on the Christmas story saying, “And she shall bring forth a Son, and thou shalt call His name Jesus; for He shall save His people from their sins.” (Matt. 1:21) Our text says that a child was born and they called Him Jesus. The name of Jesus embraces His entire purpose. He is the one who is to be our Savior. He is the one who came to save sinners.
Fredrick Wisloff in his little book titled, “Hvil eder litt,” states the following,
“Had there been no sin on earth, there would have been no Christmas. Had there been no sinners, there would have been no need of a Savior. For this very reason the Christmas Gospel is a message for sinners. And only those who acknowledge their sins can understand the true meaning of Christmas.”
Wisloff goes on to say,
“The name ‘Jesus’ is the hope of the world; it is the radiant dawn over a generation living in the night of sin; it is salvation and victory for the sinner; it is release for him who is in captivity; it is hope, it is a future, it is eternity. Without Jesus the world is hopeless darkness. With Jesus something of heaven comes to earth.”
This Christmas as we jokingly ponder who will receive presents from Santa based on our status on the naughty and nice list, we can take comfort that God’s Christmas Gift of Jesus Christ is for people on the naughty list. In other words, the Christmas Gift (i.e., Jesus) came not to call the righteous but sinners (Matthew 9:13). Therefore, as we confess that we have sinned in thought, word and deed, we can be assured that the Christmas Gospel is a message for us. God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners. This Christmas God does not have a lump of coal for you, but the Christ child. Your gift is Christ crucified for the forgiveness of your sins. Receive Him.
Read 854 times | <urn:uuid:50ac7043-b8ca-4cb9-99e7-db746841a1ff> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://steadfastlutherans.org/?p=25162 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964652 | 559 | 1.851563 | 2 |
I am in urgent need of advice. Right ear of patient has been operated on the ground that infection was in the year and after operation it was told by the doctor that out of three bones, two bones has been damaged. Further, the ear drum was also changed. The tissues were taken for tuberculosis test and test for cancer. The tuberculosis test was found positive. For treatment of tuberculosis the forecox has been prescribed by the doctor and is being taken up regularly from last one week. The recovery of hearing loss is about 10 % only. It is to submit that the left ear is also infected and has hearing loss. I have some doubt which may kindly be solved at your level.
1. Whether there is any test/symptom to locate the tuberculosis and cancer in the ear before operating?
2. The patient might be suffering from the tuberculosis, whether the medicine prescribed for right ear will also work for left ear.
3. In case of cancer, whether operation for left year is advisable?
4. Advice on overall situation, what to do?
Sorry, this question is outside the scope of an audiologist and requires direct medical attention. If you arent' comfortable with your diagnosis, please seek a second opinion from a physician that specializes in treatment of the ear.
The Content on this Site is presented in a summary fashion, and is intended to be used for educational and entertainment purposes only. It is not intended to be and should not be interpreted as medical advice or a diagnosis of any health or fitness problem, condition or disease; or a recommendation for a specific test, doctor, care provider, procedure, treatment plan, product, or course of action. Med Help International, Inc. is not a medical or healthcare provider and your use of this Site does not create a doctor / patient relationship. We disclaim all responsibility for the professional qualifications and licensing of, and services provided by, any physician or other health providers posting on or otherwise referred to on this Site and/or any Third Party Site. Never disregard the medical advice of your physician or health professional, or delay in seeking such advice, because of something you read on this Site. We offer this Site AS IS and without any warranties. By using this Site you agree to the following Terms and Conditions. If you think you may have a medical emergency, call your physician or 911 immediately. | <urn:uuid:a4cb4afd-6c96-4846-8fc3-d2a5a879f92d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.medhelp.org/posts/Hearing-Loss/Acute-hearing-loss-due-to-infection/show/1892130 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00040-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968798 | 476 | 1.671875 | 2 |
Fort Chipewyan, Lake Athabasca, Alberta, Sir George Back (1796-1878), ca. 1832
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Since Confederation in 1867, the Canadian government had pursued a policy of recognizing Native land claims only when the lands they occupied were required for settlement or development. The Athabasca region in Canada's northwestern interior was no exception. For more than two centuries, British and Canadian parties had explored the region and carefully inventoried its natural resources. Such was their diligence that, by the late 1880s, the federal government was well aware of the extent of the tar sands and was calling the petroleum field "inexhaustible" and "the most extensive ... in America, if not the world."
Reports of destitute Natives in the northwest were circulating around Ottawa for more than 20 years following Confederation. However, federal authorities only began to show an interest in settling the land claims of Athabasca's First Nations and Métis in the late 1890s. The government's change of heart coincided with the discovery of gold in the Yukon. | <urn:uuid:dfe01fad-b6ec-41d9-8752-1e593d156537> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/treaty8/020006-2000-e.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955561 | 285 | 3.46875 | 3 |
Plan Obama: Where stupid trumps reality.
By 86 votes to 32, with 59 abstentions, the committee on Monday approved a text that “expresses deep concern at serious ongoing and recurring human rights violations in the Islamic Republic of Iran.” The text also cites a wide range of violations.
The 32 countries voting against the resolution were Arab, Islamic, communist and autocratic states, along with Tehran’s left-wing Latin American allies, Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua (full list below).
Of the ten countries that received the most U.S. foreign aid in fiscal year 2011, only one – Israel – voted for the resolution critical of Iran’s human rights record.
Afghanistan and Pakistan, the two biggest aid recipients in FY2011, voted against the resolution. Six of the other seven biggest beneficiaries of U.S. aid – Egypt, Ethiopia, Jordan, Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa – abstained.
The remaining country among the top ten U.S. aid recipients, Iraq, did not vote (although Iraq’s representative did take part in other votes during Monday’s session.) The Shi’ite-led government in Baghdad balances its relationship with the United States with close ties to neighboring Iran. | <urn:uuid:508634ba-d9f3-4e33-91cc-47528ba238b0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.israelforum.com/board/showthread.php?21059-9-of-top-10-US-foreign-aid-recipients-voted-against-condemnation-of-Iran | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934068 | 261 | 1.71875 | 2 |
Duabanga grandiflora is native to Cambodia, Eastern India, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam where it is found in evergreen rain forests between 900-1500 m in elevation.
It is found in open forests including vegetation adjacent to riverbanks and in valleys. The genus Duabanga contains only two other species including Duabanga moluccana, and a cultivated, proposed hybrid species Duabanga x taylorii. Duabanga x taylorii is unusual as it is known only in cultivation at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Peradeniya, Sri Lanka. It was grown from seed obtained from an unknown source and is thought to have come from Indonesia, however, its geographic origin and its proposed hybrid origin cannot be confirmed.
(Haining, Q. S. Graham, and M.G. Gilbert. Lythraceae. In Flora of China 13: 274-276) | <urn:uuid:463b6598-8b94-4043-bd75-6a028f854ac3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ntbg.org/plants/plant_details.php?rid=3007&plantid=11927 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949827 | 189 | 3.03125 | 3 |
A Walmart supplier accused of mistreating workers has been ordered to pay nearly $250,000 in fines and unpaid wages by the US department of labour, after a campaign against conditions at the plant.
CJ's Seafood was found to have 11 serious violations for exposing workers to blocked exits and fire, electrical and chemical hazards, as well as failing to pay the minimum wage to 73 workers.
CJ's Seafood has been penalised by two separate branches of the department of labour. After an investigation the department's occupational safety and health administration found 11 violations classed as serious – where "there is substantial probability that death or serious physical harm could result from a hazard about which the employer knew or should have known".
The violations included the building not being equipped with fire extinguishers, exit signs or emergency eye wash stations, while an exit was also blocked and electrical outlets were not covered. The citations carry proposed penalties of $32,200, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (Osha) said.
In addition to the 11 serious violations, Osha found one "other-than-serious" violation, which pertained to a failure by CJ's Seafood to maintain a log of employee injuries and illnesses. That violation carries a separate penalty of $2,100, the Osha said. In a statement, the department of labour said CJ's had 15 business days from receipt of the citations to comply or contest the citations and penalties.
Further to the Osha findings, the department of labour's wage and hour division found that CJ's Seafood had flouted the Fair Labor Standards Act in refusing to pay overtime, making illegal discussions from employees' wages for items required by their jobs, such as gloves and aprons, and failing to maintain records of the hours employees had worked.
In addition CJ's Seafood had violated the H-2B foreign worker programme, the Wage and Hour Division said, by misrepresenting its need for temporary foreign workers and refusing to pay the required wage rate.
"This employer took illegal advantage of the H-2B program, which put it in a position to undercut its competition that plays by the rules," said Nancy Leppink, deputy administrator of the Wage and Hour Division.
"American workers seeking jobs should not be compelled to accept substandard wages and working conditions due to employers' abuse of temporary foreign worker visa programs."
The wage and hour division said that $76,608 is due to the 73 workers affected, while the company is also liable for $70,014 in liquidated damages. A further $67,120 is owed in penalties under the fair labor standards act and in penalties for violating the H-2B program.
The findings come after a campaign by former guestworkers and the National Guestworkers' Alliance which called for Walmart to drop CJ's Seafood as a supplier. Workers claimed they had been forced to work up to 20 hours a day without overtime.
Walmart conducted its own investigation into conditions at CJ's Seafood but said in June it had been "unable to substantiate claims of forced labour or human trafficking" at the plant. | <urn:uuid:007e6c88-fcb6-484a-acde-c81e55f32cfe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/jul/24/wal-mart-supplier-fines-conditions | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97827 | 634 | 1.5625 | 2 |
So remember that video last week where a boat captain said endangered sea turtles were being burned alive by BP? People are not taking kindly to it, voicing their opposition on Facebook and elsewhere. Credo Mobile* has jumped on the story, issuing a petition telling BP to "Stop blocking the rescue of endangered sea turtles before you burn them alive in your 'controlled burns.'" By today the petition had more than 75,000 signatures.
While wildlife conservation organizations are still reporting they haven't seen any burned turtles, the position and trustworthiness of rescue boat captain seen on the video has been confirmed. And it seems that it's indeed very possible Kemp's Ridleys were killed in the controlled burns, where trawlers use booms to corral oil into a pool before setting it on fire. To date, there have been at least 275 controlled burns in the Gulf, consuming 9.32 million gallons of oil. UC Davis's Dr. Mike Ziccardi, who's heading turtle rescues in the Gulf, wrote me in an email today that:
"Like you, we are very concerned about the possibility of there being impacts to turtles related to controlled burn operations, as juvenile turtles and spilled oil can aggregate in mats of seaweed... Burn operations target these areas when sufficient oil is present, so these are also places where there is risk of harming turtles." Ziccardi noted that his operations had not seen any burned turtles, "but our targeted on-water collection efforts do target very similar areas."
Meghan Calhoun from Audubon concurs. She says the juvenile Kemp's Ridleys, an endangered species her organization is rescuing, are around two to three years old and can be found hanging out around the clumps of sargassum sea weed where they usually shelter until they're large enough to survive in the open seas. Unfortunately, the clumps of sargassum are perfect for collecting oil and to a turtle, a glob of oil and a forest of sargassum may look very much alike. "Turtles are actually mistaking the oil now for the sargassum," Calhoun said.
Thankfully, last week's suspension of at-sea turtle rescues has been lifted. Ziccardi wrote that a pilot program has been launched pairing sea turtle biologists with burn unit teams. While the goal of the burns (which happen at an average rate of about 30 a week) is to consume oil before it makes landfall, the burns can hurt wildlife if animals caught in the sticky oil don't get out before the oil is set on fire. Hopefully, with trained wildlife rescuers accompanying the trawlers, any turtles sheltering in oily sargassum can now be rescued before they're lit on fire. Audubon's Calhoun says she has around 90 turtles currently in oil rehab (66 of which are Kemp's Ridleys) and has plenty of room to take more if they come in. The turtles can't be released until NOAA clears their environment as safe, Calhoun says, so the turtles are just "hanging out" with conservationists for the present. There's been thoughts of releasing them off the Eastern coast of the US, but turtles have an internal homing device that would likely re-route them back to the Gulf anyway, so they'll remain in custody for now.
Although there are more than a hundred live sea turtles being rehabed, there are hundreds more dead sea turtles. 317 of these dead sea turtles are waiting to be classified as "visibly oiled" or "no visible oil" by Fish & Wildlife officials. These unclassified sea turtles are simply listed as "pending" in the daily wildlife collection reports, meaning there's no way of knowing exactly how many sea turtles have died due to the spill. Hugh Morrison from the Gulf Joint Information Center says the backlog of "pending" turtles awaiting necropsies is a result of the assigned pathologist busily tending to live turtles. But, Morrison says, the necropsies are due to start this week. So if you see a sudden rise in the number of dead, oiled sea turtles reported in the media, it's not because a large number of turtles have suddenly died. It's just that authorities are only now getting around to counting them.
*Full disclosure: Credo has advertised in Mother Jones magazine. | <urn:uuid:cc3348b9-f3ac-455c-9c47-da17bee5523a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2010/06/sea-turtles-burned-backlash | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976165 | 884 | 2.515625 | 3 |
G. C. Graffius, general agent for the Pennsylvania Railroad Company at Twin Rocks, is esteemed throughout Cambria County as a substantial citizen. He was born at Houtzdale, Pa., July 14, 1885, and is a son of H. N. and Clara (Hampton) Graffius.
H. N. Graffius, retired, is a native of Huntingdon County, Pa. In early life he was engaged in the lumber business but later worked in the mines of Pennsylvania. He retired in 1920 and lives at Expedit. His wife, also a native of Huntingdon County, died Oct. 21, 1918, and is buried at Franklinville, Pa. Mr. Graffius is a Democrat and for several years served as secretary of the school board of Spangler. He is a member of the Presbyterian Church. To Mr. and Mrs. Graffius were born 13 children, as follows: John Howard, lives at Redding, Pa.; William Harry, twin brother of John Howard, lives at South Fork, Pa.; Effie, married James Hetrick, deceased, and later married Theodore Alsops, and they live at Clymer, Pa.; Charles B.; lives in York County, Pa.; Treva Belle, the widow of John Penrod, lives at Lovett, Pa.; Herbert W., a graduate of Dickinson Seminary and the University of Michigan, a teacher of mathematics at Schenley High School, Pittsburgh, Pa.; Hattie Grace, married Alvin Hetrick, lives at Spangler; G. C., the subject of this sketch; Anderson M., lives at Wehrum, Pa.; Mary Alice, a graduate nurse of Spangler Hospital and the Philadelphia Child Clinic, lives at Spangler; Minnie, died in 1898; Edgar and Edna, twins, both deceased.
G. C. Graffius received his education in the public schools of Hastings and Spangler and attended Dickinson Seminary, Williamsport. He lived at Spangler until November, 1911, when he entered the employ of the Pennsylvania Railroad at Barnesboro. The Following year he was transferred to Ebensburg and in 1915 was appointed extra agent of the Cresson division. On April 10, 1916, he opened the station at Loretto, and in September, 1917, was transferred to Twin Rocks as general agent. His home is at Expedit.
In April, 1908, Mr. Graffius was united in marriage with Miss Margaret Smith, the daughter of Isaac and Mary Smith, residents of Barnesboro. They have three children: Edith Olla, was graduated from Ebensburg High School in 1926; Milroy and Ralph DeWayne, both students.
Mr. Graffius is a Republican. He has served as Sunday school
superintendent of the Methodist Church at Ebensburg since 1919,
and is president of the official board, president of the board
of trustees, and assistant to the pastor.
Source: Gable, John E., "History of Cambria County Pennsylvania in Two Volumes Illustrated, Volume Two," Historical Publishing Company, Topeka - Indianapolis, 1926. | <urn:uuid:6433f11e-741b-49e5-ac5a-336430482bc8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~pacblack/interests/GraffiusGC.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970686 | 644 | 1.578125 | 2 |
As I was dropping off my daughters at their CATHOLIC High School, I was listening to Christina Blizzard on the radio. With the recent columns and debate in the papers about Catholic schools opening up Muslim prayer rooms I was very tempted to respond back.
My daughters are the only Muslims at their school. I am in the school council and have been for 4 years now. The principal and the staff have always been welcoming and accommodating. They offered my daughters a prayer room also but I said that it was ok. They come home and pray. Just the same when I read about Mother Teresa HS and the prayer room…. I wrote a Thank you note to the principal ….THANKING HER on behalf of the London Muslim Community. Just as I feel I am sure majority of my friends feel the same also. I think it is at the Principal’s and her staff’s discretion.
The reason for me to enroll my daughters in a Catholic HS was not that I want my kids to learn culture and ethics. Thank God we do most of that at home… respect elders, teachers, parents and so much more. I myself have been educated in a Catholic School … I used to do the prayers just like my daughters do at their HS. They attend mass and just like so many kids at their school they just cross their forearms when receiving the blessings. My one daughter, who has already graduated not only was an honor student who excelled academically but also religiously. She took part in several religious retreats. MUSLIMS ATTENDING CATHOLIC SCHOOLS HAVE NO PROBLEM WITH CRUSIFIXES IN THE CLASS ROOMS. In fact, my daughter was presented a cross and a Bible by the Rev. Fabbro and honored at St. Peter’s Seminary with a Beatitude Award which I still have at home. Majority of the Muslims have no problems in wishing “MERRY CHRISTMAS” and giving gifts at Christmas to their Christian friends/ neighbours and co-workers. Further, a Muslim must be good to his neighbors, no matter what their religion is. But the Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) taught us that a “neighbor” is not just the one next door but also includes all those up to forty houses in all directions – effectively a whole neighborhood. Christianity teaches all the same values as Islam. Because all three of the main religions in this world: Judaism, Christianity and Islam have the same common roots. They all believe in the same GOD. That is the reason why so many of the Muslim families choose to enroll our kids at a Catholic school. I love the fact that no matter what is taught, it is always tied back to God and reinforces Faith. We (Muslims whose kids attend Catholic Schools) have no problem with learning about Christianity in their Religion class unlike Oliver Erazo and Kyle Naylor (Battles over Catholic school courses frustrate families: The Toronto Star- Sept. 15, 2012) who enrolled their kids in Catholic Schools and now want their kids to be exempted from the religion course????? Not a front page news again and not even mentioned by Christina (from the Toronto Star) in her column or on the radio.
I just want to clear some more of the misconceptions that you and the host were discussing. You have mentioned in your column that most of all you hate how young girls are segregated and are forcefully placed in the back … behind the males and that the menstruating girls are not allowed to pray at all. Muslims (men and women) pray 5 times a day. They fast once a year during the month of Ramadan. Islam is a religion of easiness and it removes hardships for all Muslims. That is why Muslim females are exempted from praying for the days while she is menstruating and during pregnancy who may be weak or in pain or just fatigued (for health concerns). Muslims who are old, weak or sick are also exempted. Fasting has to be made up for but not the prayers at a later date/time. So it is for their own good Islam gives women a break every month because of the tremendous hardships they endure due to the changes in their hormones and not because they are unclean or inferior to men. ALLAH in Arabic and GOD in English, exempted them from fasting and prayer in order not to add to their hardships.
As for the women being segregated from the men, please read the following links. Wikipedia -Sex segregation. They all support that many of the other religions such as Judaism and even some Christians still have separate seating either side by side or behind for women. Even if it is side by side…there is a division between them. Just like Judaism … Islam again has the same reasoning. The segregation is to safeguard the women from the prying eyes of the men and in turn both can concentrate on praying to God, the real reason they are there for. Again refer and read Wikipedia -Gender separation in Judaism under “Reasons”. Anat Hoffman “’Women of the Wall- movement fights Israeli gender bias” is still fighting against the segregation in Judaism. This news is not very highlighted BUT when it comes to Islam why is it always in the negative. Please highlight the POSITIVES about Islam also. However all this negativity makes people research about Islam and that is why it is the fastest spreading religion in the world.
How is it that when women in other religions such as Judaism, Christianity (Nuns) or the Mennonite/Amish community follow a way of dressing – it is called modesty and when Muslim women choose to dress it is called oppression? Why are other religion-traditions and practices (sometimes very different and bizarre: goggle – 10 Weird Religious Practices http://listverse.com/2007/08/13/10-weird-religious-practices/) respected and seen with dignity whereas when it is about Islam it is medieval, old and backwards)
It is ok for a Mennonite child to be exempted from standing in school during the national anthem or the Canadian flag been taken down recently but this would have been a huge front page news if God forbid, it was a Muslim, with Islam being blamed. Just like Dowry death, Honor killing, Female genital mutilation has to do with different cultures and not Islam.
If anyone is really interested in learning and understanding about Islam from moderate Muslims then read the following articles and really try to understand the real meaning of the Quran.
1- Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf: Let the Global Movement of Moderates Rise http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/09/20/imam-feisal-abdul-rauf-let-the-global-movement-of-moderates-rise.html
2- West should do more to fight Islamophobia: Turkish minister http://www.lfpress.com/2012/09/20/west-should-do-more-to-fight-islamophobia-turkish-minister
3- Br. Nauman Ali Khan http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6zuKbBlmRo
4- Moderates in West must raise their voices: Haroon Siddiqui http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorialopinion/article/1257385–column-moderates-in-west-must-raise-their-voices-haroon-siddiqui
There are many more such people in the papers, internet and all around you in daily life (the everyday common Muslim Canadians) who are peace loving and responsible contributors not only to the Canadian society but the world…but only if we look for them.
Muslim women (with the head covering or not, which they cover by choice and are NOT forced to do so) are an intellectual part of the society. “ I also found them very confident, content and in some ways more liberated on a spiritual and intellectual level than you or I. They do everything we do here and more – they work outside their homes, they are educators, politicians, leaders`….“ Raheel Raza (Women in Islam). Other books which can be read on the Status of women are: Gender equality in Islam- Basic Principles by Jamal Badawi and Women`s Rights- a historical Perspective by Dr. Abdullah H. Al -Kahtany
Muslims respect and believe in Christianity along with all other religions. The dealings of the Prophet (Peace Be Upon Him) with other religions can best be described in the verse of the Quran: “To you be your religion, to me be mine.” Because of a few extremist please don’t judge the majority of the peaceful Muslims. Just like Christianity should not be judged by the sexual –abuse cases in churches or the crusaders, Islam should not be judged by the actions of the few. There are EXTREMIST IN ALL RELIGIONS. When the news is about Timothy McVeigh, James Holmes…they are not called terrorist nor called by their religion but are labeled as crazy, mentally disturbed, brainwashed or socially deprived and acted individually. But when it is Umar Farooouk Abdul Mutallab or Almaleki always their religion is mentioned and are labeled as TERRORIST and are most likely linked to Al-Qaida. For your information I would like to mention that the majority of the suicide bombers are youth who are brainwashed with radical thoughts, Illiterate, desperately poor, mentally tortured, their family members kidnaped and are even blackmailed into doing such NON-Islamic Acts.
A very big responsibility lies at the hands (literally) of the media worldwide. At present they are just adding fuel to an already flammable situation. Please act responsibly: Stop the negative stereotyping of all Muslims. Stop twisting the reality and taking the teachings of the Quran out of context. Stop spreading lies and misconceptions and please get thoroughly educated about Islam and Moderate Muslims and when u need to ask an expert Irshaad Manji and Salim Mansoor do not represent majority of the Mainstream Moderate Muslim point of view…. The London Muslim Community is led by two very honorable Imams/leaders: Imam Jamal and Dr. Munir El-Kassem. I understand you have to add the spice in all your news or it will not sell…But please keep it bearable enough to digest and always balance the news with some positive and peace spreading news also.
In Conclusion I would like to once again Thank the Principal of Mother Teresa C.H.S Ana Paula Fernandes for her open mindedness, “practicing what you preach” and her step towards Islam- literally meaning Peace.
AsSalamalikum- Peace be upon you!!!
A Guest Writer
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Over the course of this column, we’ve talked a great deal about privacy, both legally and ethically, and how it intersects with blogging. We’ve looked at the problems with anonymous blogging, privacy and email and even some of the false privacy-related legal threats a blogger might face.
However, privacy is a very thorny issue, even more so than most areas of law online. The reason is that much of what we think of as privacy law is actually decided on a state level, meaning in the U.S. alone there is effectively 50 interpretations of privacy law. This says nothing, obviously, about the international implications.
But privacy issue for bloggers is about to get a lot thornier than even that, or at least a lot more visible. At its F8 conference, Facebook announced a new API that is going to make it easier for people to share more things with their Facebook friends, including sharing things that they did not decide, at least on an individual level, to put out there.
Combine this with its already-promised new buttons for websites, including “read”. “watch”, etc. and it’s easy to see how the issue of privacy will likely be brought into focus again for bloggers.
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The Collection > Toilet Training
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Brain cancer has complex underlying mechanisms that promote tumors through multiple signaling networks hosted in a number of molecularly discrete diseases. A quantitative understanding can lead to a better interpretation of the effects of these signaling networks.
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10 Easy and Functional Crafts Preschoolers Can Do with Minimal Assistance
Welcome to the August Carnival of Natural Parenting: Creating With Kids
This post was written for inclusion in the monthly Carnival of Natural Parenting hosted by Hobo Mama and Code Name: Mama. This month our participants have shared how they make messes and masterpieces with children. Please read to the end to find a list of links to the other carnival participants.
When I need to get work done during the day and Kieran is having a hard time playing alone, I can usually engage him in a craft next to me. He likes to work alongside me – it’s still connection, even though we’re not engaging in a high level of interaction.
Craft activities for preschoolers often require quite a bit of parental involvement, so we’ve figured out some fun ones that he can do with little help. Following are ten easy and relatively inexpensive craft ideas that your preschooler can engage in with little assistance. Added bonus: all of these ten ideas double as something functional – whether it’s an educational component that your child can revisit later, decor for your home (can’t all craft projects be turned into home decor?!), or gifts for a friend or family member.
1. Cut and Paste
There is something about scissors and glue that can hold many a child’s attention for long, concentrated periods of time. In this activity for preschoolers who are mastering their ABC’s and the concept of grouping, there is an added element of learning. Ask your preschooler to cut out pictures that belong to some theme – you can choose “things that start with the letter P,” “animals,” “things that go,” etc. I would try to have a few of these items cut out for your child already so they can have something to use as a guide. Once your child has a group of similar items cut out, they can paste them onto a piece of paper. You can write the group category on the paper and then save these collages to pull out and discuss later.
2. Painting Garden Rocks
If you can move your work outside (or if you have a good indoor space for painting that you don’t have to worry about), find some good sized rocks, give your little one some paint, and let them get artistic. We use tempera paint, because we just repeat the project after our paint washes off of the rocks. But if you’re going to use the colorful garden rocks as gifts, I’d use something more permanent.
3. Decorate Homemade Greeting Cards, Recipe Cards, and Stationary
Some people are fabulous about sending out thoughtful letters and cards – this one is for you. Set your child up with stamps and ink pads (or create your own stamps from fruits or veggies), crayons, stickers, and other fun items and have them decorate blank note cards, stationary, or greeting cards.
You can set these aside to send out anytime you want to make someone smile. For the chefs among us, you can also create a homemade recipe card set to gift people on birthdays or holidays. Or for those of us who are incredibly organized (like Kellie of Mindful Life), you can turn your newly decorated 3×5 cards into a chore filing system.
4. Dress-up Creations
What kid wouldn’t want to wear something s/he had created?! There are several relatively easy craft ideas your preschooler can do with minimal assistance.
String necklaces made of colorful macaroni (you can dye them yourself in advance with natural dyes!1), large wooden beads, cereal, or use a hole puncher on shapes/pictures that your child cuts out of construction paper or magazines.
If you’re feeling more adventurous, let your child paint old shirts, aprons, or other dress-up clothes (another outside project perhaps) for the dress-up box. You could also cut a rudimentary cape out of an old sheet or spare fabric and let your little one paint that in his/her favorite superhero colors.
5. Create Your Own Wrapping Paper
This one is both a money saver and a fun way to personalize gifts – create your own wrapping paper using butcher or recycled paper decorated with paint, stickers, markers, or whatever other medium your child is in the mood for. We did this a couple of years ago using tempera paint – the results were beautiful, but be warned – the paint tends to fleck off when you wrap a package with the paper.
6. Decorate Your Walls with Art Displays
There are so many ways to brighten up your house using children’s artwork. I love this idea from Childhood 101 on creating an art space – what an inspirational place to make more art! In our house, we have a pretty art display board that Kieran proudly displays his creations on. You can also choose to find nice frames to hang your child’s artwork in – show it off around the house! Have a regular “art day” when your kids can sit next to you and create with whatever medium they choose – then rotate the artwork in and out of your regular display places.
7. Painting and Decorating for Gifts
There are so many simple items you can buy to decorate for gifts. The adults in your child’s life will enjoy watering cans, clay pots, wooden step stools, picture frames, or other items decorated by your little one. Because you’ll likely be using permanent paint to decorate with, this might be a good activity for an outside craft project (and you might want to have kids paint the clay pots in the yard so there is less of a chance that the pots will break).
8. Sticker Scenes
One of Kieran’s favorite easy crafts is to get out our box of stickers and put them all over paper. He can sit for quite awhile, calmly peeling off stickers and placing them in whatever order he thinks makes sense. To make this more of a “learning” experience, challenge your preschooler to create a scene made of various stickers. Feel free to offer some direction at first by showing them how they can put several stickers together, then telling a story about them. Once they’ve arranged their stickers on the page, have them narrate a story about their creation. No matter what the story, celebrate their creativity!
9. Playing Kitchen
For little ones who are eager to help you in the kitchen, turn the kitchen into their own personal creation space. Set your child up with playdough (you can make your own!) and real kitchen utensils: rolling pin, butter knife and cutting board, slotted spoon, egg separator, ice cream scoop, plate, bowl, measuring cups and spoons – anything remotely interesting that you use in the kitchen, pull it out. It can all be washed! You can even create “recipes” for your child to follow – feel free to use numbers and pictures instead of words to help your preschooler make sense of the recipes.2 What a fun, no-pressure way for kids to learn about kitchen utensils and the process of baking from a recipe!
10. Decorate Picture Frames with Nature or Miscellaneous Crafty Objects
Buy some cheap picture frames at your local dollar store, make sure they have plenty of room on the frame (not the glass) to glue objects on. Let your little one decide what to decorate the frames with – you could go on a nature walk and pick up things outside (twigs, leaves, dried flowers, etc.), or you could get out all of those random craft items that you’ve been saving for a rainy day (think googly eyes, feathers, colorful pipe cleaners, etc.). Let your child go crazy with a bottle of glue (remove the glass from the frame first so that there are no accidents).
What are your go to craft projects when you need some time and space to get your own work done?
What are your favorite art projects that can double as “functional”?
Please take time to read the submissions by the other carnival participants:
(This list will be live and updated by afternoon August 9 with all the carnival links.)
- Family Draw Time Art Show — Kate Wicker shares art (and inspiration!) from her family’s cherished tradition of family draw time.
- The Rules of Creativity: Learning to Create with the “Non-Creative” — Zoe at Give an Earthly shares how she learned to accept her “non-creative” child and claims that anyone, child or adult, can be creative given the right handling and environment.
- Creating With Kids: 4 Ways That Work For Us — See how Kristin at Intrepid Murmurings nurtures creativity with her kids through craft projects, outdoor creative play, celebrating the creative process, and setting up “little spaces of beauty.”
- Creating memories, not things — Mrs. Green from Little Green Blog reflects on life with a ten year old and how ‘creating together’ has evolved from ‘things’ to memories.
- The Gift of Creation — It may be hot, but Kellie at Our Mindful Life is already thinking about winter.
- Hidden Talents — Sylvia at MaMammalia describes how providing the opportunity for creativity sometimes means learning to look for hidden talents in unusual places.
- Creating Joy — CatholicMommy at Working to be Worthy shares how she and her one year-old son create joy for their community.
- How to do Crafts with Kids — Gaby from Tmuffin guest posts at Natural Parents Network and describes how to keep things simple when doing crafts with kids for magical (easy-to-clean, and tantrum-free) results.
- Sugar & Spice & Baking on the Kitchen Floor — Carrie at Love Notes Mama enjoys making a mess in the kitchen with her daughter.
- Young Scientist Makes Purple Potion — Hannah at Wild Parenting loves being a lab assistant for the young scientist in her life.
- Making a butterfly house — Lauren at Hobo Mama demonstrates the proper way to build a wooden butterfly house with a preschooler.
- Nurturing Creativity — Amyables at Toddler In Tow shares the enjoyment she feels in nurturing the creativity of her children.
- Home School Music – Sparking A New Generation Of Musicians — Based on her musical background, Chante at My Natural Motherhood Journey talks about how she creates with and teaches music to her children.
- Creating (im)perfectly Together — Mudpiemama shares some of the highlights of a summer spent building everything from ships to hoops but most of a lesson on letting go of perfection.
- Family Soccer Kick Around — When her children wanted to play soccer, Mandy at Living Peacefully with Children helped organize something that would work for her family.
- Creating Memories Together on Skype — Deb Chitwood at Living Montessori Now tells how you can create memories online with adult children or anyone who lives in another city or country.
- We’ll always have Halloween: Creating costumes for kids — Jessica Claire at Crunchy-Chewy Mama is not the craftiest mom on the block, but she does make a mean homemade Halloween costume.
- Let’s Make Juice! — Wendylori at High Needs Attachment shares about the benefits of juicing with kids, as well as a quick recipe.
- Everything’s Better When It’s Homemade — Amanda at Let’s Take the Metro praises the art of homemade goods.
- Creating the Opportunity for Art — Jenn at Monkey Butt Junction shares how her family has created an environment conducive to art.
- 10 Easy and Functional Crafts Preschoolers Can Do with Minimal Assistance — Dionna at Code Name: Mama offers ten easy crafts preschoolers can do while sitting near parents — but they don’t need a lot of parental help. Added bonus: all of these ten ideas double as something functional (gifts, decor, educational).
- Creating with Kids: Singing Together — Ana at Pandamoly details the important role music takes in her household and provides a quick (and easy!) tutorial for creating fun songs to sing together!
- Create This — jessica at instead of institutions considers different aspects of creativity including those without an end product.
- Make Your Own Pocket Bib — A tutorial from Amy at Anktangle on how to make two simple and quick bibs to keep your little one clean at the table.
- Creating Together in the Kitchen — Despite not feeling “crafty,” Momma Jorje finds a way to create and connect with her toddler.
- An Artist-Mama’s Perspective — In this post, Shannon at The Artful Mama discusses the differences between her choice of artistic outlet and her son’s, and how they embrace those differences together.
- Heart of the Home — Jona at Life, Intertwined shares some highlights of cooking with kids.
- Getting creative with kids — Isil at Smiling like Sunshine shares how much she enjoys watching her daughter getting creative.
- Creating with Children – The Nature/Seasonal Table — Jennifer at Hybrid Rasta Mama celebrates the rhythm of the natural world with her toddler through the creation of a seasonal nature table.
- How Involving My Kid Saves My Sanity — The Happy Hippie Homemaker explains how involving her toddler in projects allows her to get more done, while providing valuable opportunities to teach and to bond (added bonus: amazing oatmeal raisin cookie recipe!).
- In the Kitchen with Kids — Cooking with Real and Pretend Food — Terri from Child of the Nature Isle engages her kids in the kitchen with culinary creations of both real and pretend food.
- Here’s a post on dying eggs with natural dyes; this one is on dying rice; dying macaroni with natural dyes would use the same concepts, but here’s an article specifically on dying macaroni with food coloring. ↩
- Here is a piece on non-reader recipes – obviously the recipes are for real food, but it can give you some ideas for playdough recipes. ↩
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"10 Easy and Functional Crafts Preschoolers Can Do with Minimal Assistance"
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- Giveaway: 12×16 Custom Portrait from Destany Fenton Fine Art – $220 ARV CLOSED
- Giveaway: Story Starters Game from Mama May I – $25 ARV CLOSED
- Giveaway: $35 Gift Certificate to Earthslings – $35 ARV CLOSED
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- Giveaway: 3 Pairs of Earrings from Job Description Mommy – $45 ARV CLOSED
- Revisionary Parenting
- Giveaway: Qwirkle Game from SeriousShops.com – $25 ARV CLOSED | <urn:uuid:d2b8945b-85ac-4164-8721-3746ae61f8bc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://codenamemama.com/2011/08/09/aug-carnatpar/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.916207 | 3,335 | 2.578125 | 3 |
Britney Spears Reveals What She Would Do If She Wasn’t Famous
In an interview with PopJustice, Britney Spears was asked about what she would be doing if she wasn’t a pop superstar. Spears talks extensively in the interview about how she had envisioned from an early age, even before releasing her first single, living a happy family life and being a good mother for her children. She admits she has managed to accomplish that, but what else would she be doing with her life?
Britney says she would be would most likely be teaching had her career not taken off. Her mother was a teacher, and that inspired Britney to want to do the same with her life. What would Ms. Spears be teaching? “I’d specialize in reading and history…with an emphasis in 1920′s history.”
Britney was also asked whether or not she would be ok with her children going into her current line of work. She says she would be hesitant, but allow it, stating “I’d definitely keep an eye on them, but if that’s what they wanted to do then I’d let them go after it. I’d just be very protective“ | <urn:uuid:ce639f9e-2e9a-4a93-aa6c-d7935a39ac6f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mix108.com/britney-spears-reveals-what-she-would-do-if-she-wasnt-famous/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00031-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.990429 | 255 | 1.65625 | 2 |
A recent study among teenagers reveals that in Finland one in four children experiences some harm or emotional disturbance caused by their parent’s use of alcohol during their childhood. The A-Clinic’s “Fragile Childhood” campaign team asked Havas Worldwide Helsinki how it should use its small budget to promote discussion of this difficult subject.
Based on the premise that alcohol changes the way we behave – especially in the eyes of emotionally immature children – Havas Worldwide Helsinki created “Monsters”: a campaign film designed to provoke media debate. It encouraged viewers to visit the organization’s Facebook pages and share their thoughts – even anonymously – on parental alcohol use.
Published on YouTube both in Finnish and English, the film exploded, and the powerful execution resonated with viewers on every continent. The film went viral, and within five days, picked up a million YouTube hits. Both the film and issue-at-large were discussed on CNN, Huffington Post, CBS, RTL, MSN, Fokus, Der Speigel, and many other major media outlets worldwide. Locally, the campaign achieved blanket coverage in TV, print, and online media far beyond our client’s expectations. To date, total views on YouTube have exceeded 1.75 million. | <urn:uuid:0e7a9147-02c4-405a-8b1f-64e888ed2041> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.havasworldwide.com/our-work/fragile-childhood | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00052-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933563 | 261 | 2.03125 | 2 |
Interesting spotting on radarMarch 8th, 2013 at 8:18 am by Nicholas Ferreri under Weather
Here’s an interesting radar spotting that comes from the National Weather Service – Chicago Office.
The National Weather Service says the long, narrow returns that show up in the animation are from chaff being dispersed by aircraft. According the the National Weather Service in Louisville, where similar images have been spotted, chaff commonly is in the form of very small pieces of metal, like aluminum.
Chaff is said to typically be used by the military as a way of counteracting radar during military measures and to throw off an enemy. Basically, with the metal pieces being released, the radar beam encounters them in the atmosphere and the beam is then reflected back toward the radar site – just as it would be when encountering actual raindrops.
The NWS in Chicago did not list a reason as to why chaff was being used by the military when it showed up on radar Thursday evening. | <urn:uuid:04ce4835-cd2c-471e-bdb7-d50c04b0e8e7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.wane.com/2013/03/08/16707/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963891 | 201 | 2.375 | 2 |
The Advanced Light Source (ALS) has launched a new “ALS Postdoctoral Fellowship” program that provides challenging opportunities to conduct research in areas supportive of the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (LBNL) and ALS missions. Fellows become integral members of ALS research teams, where they are exposed to current scientific challenges that can be tackled with the use of advanced synchrotron radiation tools. They share and exchange innovative scientific ideas and techniques, and enhance their professional development. To view projects and details about previous fellowhsip recipients, see ALS Postdoctoral Fellowship Highlights.
Fellows also have access to a valuable combination of outstanding professional staff, scientific equipment and facilities available at the ALS as well as potential access to other LBNL user facilities including the Molecular Foundry, the National Center of Electron Microscopy and the NERSC computing facility.
Research Areas at the ALS include Physical Sciences, Energy Sciences, Biosciences, Chemistry, Environmental Sciences, and General Sciences. The ALS is recognized as one of the world leading facilities in the following specialized areas of science:
- Coherent Imaging and Scattering
- Ultrafast and Ultrasmall Science
- Mantetism and Magnetization Dynamics
- In-situ studies of systems with Photon-In/Photon-Out and Photon-In/Electron-Out Techniques
The Advanced Light Source (ALS)
The Advanced Light Source (ALS), a division of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, is a national user facility that generates intense x-ray radiation for scientific and technological research. As the world's first third-generation synchrotron radiation source, the ALS offers outstanding performance in the VUV-soft x-ray energy range and excellent performance from the infrared to the hard x-ray regions. The facility welcomes researchers from universities, industries, and government laboratories around the world. It is funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Basic Energy Sciences.
The purpose of the ALS Postdoctoral Fellowship program is to identify outstanding individuals in new and emerging scientific and engineering research fields. This program will provide advanced training for Postdoctoral Fellows in a scientific or engineering career in Synchrotron Radiation Science. As an added mission it will also provide opportunity to identify outstanding scientists in historically underrepresented groups.
The ALS is divided into various functional groups (see Organization). Five of these groups will formally participate in this program - the Scientific Support, the Experimental Systems, Accelerator Physics, Electrical and Mechanical Engineering groups with the first three listed above being the primary participants.
Applicants must be legally eligible to work in the United States, regardless of citizenship and have received a doctoral research degree from an accredited academic institution in an appropriate scientific or engineering discipline within three years of the appointment start date. Awards are initially for one year with the possibility of renewal for a second and/or third year, contingent on satisfactory annual performance reviews and funding availability. Renewals will be evaluated at the end of each year.
Salary and Stipend
A monthly salary will be paid at a rate competitive with current ALS/LBNL postdoctoral fellows. Additional funding support will be available for research-related materials, supplies and services, professional development, and research-related travel. Postdoctoral fellows are also eligible for mid-level career benefits.
Applicants must submit a completed ALS Postdoctoral Fellowship packet that includes: an application form, C.V., publication list, statement of research (up to 3 pages) to be performed (preferably written in consultation with an ALS Scientific mentor), and three references. Applicants must also obtain the commitment of an ALS scientific mentor who will work with them throughout the duration of the proposed fellowship. For further guidance, the applicant may directly contact the leaders of the aforementioned ALS functional groups.
Interested applicants should submit the following documents online via Berkeley Lab's Current Job Openings Web site (requisition 72882)after reviewing the job description and application requirements.
Selection Procedure and Criteria
All Fellowship packets will be received, processed, and reviewed by the ALS Postdoctoral Fellowship committee. Applications are reviewed on a quarterly basis.
Applicants will be reviewed with regard to their qualifications and the merits of their proposed research. Additionally, applicants will be rated on their diversity of experience, educational background, and the relevance of these qualifications to ALS research needs. Research statements will be evaluated on a demonstrating an understanding of the problem, the soundness and originality of the proposal, and its relevance to the ALS.
All candidates will be considered on an individual basis. Award recipients will be notified within 30 days of the application review and must provide written confirmation of their acceptance within 30 days after notification. The number of Fellowship awards granted each year is dependent upon the availability of funding and the quality of applications.
All contingencies of an appointment offer must be met before the Fellowship term begins. If an award is offered to a doctoral degree candidate, the candidate must present acceptable evidence that all formal academic doctoral degree requirements have been met.
Fellowships involve a full-time commitment to the research program, and the fellow must be in residence at ALS/LBNL during the entire period of the fellowship. Fellowship research must be conducted in accordance with a plan that meets the overall research needs of the ALS.
Fellows are required to sign and abide by the appointment letter, the terms of appointment, and other required ALS/LBNL documents. They are also required to submit a final report of research accomplishments to the ALS, acknowledge the support of ALS/DOE/BE
S in publications and presentations related to research conducted during the fellowship, and provide a copy of these publications to the ALS/LBNL. | <urn:uuid:983778d1-6de5-49bd-82ce-4f66ca1fd87a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www-als.lbl.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=401-als-postdoctoral-fellowship-program | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933333 | 1,161 | 2.125 | 2 |
Slough red light cameras to be installed
Cameras are to be installed at junctions across Slough to catch drivers jumping red lights.
The council said an "alarming" number of people were risking crashes by ignoring signals to stop.
A recent survey carried out over a seven-day period revealed that 761 drivers jumped red lights.
The authority has also launched a poster campaign and warned drivers they face fines when cameras are installed later this year.
Keith Beasley, road safety officer for Slough Borough Council, said: "Drivers who abide by the law and obey the red traffic lights have absolutely nothing to worry about.
"The introduction of the cameras is one part of a much wider programme designed to reduce road traffic casualties within the borough." | <urn:uuid:e3970dbb-c5e0-413b-8f74-7860dc5bb0cf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-berkshire-19039031 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968309 | 156 | 1.65625 | 2 |
What do you do when the candidate who won the election was the one whose budget cut your favorite program? In the case of The Planetary Society, the answer is to congratulate him—and ask him to reverse those cuts. In a statement Thursday, the organization congratulated President Obama on his reelection Tuesday while asking him to restore funding for NASA’s planetary science program in the forthcoming 2014 budget proposal.
“As our economy continues to rebound, we call on President Obama to invest in our future by making a commitment to increase NASA’s capacity to pursue groundbreaking robotic and human space missions over the next four years,” the society’s statement reads. “The first step along this path would be to restore NASA’s Planetary Science funding to $1.5 billion in the upcoming 2014 budget.” That restored funding, the organization said, could be used to support Mars sample return mission planning, as well as for another flagship-class mission, to Jupiter’s icy moon Europa. Such work, it added, would also “create high-tech, high-skilled jobs across the country.”
The Planetary Society has been an outspoken opponent of the administration’s proposed 20-percent cut in planetary science funding, from $1.5 to $1.2 billion in the 2013 budget proposal, including its “Save Our Science” (SOS) initiative. The House and Senate have partially restored that funding in their versions of appropriations bills that include NASA, but a final spending bill awaits negotiations in the coming weeks on far larger issues on federal spending in an effort to avoid the automatic spending cuts of sequestration that would take effect in January. | <urn:uuid:750349bc-44bc-40ac-92ac-4880d79cddb0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.spacepolitics.com/2012/11/09/planetary-society-congratulates-obama-asks-for-more-planetary-funding/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=planetary-society-congratulates-obama-asks-for-more-planetary-funding | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956091 | 343 | 1.5 | 2 |
After failing to resolve the dispute through the Indus Waters Commission, the federal government has directed the Foreign Office to initiate the process of requesting the
appointment of a neutral expert as stipulated in the Indus Waters Treaty, the Daily Times newspaper quoted an official document as saying.
Under the treaty, the western tributaries of the Indus river were allocated to Pakistan though an article of the pact allows India to use these waters for hydropower generation.
Official sources told the newspaper that the Pakistan government will try to solve the dispute bilaterally during secretary-level talks.
They said Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi had already said Pakistan will discuss the dispute over sharing of river waters with India.
The Pakistan government is not anticipating "any leeway" from India and has thus finalised preparations to request the appointment of a neutral expert to resolve the matter, the sources were quoted as saying.
Both countries previously settled their differences on the Baglihar project through the arbitration of a neutral expert.
Islamabad: Pakistan has decided to approach the World Bank to request the appointment of a neutral expert to resolve a dispute with India over the Kishanganga hydroelectric project if bilateral efforts fail to settle the matter, according to a media report.
First Published: Monday, September 28, 2009, 14:39 | <urn:uuid:7b7da88f-96d0-4d9a-a25c-9a32d57a0160> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://zeenews.india.com/news/south-asia/pak-to-approach-wb-over-water-dispute-with-india_566807.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00020-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960753 | 269 | 2.078125 | 2 |
March 26, 2002
The number of days idle because of strikes and lockouts was at a historic low in 2001.
There were 1.2 million workdays of idleness in 2001 due to major work stoppages. Major work stoppages are defined as strikes or lockouts that idle 1,000 or more workers and last at least one shift. The previous low for days of idleness due to work stoppages was 2.0 million in 1999.
Fifty-three percent of last year's work stoppage days of idleness (608,300 days) stemmed from four major disputes. The one with the most days was between the State of Minnesota and the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees and the Minnesota Association of Professional Employees (242,500 days); and the second was between the State of Hawaii's Department of Education and the National Education Association (161,200 days). The third was between Comair and the Airline Pilots Association (116,600 days), and the fourth involved the Midwest Generation Company and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (88,000 days).
Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, The Editor's Desk, Historic low for days of idleness due to work stoppages on the Internet at http://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2002/mar/wk4/art02.htm (visited May 21, 2013).
This edition of Spotlight on Statistics examines labor productivity trends from 2000 through 2010 for selected industries and sectors within the nonfarm business sector of the U.S. economy. Read more » | <urn:uuid:fccc6e0b-7374-48da-80ab-cefc955a3553> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/print.pl/opub/ted/2002/mar/wk4/art02.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00041-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950823 | 328 | 2.65625 | 3 |
Henderson Hall encompasses 22.3 acres of land located in Arlington, Virginia. The facility provides barracks and support for Marines assigned to Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps as well as certain schools and agencies within the Washington, DC Metropolitan Area.
With the expansion of the Marine Corps in World War II, and the move of Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps to the Navy Annex Building on November 10, 1941, the organization of a Headquarters and Service Company was effected on March 1, 1942 to support the personnel of Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps. Subsequent revisions and unit redesignations occurred with the designation of Headquarters Battalion on April 1, 1943. A second Headquarters Battalion of Women Marine Reserves was organized in September 1943 to provide barracks for a portion of the 2,658 women assigned. During August 1946 a substancial number of Women Marines were released from active duty making Henderson Hall barracks available for the billeting of Male Marines.
Henderson Hall is located on South Southgate Road in Arlington, Virginia on the southern border of Arlington National Cemetery, north of the Navy Annex, west of the Pentagon and right next door to Fort Myer. The lands associated with Henderson Hall were acquired through deeds and other actions between 1943 and 1952. The Governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia executed a Deed of Cession of Political Jurisdiction to the United States of America on February 15, 1954.
There is no family housing located on board Henderson Hall. Marines stationed at Henderson Hall are authorized to apply for family housing at Family Housing Department, Anacostia Naval Station. Family Housing is available on board several military installations and in Government leased quarters located in the surrounding communities. Many new arrivals, particularly married Marines who live on the economy, are not accustomed to the high cost of living in the Metropolitan Washington Area. The situation is even more critical to married E1-E4 servicemembers. All Marines should develop a family budget prior to departing their old duty stations.
In its 2005 BRAC Recommendations, DoD would realign Henderson Hall, VA, by relocating the installation management functions to Fort Myer, VA, establishing Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall, VA.
All installations employed military, civilian, and contractor personnel to perform common functions in support of installation facilities and personnel. All installations executed these functions using similar or near similar processes. Because these installations shared a common boundary with minimal distance between the major facilities or are in near proximity, there was significant opportunity to reduce duplication of efforts with resulting reduction of overall manpower and facilities requirements capable of generating savings, which would be realized by paring unnecessary management personnel and achieving greater efficiencies through economies of scale. Intangible savings would be expected to result from opportunities to consolidate and optimize existing and future service contract requirements. Additional opportunities for savings would also be expected to result from establishment of a single space management authority capable of generating greater overall utilization of facilities and infrastructure. Further savings would be expected to result from opportunities to reduce and correctly size both owned and contracted commercial fleets of base support vehicles and equipment consistent with the size of the combined facilities and supported populations. Regional efficiencies achieved as a result of Service regionalization of installation management would provide additional opportunities for overall savings as the designated installations are consolidated under regional management structures. The quantitative military value score validated by military judgment was the primary basis for determining which installation was designated as the receiving location.
|Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list| | <urn:uuid:92d5e540-e5df-417c-b142-8cb470917702> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/henderson-hall.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00075-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96079 | 701 | 1.890625 | 2 |
Correction: The headline on Friday's PFS story on A1 was inaccurate. The utilities have not decided yet whether they will try to revive the nuclear-storage plan.
In a move that may mean the death of a plan to store thousands of tons of nuclear waste about an hour's drive from Salt Lake City, the U.S. Interior Department on Thursday rejected the lease to build the facility.
"We just wanted to put a spike right through the heart of this project and this does it," Sen. Orrin Hatch said Thursday after being notified of the department's action.
In a pair of decisions, spanning 47 pages, two agencies in the department rejected a lease Private Fuel Storage signed with the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes to store 44,000 tons of spent nuclear rods on 100 acres of reservation land. PFS is a group of companies that operate nuclear reactors where waste has been piling up for a half-century.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) found it could not approve a rail line to the reservation because it would have to cross a newly created wilderness area.
A plan to transfer the waste onto tractor-trailers and truck the waste to the reservation was also rejected because it would significantly increase traffic along the two-lane road and because workers transferring the casks would be exposed to radiation.
Those considerations and others - including unanswered questions about the vulnerability of the site to a terrorist attack - prompted the Bureau of Indian Affairs to reject the tribe's plan. The BIA cited inadequate police protection on the reservation, with Tooele County sheriff deputies lacking jurisdiction on the reservation and the nearest BIA officers stationed 4 1/2 hours away.
Furthermore, with a planned permanent repository at Yucca Mountain, Nev., still up in the air, it is unclear when the waste would leave the reservation, and the department lacks the technical knowledge to monitor the waste.
The rulings make it clear that the ultimate decision belonged to Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne, the former Idaho governor confirmed in May to his Cabinet post. The decisions describe him as a "trustee-delegate" charged with "the complex task of weighing the long-term viability of the Skull Valley Goshute reservation as a homeland for the Band (and the implications for preservation of tribal culture and life) against the benefits and risks from economic development activities. . . . "
After conducting this balancing test, "we conclude that it is not consistent with the conduct expected of a prudent trustee to approve a proposed lease that promotes storing [spent nuclear fuel] on the reservation," wrote Associate Deputy Interior Secretary James Cason.
But nowhere in the 47 pages is there any indication the Skull Valley Band was involved in the decision making. And, in fact, tribal Chairman Leon Bear apparently did not learn about Kempthorne's decision until after Hatch issued a press release, according to PFS spokeswoman Sue Martin.
Martin indicated it is premature to declare the project dead.
"We do need to see the record of decision and look at it in some detail before we get a good feel for what our options are. I believe Senator Hatch would lead you to believe we have no options and I'm not sure that's true," Martin said. "We'll have to see. Stay tuned."
Mary Allen, one of three Goshute leaders who began negotiating the deal 10 years ago, said the tribe would fight the ruling because members want the financial benefit of the project. The exact sum the 125 members could expect from the deal has never been disclosed, although it is rumored to be in the tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars.
Allen called Thursday's ruling "just another roadblock."
"The lease was recognized" by the Interior Department, Allen said. "The BIA is scared because of the politics and Senator Hatch."
Hatch, though, wasn't the only politician fighting the project.
Sen. Bob Bennett noted that all five Utah congressional members have lobbied the Interior Department to kill the plan. Their pleas in recent months have been directed at Kempthorne.
"I raised this issue with Secretary Kempthorne prior to his confirmation last spring and stressed the importance of it to our state. I am delighted with his prompt response," Bennett said in a statement Thursday. "This ends any possibility that the Goshute facility will ever be used for the storage of high-level nuclear waste."
Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. declared Thursday's action "the best news I think our state has seen in recent years . . . And it's one that people have fought very hard for and we're there. We can finally put a period at the end of the sentence."
Despite what PFS says, Huntsman added, "This makes it a done deal. It's over."
PFS received its Nuclear Regulatory Commission license last year, nine years after applying for it. The license was conditioned on the BLM's approval of a plan to transport the waste to the site and BIA's final OK of the Goshutes' lease with PFS.
The Interior Department decision could be challenged in court.
"We need to sort through the ashes and put out a few embers maybe, but other than that it's stone cold dead," Hatch said. "It couldn't happen to nicer people."
Since the NRC voted to approve the PFS license a year ago, Utah's congressional delegation pushed through legislation creating the Cedar Mountain Wilderness Area adjacent to the Skull Valley reservation, blocking rail access to the site. All but two of the project's original 11 backers have said they will not help fund construction of the project.
And efforts are underway in Congress to create at least one and possibly several government-run interim storage facilities, potentially making private storage unnecessary.
In May, Hatch and Bennett wrote to the BLM, arguing the wilderness designation made it impossible for PFS to build the rail line to the reservation, and that an alternate plan - to build a station to move the nuclear material from trains to trucks and drive it to the reservation - was full of holes.
There was no security plan for the proposed transfer facility, it would violate the land management plan for the area, would hurt Air Force training on the nearby Utah Test and Training Range and would be a terrorist target, the senators argued.
The BLM received more than 4,500 letters, mostly from Utahns opposed to the nuclear waste site.
"These are the largest nails in the coffin, but we know the nuclear industry is desperate to transfer the risks and liabilities away from their own users and to other states," said Vanessa Pierce, director of the Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah. "It just goes to show that when citizens speak up loud and clear, they have more power than they imagine."
Margene Bullcreek said she was ecstatic about the ruling because the waste project has torn the tribe apart.
"It's been a long, long trial and at this point it's a big, big triumph," Bullcreek said. "We still need to deal with economic development, but I'm glad we will not have this poisonous waste."
Rep. Chris Cannon said he expected the Interior Department to reject the PFS plan.
"PFS has never made sense," Cannon said. "We should be very pleased that Interior has done what we asked them to do."
Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, said the decision was a huge win for Utah and especially for the military and its test and training range, which is three miles from the proposed nuclear waste storage site.
"They were looking for good reasons and I think we gave them good reasons and I applaud the Interior for their decision," Bishop said.
"I wish it would have been resolved sooner," said Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah. "I don't know anyone in America who wants nuclear waste thrown in their backyard."
Tribune reporter Thomas Burr contributed to this report.
* The U.S. Interior Department denied a lease and a transportation plan that were crucial to proposed nuclear waste storage in Utah's Skull Valley, about 45 miles southwest of Salt Lake City.
* Critics pronounced the project dead. But the decision could still be appealed in court.
* The Skull Valley Goshutes and their commercial partner in the project have yet to say if, or how, they will fight the rulings. | <urn:uuid:86055e7c-ab2b-4674-a26a-c2e4a84d59de> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://archive.sltrib.com/printfriendly.php?id=4304740&itype=ngpsid | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973953 | 1,702 | 1.828125 | 2 |
- Bill Peckmann has plugged me into some artwork and illustration by the very talented artist, Keith Ward. I’ve already featured a number of his pieces on several different posts. Last week, I featured a sampler of his illustration work. Here, I’d like to continue that.
Today we feature three separate books by Mr. Ward. These were sent to me by Bill, and from here on, I’ll let Bill do the tellng:
- It’s with many thanks again to collector/fan Denis Wheary, that we are able to sample more of illustrator Keith Ward’s early children’s book art. This time around we get to see how Mr.Ward handled ‘black and white’ and three color illustration back then.
- Because of his very beautiful color art for books and magazines (his covers for ‘Child Life’ magazine are outstanding!) in the 1930′s, these first excerpts might not even look like the hand of KW. They are taken from a non fiction, ‘National Geographic’ type book titled ‘Termite City’, published in 1937. The ‘serious’ subject matter drawings are very successfully designed and executed in scratchboard.
Published in 1943, here are some pages from KW’s three color book
and they show how to handle a ‘gimmick’ die-cut problem very successfully.
The last few pages of tiger art are beautiful.
Thanks to Denis, I’ve become reacquainted with a book,
which it turns out, might be my first remembered book from childhood.
It was the ‘glow in the dark eyes’ that hooked me then, but now I’m
very grateful to rectify that by being able to understand the terrific art. | <urn:uuid:82b53cfd-f1ca-4363-a6d0-d9f215179dc5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.michaelspornanimation.com/splog/?p=3022 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00042-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970936 | 383 | 1.828125 | 2 |
Robbers decided to dig a 100-foot tunnel to aid them in robbing a bank. In Berlin, Germany, police say that a group of thieves dug a tunnel from an underground garage to the bank's safe deposit room. On Jan. 14, ABC News reported that the thieves were successful in the robbery and they set fire to cover their tracks as they left.
The tunnel "must have taken weeks or even months to complete. It was elaborately constructed and even had ceiling supports" explained a spokesperson for the Berlin police. Perhaps the only reason that police arrived at the bank was because of smoke being reported from the deposit room.
The robbers who dug a 100-foot tunnel to the bank were able to take home quite a few items from the deposit room. At this point, it is unknown exactly what was stolen and police and bank personnel are working hard to identify missing items. It is possible that the stolen items could provide some insight on who might have broken in to the bank.
It is unclear if there are any leads at this point. The robbers seemed professional and they obviously spent some time planning this heist. Police don't know how many robbers were involved and where they could have ended up. By now, the robbers could be in another country.
When robbers dig a 100-foot tunnel to aid them in a job, that is something you just don't hear every day. It sounds like something out of a movie.
© Effie Orfanides 2013 | <urn:uuid:5d67a56f-841e-48d8-b110-f80fff907072> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.examiner.com/article/robbers-dig-100-foot-tunnel-aiding-bank-heist | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00026-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.988682 | 299 | 2.25 | 2 |
Running to catch the sun
We are all heading for the grave in an indifferent universe. How do we cope with such existential concerns?
So you run and you run to catch up
with the sun but it's sinking,
Racing around to come up behind you
The sun is the same in a relative way,
but you're older,
Shorter of breath, and one day closer
‘Time’ by Pink Floyd
The Dark Side of the Moon, 1973
HUMAN vanity often drives us to exalt our unique intellectual abilities – for language, culture, abstract thought, and conscious self reflection. In part, they are what makes human existence so rich. Combined with an unmatched capacity for thinking about the future, they enable us to draw on past experience and think about our long-term goals, meaning we can function more effectively in the present.
Yet these cherished gifts come at a price. Our self-awareness and unparalleled foresight mean that we humans, unlike other animals, realise that we will all shuffle off this mortal coil sooner or later. This poses a potentially devastating challenge to our psychological equanimity – the prospect of annihilation threatens to rob life of ultimate purpose, and render the pursuit of a meaningful life a futile effort.
Facing up to the facts of life
The fear of death is far from being the only existential concern about which we exercise ourselves. Irvin Yalom, an existential psychotherapist and emeritus professor at Stanford University (see p.584), has described three other potent ‘givens of existence’ or facts of life that can lead to existential distress: freedom – whether we are really in control of our choices, and the responsibility that comes with making those decisions; existential isolation – the need to be connected to others, and the fundamentally isolated nature of our subjective experience of the world; and, finally, meaninglessness – the desire to believe that our lives are meaningful, even though the slings and arrows of life’s fortunes often seem random and in violation of the bases that imbue our lives with meaning.
These issues have historically been addressed by existentialist philosophers such as Jean-Paul Sartre and novelists, including Albert Camus, who have tended to rely on introspection and armchair rumination. In recent years, however, the questions posed by these givens of existence have increasingly been subjected to the experimental techniques of modern psychology, and given rise to a new subfield: experimental existential psychology, or XXP as it’s more snappily known.
Full article is attached in PDF format, or you can access the site here. | <urn:uuid:7059f3d8-dfe7-4da7-9a35-484e695e3ddd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.atheistnexus.org/profiles/blogs/running-to-catch-the-sun | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00061-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.931204 | 541 | 2.28125 | 2 |
On the first May Bank Holiday of 2013, a lively group took a walk organised by the Wye Valley Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty organisation. There were two surprises: (1) although it was a Bank Holiday weekend, the weather was glorious, and (2) even after a dismal winter and spring, the bluebells were out in full glory. The Wye Valley walk is long and varied, and the group walked the Piercefield Estate section near Chepstow. The estate was imaginatively landscaped in the 18th century by local grandee Valentine Morris. The Morris family accumulated great wealth from plantations in the Caribbean. Valentine Morris hired esteemed architect Sir John Soane – famous for his work on the Bank of England – to design the family home by the River Wye. The skeleton of the manor house still exists today. The house was surrounded by woods and gardens — landscaped with fanciful follies, including grottos, artificial caves, statues, and sheltered viewpoints. River Wye tours were very popular in the 18th century, and travellers would come to view the estate and walk the grounds. It is still possible to enjoy this same walk, even though a large section of the estate is now occupied by Chepstow Race Course! | <urn:uuid:c14bbcbe-fac9-4ad2-be85-d4681d6c4c91> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ftg.org.uk/wordpress/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00076-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981439 | 256 | 2.3125 | 2 |
Every user is a member of one or more groups. To find out which groups you belong to use the command:
To find out which groups another user belongs to use the command:
Your files and directories are owned by the group (or one of the groups) that you belong to. This is known as their "group ownership".
To list the group ownership of your files:
You can change the group ownership of a file or directory with the command:
chgrp group_name file/directory_name
You must be a member of the group to which you are changing ownership to. | <urn:uuid:a3b176bc-8a76-489e-a4ba-02d5efd3197e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mcsr.olemiss.edu/unixhelp/tasks/change_own.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00031-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954265 | 123 | 2.390625 | 2 |
POMEROY — Recognizing that money is tight and people are working hard to make a positive change to their finances, Farmers Bank has kicked off a program to help consumers better understand their finances and get them on track to a better financial future.
The bank understands the fancy “bank-speak” and pages of small print can get confusing. So they decided to do their part and help people in our communities better understand their finances and assist them with getting on track to a better financial future by launching a financial wellness program called “Banking on U.”
“Banking on U” consists of eight seminars with different topics on personal finances. On Thursday, Feb. 21, they kicked off the program with “Understanding Your Credit Score” at the Pomeroy Library from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. Eddie Lanham, Farmers Bank Credit Analyst and Senior Vice-President, led the discussion with the ins and outs of credit scores and tips, guidelines, and strategies on how to improve it.
“At Farmers Bank, we’re here to help everyone we can. That’s why we’re offering these seminars to the public at no cost. We’re just trying to make banking as simple, easy, and convenient as possible,” said Paul Reed, President and CEO of Farmers Bank.
Each seminar will have light refreshments, giveaways, and great prizes and is offered to the public at no cost. At the end of the year, all attendees who complete a survey will be entered into a drawing to win $1,000 cash.
The next seminar, “Home Improvement”, will be held at the Point Pleasant River Museum on March 21 from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. RSVP at facebook.com/myfarmersbank, call your local branch, or just stop by. You can also go to Farmers Bank’s Facebook page and vote on which seminar you want them to offer next. | <urn:uuid:b6d09e57-b0e7-4cdd-9386-e665b5b79d27> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mydailytribune.com/view/full_story/21883544/article-Farmers-Bank-launches-financial-wellness-program | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00073-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959356 | 420 | 1.5625 | 2 |
• Card on the Tricentennial Anniversary of German Settlers in America, 1983 CD
• Chronology of Germans in America CD
• Emigration to North America
• First German at Jamestown
• German-American Biographies
• German-American History & Heritage
• The German-Americans: An Ethnic Experience
• German Immigrant Painters
• The Germans in America
• Germans in the U.S (Religious Groups).
• Germantown, PA
• Max Kade German-American Center
• Mennonites (Catholic Encyclopedia)
• The 1848ers
• Research Center German Emigrants in the USA
• Seven Million Germans Were Once Foreigners
• Why Germans Left Home
Exhibits - Digital Images
• Auswandererkarte nach Amerika, 1853
• Ellis Island Immigration Museum
• German Farm at Frontier Culture Museum in Staunton, Virginia
• The Germans in America
• "Schöne Neue Welt - Rheinländer erobern Amerika"
• Shaping the Circle German-Americans in Indianapolis: 1840-1918
• Virtual Walking Tour of German-American Sites in Washington, DC
• German-Born Population, 1850-1990
• Historical U.S. Census Browser
• Historical Census Statistics on the Foreign-born Population of the United States: 1850-1990
• The 1990 Census: German-Americans
• German-American Internet Scavenger Hunt
• German Immigrants: Their Contributions to the Upper Midwest
• Teacher's Guide to Celebrate German-American Day, October 6
• German Immigrant Culture in America
• German-American Historic Sites and Museums
• German-American Libraries and Archives
• German-American Studies at the University of Cincinnati
• IUPUI Max Kade German-American Center
Postal Commemorative Society, 1983. German Immigration Tricentennial: First German Settlers Land in America
German immigration began in the 17th century and continued into the late 19th century at a rate exceeding that of any other country. Working with William Penn, Franz Daniel Pastorius established "Germantown" near Philadelphia in 1683. German immigrants in this early period came from the states of Pfalz, Baden, Wuerttemberg, Hesse, and the bishoprics of Cologne, Osnabruck, Muenster, and Mainz.
At the beginning of the 18th century, economic problems in Germany brought a new wave of immigrants. Nearly one million German immigrants entered the United States in the 1850s; this included thousands of refugees from the 1848 revolutions in Europe. In these later phases of German immigration, newcomers joined established settlers. This phenomenon of "chain migration" strengthened the already existing German regions in the United States. Today, approximately 58 million Americans claim German ancestry. They are most numerous in California, followed by Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, and Texas. The most dense German-American populations are in the "German belt" -- Wisconsin, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, and Iowa.
Politics & Government
German-American political participation was more focused on involvement in the labor movement than in government. Germans in America had a strong influence on the labor movement in the United States. Labor union membership enabled German immigrants to improve working conditions and to integrate in American society as a whole. Originally strong in such occupations as baking, carpentry, and brewing, they were also laborers, farmers, musicians, and merchants.
The first and most prominent German figure in American politics was Carl Schurz. He was influential in the election of Abraham Lincoln, served as ambassador to Spain, became a general in the Civil War, later was elected U.S. senator from Missouri, and finally was appointed Secretary of the Interior under President Rutherford Hayes.
Relations between the United States and Germany in the 19th century focused chiefly on immigration and commerce. On the whole, the main interest of the United States was to maintain the continental equilibrium of power -- political relations were of secondary importance. The United States was often represented only indirectly through the diplomacy of Great Britain and France. After 1871, as a unified Germany became a more dominant power in European politics, the relationship encountered some frictions as a result of naval and economic rivalries.
• American Memory Documents on German-American History
• America's Most German-American City
• Ferner thue ich euch zu wissen...
• German Achievements in America
• Presidential Proclamation on German-American Day, Clinton, 1995 CD
• Treaty between the King of Prussia and the U.S.A., 1786 CD
• Treaty of Amity and Commerce, 1799 CD
• Treaty of Commerce and Navigation, 1828 CD
• John Quincy Adams, U.S. President (1825-29)
• Benjamin Franklin, Scientist and Statesman | Deutsch
• Nathanael Greene, General in Revolutionary War
• Thomas Jefferson, U.S. President (1801-09) | Deutsch
• Alexander Hamilton, Statesman
• Rutherford B. Hayes, U.S. President (1877-81)
• Abraham Lincoln, U.S. President (1861-65) | Deutsch
• Carl Schurz, Politician and Journalist | Deutsch
• Baron von Steuben, General in Revolutionary War | Deutsch
• George Washington, U.S. President (1789-97) | Deutsch
Texts are abridged from U.S. State Department IIP publications and other U.S. government materials. What kind of information materials are available?
CD: These documents are available in fulltext format on the About the USA CD-ROM. Teachers: Request a copy for classroom use.
L: Selected documents are available in German as well as other languages, including Arabic, Chinese, French, Spanish, Persian and Turkish.
Any reference obtained from this server to a specific commercial product, process, or service does not constitute or imply an endorsement by the United States Government of the product, process, or service, or its producer or provider. The views and opinions expressed in any referenced document do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government.
U.S. Diplomatic Mission to Germany /Public Affairs/ Information Resource Centers
Updated: June 2008 | <urn:uuid:416fd146-9d4c-463f-bba6-063e2f039de8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://usa.usembassy.de/garelations8300.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.909516 | 1,315 | 3.34375 | 3 |
150 Watkins Avenue
Increase your mastery of emotional intelligence in order to increase your own effectiveness and to support others to develop EQ using Six Seconds’ powerful methodology and model
Learn from the leaders in the field how to raise emotional intelligence in yourself and others. Develop an in-depth understanding of emotional intelligence as you gain new tools to apply immediately to fuel positive change at work, at home, and at school — starting with yourself.
Emotional intelligence is critical to leadership, learning, and organizational performance. Learn from the leaders in the field how to raise your and others’ emotional intelligence. Gain an in-depth understanding of emotional intelligence as you develop new tools you can put to work immediately.
Ideal for people seeking to incorporate emotional intelligence (EQ) into training, leadership, consulting, or teaching, this is the only course of its kind.
Five full days of hands-on, dynamic instruction, activities, practical projects, networking, laughter, and learning. This workshop is highly active, brain-based, and experiential The content is based on 35 years of practical teaching experience and the Self-Science curriculum featured as a model in Daniel Goleman’s Emotional Intelligence. Certified Associates are delivering programs in over 20 countries and all US states; over 3000 professionals have attended this program and found great professional and personal value.
A recent group said the program increased their EQ toolbox by 313%, and when asked if the course would help them improve performance at work, they said it was 10 out of 10 (here are some course evals: 1, 2, 3). Delegates call it “life changing and affirming,” and “a transformational experience for everyone serious about emotional intelligence,” and rate it 9.14/10 on “this course changed my life.” You will improve your communication and teaching skills and your understanding of emotional intelligence — or your money back!
The seminar follows Six Seconds’ Know Yourself, Choose Yourself, Give Yourself model for learning to develop and apply emotional intelligence (the same model as the SEI assessment). Participants experience an EQ learning environment and learn how to use a range of effective tools that can be adapted to a variety of audiences.
It’s difficult to understand the unusual nature of this program just by reading — here are some images to help, from an EQC in Singapore
By attending this program you will…
- Understand the powerful “Know Yourself, Choose Yourself, Give Yourself” model and approach to increasing and applying EQ.
- Take home dozens of proven EQ exercises and learning tools that you can use yourself and with your teams/families/clients.
- Experience Six Seconds’ learning design that will enhance the effectiveness of all your training, coaching & teaching.
- Review the latest research on the brain, emotions, and performance.
- Strengthen your own emotional intelligence.
After completing certification, you are licensed to use the tools, modules, and models from this course for your own development, with your colleagues / team members, with clients / students / small groups. To deliver Six Seconds’ training modules, also attend the EQ Trainer Certification. Royalties apply when Six Seconds’ content is used for profit.
A few comments about this course
“A best-in-class process to bring EQ concepts to life …” – Cynthia Ng, SVP Learning and Development HSBC
“I considered many EQ certification programs – this is the only one that promised a process I could use and adapt rather than just a script to follow. It deliv- ered far more than promised. The course challenges you to grow and creates both commitment and resources.” - Jodie Minor Training Director, Deluxe
“The most meaningful and practical training I have ever attended.” - Jennifer Kennett – Director, Elements Wellness Centre
“This was an excellent course. It helped me in many different ways, at a personal and professional level. This was inspiring. I would recommend it.” – Helen McVeigh, Chief Inspector of Schools (Cayman Islands)
“There are many EQ training pro- grams but Six Seconds and its phenomenal trainers are the real thing. You will be personally and professionally transformed.” - Kathleen Ruby, PhD., Dir Wellness and Leadership Development WSU College of Veterinary Medicine
- EQ Certification: Building Capacity for Transformation with Emotional Intelligence - 22 Jul 2013 - 09:00
- Coaching EQ Certification - 29 Jul 2013 - 09:00
- Advanced EQ Trainer Certification - 14 Oct 2013 - 09:00 | <urn:uuid:57e0ad0b-50d6-4e2e-bf8e-7a480cbdab75> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.6seconds.org/locations/holbrook-palmer-park/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00033-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935271 | 946 | 1.773438 | 2 |
An interesting mix of 19th and 20th century medical books are now available for research in our History of Medicine Collection.
Cannon, Walter B. Traumatic Shock. New York: D. Appleton, 1923. Summarizes Cannon's investigations on shock in World War I.
Fowler, O. S. The Practical Phrenologist and Recorder and Delineator of the Character and Talents of... As Marked by...: A Compendium of Phreno-Organic Science. Boston: O.S. Fowler, 1869.
See also my earlier post on this book.
Holman, Emile. Arteriovenous Aneurysm, Abnormal Communications between the Arterial and Venous Circulations. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1937. Trained by William Stewart Halsted, Holman was Chairman of Surgery at Stanford, establishing its surgery resident program in the "Halstedian" tradition.
Papanicolaou, George N., and Herbert F. Traut. Diagnosis of Uterine Cancer by the Vaginal Smear. New York: Commonwealth Fund, 1943.
Papanicolaou's reports that cancer cells could be recognized in vaginal smears were largely ignored until the publication of this monograph brought wider interest to his discovery.
SIGERIST, H. E., PAUL, E., & PAUL, C. (1933). The great doctors; a biographical history of medicine. New York, W.W. Norton & Co.
A classic of medical biography, our "new" copy 3 is inscribed the author.
All of the books above were received as donations. Since its inception, the library has relied primarily on donations to build its rare book collections. We are honored and humbled that so many individuals have chosen Historical Collections & Archives as a home for treasured books. | <urn:uuid:4aa73fdb-0bb5-40f7-9c1d-1cc15747f240> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ohsu-hca.blogspot.com/2012_07_08_archive.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00047-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.921438 | 392 | 2.265625 | 2 |
Is organic food healthier for you and worth the higher price tag?
Even if organic isn’t healthier, it is still tastier in some people’s eyes
It comes at a premium price, but it seems organic food may not be worth shelling out for.
Many people pay as much as a third more for organic food in the belief that it is healthier and safer. However, Dr Dena Bravata and colleagues from Stanford University Medical Centre, California, found no clear evidence of any significant added health benefits.
They also found that there was no guarantee organic food would be pesticide-free – a key attraction for many consumers – though it did have lower levels.
Senior author Dr Bravata said: ‘There isn’t much difference between organic and conventional foods, if you’re an adult and making a decision based solely on your health.’
The results, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine journal, come from the biggest review yet of existing studies comparing the two types of food. However, UK campaigners said the survey was not equipped to detect real differences.
Researchers sifted through thousands of papers looking into the health benefits of organic food.
The review included studies of people with organic and conventional diets, as well as research into nutrient levels, bacterial, fungal or pesticide contamination.
Researchers found no consistent differences in the vitamin content of various foods. They also found no difference in protein or fat content between organic and conventional milk.
They were also unable to identify specific fruits and vegetables for which organic appeared consistently to be the healthier choice.
Certain organic foods produce higher greenhouse gas emissions than their conventional farmed counterparts
Co-researcher Crystal Smith- Spangler, who is also an instructor of medicine at Stanford’s School of Medicine, said: ‘Some believe that organic food is always healthier and more nutritious. We were a little surprised that we didn’t find that.’
The researchers did find organic produce was 30 per cent less likely to be contaminated with pesticides than conventional fruit and vegetables, but not guaranteed to be pesticide-free, while pesticide levels of all foods came within the allowable safety limits.
Two studies of children found lower levels of pesticide residues in the urine of those on organic diets, though for all those studied the levels were below allowable safety thresholds.
A spokesman for the Soil Association said: ‘This US study, of limited application in Europe, found organic food helps people avoid pesticides in their food.
“However, the scientific methodology used for the review, while suitable for comparing trials of medicines, is not right for comparing different crops.’
Organic farming may not be better for the environment, according to Oxford University scientists.
They found organic milk, cereals, and pork all generated higher greenhouse gas emissions than their conventionally farmed counterparts. Organic beef and olives produced lower emissions. | <urn:uuid:3e64f9f3-34f2-4d32-8546-22213ff4dcd1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ktrmurali.wordpress.com/tag/oxford-university/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962373 | 594 | 2.578125 | 3 |
Guide to Completing Equity in Athletics Disclosure Act (EADA) Form
Each year colleges must provide as required by section 485(g) of the Higher Education Act of 1965, as amended, 20 USC 1092(g)(also known as the Equity in Athletics Disclosure Act) data on a federal web site. Each college president is sent information annually to gain access to the site with the reporting deadline date. Participation numbers, scholarships, program budgets and expenditures, and coaching salaries by gender are reported.
The data reported provides prospective student-athletes information to help them make decisions about their potential or continued enrollment in a postsecondary institution. Prospective and current students, and the public, use the information to assess an institution’s commitment to and progress toward gender equity in its intercollegiate athletic program.
Helpful Web Sites | <urn:uuid:2b0628be-fb9c-489a-ad6c-0157dee40b4c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sbctc.ctc.edu/College/_s-eadaform.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941142 | 170 | 1.828125 | 2 |
When you hear the word "steroid" you may immediately think of muscle-bound body builders and the health risks they incur from abusing anabolic steroids — drugs that were originally intended for people with growth disorders, low levels of testosterone, and other health conditions.
If your child has been prescribed steroids for cancer, rest assured that he or she will not be taking anabolic steroids, but rather corticosteroids. Corticosteroids are made from a naturally occurring steroid in the body called cortisol.
How Cortisol Can Help
Cortisol is a hormone (like testosterone or estrogen) that can have therapeutic effects on the body. Synthetic versions of the hormone — including cortisone, hydrocortisone, prednisone, and methylprednisolone and dexamethasone — are prescribed to help:
As with many medications, side affects can be associated with steroids. Before your child begins taking steroids, ask your doctor what to expect. This way, you can plan ahead for any unsettling symptoms or adverse reactions, should they occur.
Temporary side effects may include:
weight gain — often in unusual places, like the cheeks or the back of the neck
stomach upset or ulcers
osteoporosis (a degenerative bone disease)
high blood pressure
increased blood sugar and, in some cases, developing type 2 diabetes temporarily (and kids who already have diabetes need to monitor their blood sugar levels more closely)
for girls, irregular menstruation (missed or late periods)
Less common side effects include bruising more easily, difficulty fighting infections, acne flare-ups, and increased facial hair.
A child who develops several of these symptoms may have a condition called Cushing syndrome. Though not serious, Cushing syndrome can be distressing, especially for girls.
Symptoms may subside with changes to the way your child takes the medications; talk to your doctor about this.
Chances are, you and your child will probably find that any side effects are overshadowed by the benefits of the treatment, but check with your doctor about ways to make them easier to live with. And remember, most side effects are only temporary. Once treatment stops, side effects will, too.
Whether your child is on steroids for a week or months, it's important to always follow the recommended guidelines, and check first with a doctor before making any changes to treatment (for example, ask a doctor before taking the medicine at night if your child has been regularly taking it in the morning). Also, encourage your child to let you know about any adverse reactions during or after a steroid treatment.
More tips for safely taking steroids:
Don't let your child quit "cold turkey." Always work with your doctor to end steroid medication — this is important because during treatment, the body manufactures less cortisol. Tapering off the medication gives the body a chance to get its own production back up to normal and avoid a potentially serious withdrawal.
Carry the card. If your child will be taking pills at home, the doctor may provide a steroid card or a medical alert bracelet. Your child should have this card handy at all times (in a wallet, for example) so that in case of an emergency, the doctors or hospital will know your child is in treatment and needs the regular dose. (This is only for longer-term treatments; a child on a short course may not be given a card.)
Never double-up after a missed dose. Try to set aside a specific time every day for your child to take the medication. If your son or daughter forgets a dose, call the doctor or nurse and ask what to do.
No flush, no foul. If tablets are left over after treatment, give them to your doctor or a pharmacist. Don't flush them down the toilet or throw them away because they could contaminate your local water supply.
If you have any questions during your child's steroid treatment, speak with your doctor. | <urn:uuid:600e347d-fcca-4db9-87ef-0a9b43f6da02> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kidshealth.org/PageManager.jsp?dn=Willis_KnightonHealth_System&lic=304&cat_id=20661&article_set=67337&tracking=P_RelatedArticle | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936901 | 810 | 2.9375 | 3 |
Transportation of Federal Sick and Wounded
The first removal of helpless wounded from the battle-field was usually effected by hand-litters, of which the number issued during the war exceeded fifty thousand. There were a number of patterns used, of which the best weighed twenty-four pounds, was quickly collapsible when not required, and possessed legs, which made its temporary use as a cot readily possible. Many wounded were also removed by their comrades on extemporized litters made by passing poles or muskets through the sleeves of coats which were then buttoned over them; or these supports were rolled in the edges of blankets, and litters thus formed. Hurdles, gates, window shutters, and ladders, with brush and hay thrown over them, were also used. Poles interlaced with rope or wire were employed. Hammock litters were made by swinging the wounded man in a blanket with its ends lashed to a single pole. The Indian travels, a frame on two long poles dragged after a horse, their front ends being supported by the saddle and tied together with a breast-strap, was also used. The ordinary "chair seat," as made by children at play, was frequently employed to remove wounded over shorter distances. Mule-litters and cacolets, the latter chairlike affairs swung on each side of the mule's back, were suggested and some were provided, but seem to have been little used. They were specially intended for rough country where wheeled vehicles could not readily go. Wounded able to walk were expected to make their own way back to the surgeon, with or without assistance.
But the transportation results achieved in these ways were usually possible only over short distances. The organization of the medical service made no provision for removal of the wounded from the regimental collecting-points to hospital facilities further to the rear. There were no sanitary organizations in reserve, available to assist near the firing-line where their service might be needed, or to bridge with their succor, care, and transportation, the often tremendous gap between the relief stations of the regimental surgeons and the general hospitals, usually far in rear. Frequently surgeons with some regiments in action were overwhelmed by the number of casualties in their organizations, while others might be idly waiting with commands held in reserve. The need for organizations to play the part of intermediaries was obvious, but for some occult reason failed to appeal at first to those who had the direction of general military affairs in charge. The lack of such specially equipped and trained organizations resulted in a vast amount of suffering during the first eighteen months of the war, and gave rise to much criticism of the Medical Department which the latter in nowise deserved.
A carefully matured plan for the organization of a hospital corps, to belong to the Medical Department and take over work which was at that time being inefficiently done by some sixteen thousand enlisted men detailed from the line of the army, was submitted to the Secretary of War on August 21, 1862, but failed of adoption as a result of the opposition of General Halleck, general-in-chief. An appeal was then made as follows:
HON. EDWIN M. STANTON,
Secretary of War.
SIR : I have the honor to ask your attention to the frightful state of disorder existing in the arrangement for removing the wounded from the field of battle. The scarcity of ambulances, the want of organization, the drunkenness and incompetency of the drivers, the total absence of ambulance attendants are now working their legitimate results-results which I feel I have no right to keep from the knowledge of the department. The whole system should be under the charge of the Medical Department. An ambulance corps should be organized and set in instant operation. . . . Up to this date six hundred wounded still remain on the battlefield, in consequence of an insufficiency of ambulances and the want of a proper system for regulating their removal in the Army of Virginia. Many have died of starvation ; many more will die in consequence of exhaustion, and all have endured torments which might have been avoided. I ask, sir, that you will give me your aid in this matter ; that you will interpose to prevent a recurrence of such consequences as have followed the recent battle-consequences which will inevitably ensue on the next important engagement if nothing is done to obviate them.
I am, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
WILLIAM A. HAMMOND,
This letter was returned with an endorsement from General Halleck, reiterating his continued disapproval of the whole plan of medical organization, in the face of which opposition in high places, no further steps at army headquarters could, for the time, be taken.
But in the mean time, medical officers of independent commands had been endeavoring to improve conditions within the immediate jurisdiction of their commanders, and in the Army of the Potomac, Medical Director Letterman had convinced General McClellan, perhaps the ablest organizer in the Northern forces, of the need for some special provision for the first aid and transportation of wounded. On August 2, 1862, General McClellan issued an order embodying Medical Director Letterman's plan, which was not only the first of its kind but so complete and practical as to have since served as the basis for the organization of the medical service in the field in all the armies of the world. The order need not be here further discussed than to mention that it organized an ambulance corps with animals, transportation, personnel, and supplies complete, to be used for succoring and transporting sick and wounded men, " and for nothing else."
The advantages of this organization became speedily manifest, and at the battle of Antietam, in the following month, it gave admirable service. Of its operation in the battle of Fredericksburg, Surgeon Charles O'Leary, medical director of the Sixth Corps, said in his official report:
" During the engagements of the 13th, the ambulances being guided and governed with perfect control and with a precision rare even in military organizations, the wounded were brought without any delay or confusion to the hospitals of their respective divisions. Not a single item provided for the organization of the field-hospitals suffered the slightest derangement, and the celerity with which the wounded were treated, and the system pervading the whole Medical Department, from the stations in the field selected by the assistant surgeons with the regiments to the wards where the wounded were transferred from the hands of the surgeons to be attended by the nurses, afforded the most pleasing contrast to what we had hitherto seen during the war. . . ."
In the operations at the time of the battle of Chancellorsville in the following May, the Sixth Corps charged and took Marye's Heights behind the town of Fredericksburg. The medical director of the corps, in his report, says : " The charge was made at I P. M.. ; the heights were taken, and in less than half an hour we had over eight hundred wounded. Two hours after the engagement, such was the celerity and system with which the ambulances worked, the whole number of wounded were within the hospitals under the care of nurses."
In the battle of Gettysburg the ambulance organization was intact, and such was the perfection of its administration, that, on the early morning of the 4th of July, the day after the battle ended, not one wounded man of the great number who had fallen was left on the ground. The inspector-general of the army himself reported this interesting fact from personal examination.
The success of the plan under McClellan induced Grant to adopt it in the Army of the Tennessee, in an order dated March 30, 1863. Finally, Congress tardily passed an act, approved by the President on March 11, 1864, establishing a uniform system of ambulance service throughout the military forces. After it was once established, the value of this ambulance organization in the saving of life, suffering, and tears cannot be overestimated.
The ambulances were of a number of types, two- and four-wheeled. The former were soon found intolerable from their incessant rocking motion. The four-wheeled type was issued in various forms, successive models designed to avoid the demonstrated defects of their predecessors being issued. The Rucker ambulance was the final development toward the end of the war and gave much satisfaction. In a general way, it was the prototype of the improved ambulance now used in our army. One great fault of all these four-wheeled ambulances was their excessive weight in relation to their transportation capacity. After every great battle, any available supply wagons were used to supplement the ambulances. These were springless, but, with their floors well bedded with brush and hay, were made very comfortable for the wounded placed in them, while their canvas tilts served admirably to screen against rain and sun.
The medical-transport service in battle, as finally perfected, worked about as follows: The medical officers of regiments accompanied their organizations into action and established stations as near the firing-line as possible and usually at a sheltered point, with ready access from both front and rear. Hither the wounded resorted or were conveyed as the situation permitted, had their wounds dressed, and were set aside or started for the field hospital, if able to walk.
As soon as possible the ambulance corps came up and took over the helpless wounded, freeing the regimental surgeons and enabling them to accompany their organizations to the front or rear. If the ambulance train could not reach the places where the wounded were lying, it was halted at the nearest practicable point, and the ambulance corps went forward and removed the wounded to the ambulances by means of litters.
The ambulance train then removed the wounded to the field-hospitals, the service of which is later discussed and of which there was one to each division, where more elaborate professional treatment was received. These field-hospitals were usually located just beyond the range of artillery fire. Sometimes several of them were established close together, and if tactical conditions permitted, they would be brought up and established on an occupied battlefield, thereby saving the time and suffering incident to removal of the wounded therefrom.
After reaching the field-hospitals and receiving the necessary attention to fit them for further transportation, the wounded were removed as soon as possible to the great base and general hospitals, which at one time aggregated two hundred and five in number.
In continuance of the work of the ambulance service, the railroads and steamships were brought into use. Sometimes conditions permitted trains to be run close to the scene of action and to receive wounded almost on the battlefield itself. This was the first war of great magnitude in which railroads were so employed.
The hospital trains were under the control of the Medical Department. The surgeon in charge was the sole head. Some were made up of passenger-cars which were regularly equipped or constructed by the railroad companies for the better care of wounded; some were hastily improvised at the front from ordinary freight-cars, merely emptied of the supplies which they had brought up and in which the wounded were merely laid on beds of boughs, hay, or straw. Between the two extremes there were all varieties of arrangements. Some cars
were fitted with bunks; others with stanchions and supports, upon which litters were laid or suspended, jarring being taken by springs or rubber. These trains often included special cars arranged and used as kitchens, storerooms, dispensaries, and surgeries. From the completeness of their resources, the better type of them was practically a hospital on wheels.
Frequently the sick and wounded were easiest and best removed by water, particularly in the vicinity of the Atlantic coast and in sections of the Mississippi watershed. But all transport vessels were under control of the Quartermaster's Department, which ordinarily gave the greatest preference and importance to its own duties, until higher authority, roused by the justice of the appeals, ordered a number of steamers placed under the exclusive control of the medical officers. These varied in type from ordinary freight-boats and transports returning empty, to the finest type of speedy, capacious steamers, completely remodeled into floating hospitals. Some of these hospital boats were planned for the care of four hundred or more patients. One old hulk was fitted up after the battle of Shiloh, with accommodations for a thousand men, and used as a receiving and forwarding hospital for the fleet of river hospital steamers. The latter were kept continually on the move, and a single such steamer is recorded to have removed 12,299 sick and wounded in the space of seventeen months. This steamer hospital service was a new departure in military affairs and was a matter of gradual development to the end of the war, when it had become most complete as to equipment and administrative efficiency. All the boats used for hospital purposes were ultimately assigned officially to the use of the Medical Department, either for the trip or-in the case of specially equipped steamers-indefinitely. The surgeon in charge was in complete control of the boat and its movements, except in respect to the details of navigation. The system worked so successfully as to be continued during the Spanish War, and is part of the regulations at the present time.
Source: "Photographic History of the Civil War" Volume IV, Article By Edward L. Munson, M.D., Major, Med United States Army.
This Page last updated 02/10/02
RETURN TO AMBULANCE CORPS PAGE | <urn:uuid:17696813-effb-496d-9590-e6a0991aa4dc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://civilwarhome.com/sicktransportation.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9845 | 2,774 | 3.5625 | 4 |
ONSET - Mona Smead lovingly describes her neighborhood of small cottages in the center of this village, near Onset Beach with its bluff of green, grassy hills.
Nothing could shake her, she thought, from the home on Union Avenue that she bought in 1988 and where she raised her two children.
Boston Community Capital's SUN (Stabilizing Urban Neighborhoods) Initiative: 617-933-5880
"This is home to me," she said. "This is where all the love is."
Yet she nearly lost the house in 2008 when her employer cut her full-time hours and her usually reliable overtime.
Then, about two weeks before her foreclosure date, Smead saw a TV news segment about Boston Community Capital's SUN (Stabilizing Urban Neighborhoods) Initiative.
Founded in 2009 by Elyse Cherry, a former partner with the Boston law firm of Hale and Dorr and the chief executive officer of Boston Community Capital, the SUN program is like no other in the country.
In a speech in 2011, Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke praised it as one of the few solutions to help low-income families at a time when the recession has blighted their neighborhoods with evictions, foreclosure auctions and boarded-up homes.
"Because we work in these neighborhoods, we saw this coming before most people," Cherry said of the housing crisis.
Smead, 47, who said she once had a high credit rating, found herself on the fast track toward a foreclosure auction in October 2011. By then, she had lived for three years with bankruptcy and with the threat of foreclosure.
She already had been scammed by a modification company called New Hope Modifications, which was shut down in 2010 by the attorney general in its home state of New Jersey.
The company took two months of mortgage payments, then its website disappeared and Smead never heard from it again, she said.
She also had applied for a modification of her mortgage through a program made available by President Barack Obama's Making Home Affordable Act. But Bank of America, which held her mortgage, denied her modification application.
Smead, 47, feared she'd lose the house in the winter and have nowhere to go with her two elderly dogs.
"You want to talk about stress and depression," Smead said. "I have not been living; I've been more like the living dead."
Though close to giving up when she saw the news program about SUN, she made one last call.
SUN convinced her to come to Boston to apply.
The SUN program was able to negotiate a sale price for Smead's house with Bank of America. It bought the house and sold it back to Smead for an amount that was 61 percent lower than her existing mortgage. Her monthly payments on the new 30-year fixed-rate mortgage are 58 percent lower than her previous payments, said Cherry. (Smead agreed to talk to the Times if specifics of her loan were not included.)
SUN adds a 25 percent markup that's folded into the new loan. And to avoid speculators using the program, homeowners must give back half the profit if they make one when they sell the home.
It's fair, Cherry said, "since you've only had to pay half the mortgage, you only get half of the appreciation."
For Smead, it's like a dream come true. "It's like when someone dies and people are afraid to talk to you. Well, now when people call, I have a really good story to tell," she said.
Boston Community Capital, a 27-year-old nonprofit organization, created SUN by asking foundations, wealthy donors and other sources to create a $50 million loan fund. It created its own licensed mortgage lender, Aura Mortgage, to hold the loans as would a bank.
SUN's concept works on the principal that because values have dropped, many people can afford their homes at the current market price. They just cannot afford their current loan.
The idea was innovative enough to gain national attention - and not just from Bernanke. In 2010, Boston Community Capital won $5.5 million in grants and low-interest loans from the MacArthur Foundation and other partner agencies and corporations.
"There are many efforts like this across the country, but this is a very promising one," said Debra Schwartz, director of program-related investment at the MacArthur Foundation in Washington, D.C..
SUN's creation of interlocking agencies to raise the money and carry the mortgages is an innovative approach to tackle a complicated process, Schwartz said.
The average SUN participant sees a 45 percent reduction in both the principal and the monthly mortgage payments, Cherry said.
Banks are willing to sell to Boston Community Capital because SUN pays the market rate, Cherry said.
Since 2009, SUN has helped 200 families and the program has the potential to expand. Only one of those clients has defaulted, she said.
"We work with responsible borrowers," Cherry said.
Applicants must be residents of Massachusetts, be in default or foreclosure, and have a stable income to support their new mortgage, Cherry said.
They also must come to the table with $5,000 to put down at the time of the sale, she added.
SUN won't work for everyone. Sometimes, for example, the value of the property has not fallen low enough to make it affordable, Cherry said.
But for many struggling homeowners, it's worth a try.
"I fought for so long, and finally something really, really worked," Smead said. | <urn:uuid:70abaf60-4075-4b71-bd30-242e9d602699> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120408/NEWS/204080349 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00071-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979708 | 1,158 | 1.820313 | 2 |
Corn ending stocks are at projected at dangerously low levels. Coupled with ongoing drought, scarce stocks could send prices soaring or crashing just as they did in 2008 and 2009, when prices rose to record-highs only to crash following the Great Recession.
In its latest World Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE), USDA lowered its corn carryout from 647 million bushels in December to 602 million bushels. Balanced against projected corn demand, the new ending stocks figure puts the stocks-to-use ratio for U.S. corn at only 5.3%, well below the historical average of 12 to 13%, and one of the lowest stocks-to-use ratios ever, says Chad Hart, agricultural economist with Iowa State University. Last year’s corn stocks-to-use ratio was 7.9%, and the year before that, the ratio was 8.6%.
The Drought Card
The worrisome thing about having such a low stocks-to-use ratio for corn is that subsoil moisture is short across most of the western Corn Belt, where drought still lingers.
"The potential for price volatility is just as great in 2013 as we saw in 2008," says Hart. "With continued drought we could have record-high corn prices." If drought ends, and the U.S. crop is a bumper, the worry is that corn prices could plunge. "And the threat of recession still hangs over the market as well," he adds.
According to the High Plains Regional Climate Center, drought conditions persist in the portion of the western Corn Belt covered by the center, which includes Nebraska, North and South Dakota, and Kansas. Severe or extreme drought conditions now cover 86% of the region, with moderate drought covering 93%.
On-farm corn stocks have also fallen, according to USDA’s quarterly Grain Stocks report. Corn stored in all positions on December 1, 2012, stood at 8.03 billion bushels, down 17% from a year earlier. Of those stocks, 4.59 billion bushels were stored on farms, a 26% drop from the previous year. Off-farm stocks, at 3.44 billion bushels, were 1% smaller than last year.
The world stocks-to-use ratio at 12.3% is also dropping, down from last year’s 13.5%, according to the latest WASDE report.
"Crop producers don’t need to sell right now and livestock producers don’t need to buy feed or sell animals," says Hart. Livestock producers want to think seriously about putting a ceiling on feed costs, though, and crop producers want to put a floor under prices through the use of options, futures, forward contracts, and other tools.
See all of the data, coverage and analysis of the WASDE, Crop Production, Grain Stocks and Winter Wheat Seedings reports. | <urn:uuid:b0513545-f859-4ce5-b659-aab3bab75c7b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://origin-www.agweb.com/article/corn_price_volatility_could_see_repeat_of_2008/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96299 | 599 | 2.234375 | 2 |
Hand sewing is the foundation of needlecraft, and quilting is no exception. But trust art quilters to take needlework and turn it on its head!
For me and many of the art quilters I know, quilting is something we mostly do by machine. Handwork is reserved for embellishment, mark making, and design.
|Hand sewing a bevy of boro bobbles is fast,
easy, and satisfying.
Art by Victoria Gertenbach.
But while I admire the intricate, mesmerizing lines of free-motion machine stitching, hand stitching is what I love. I'm always looking for sewing projects where I can add a bit of hand sewing. It's charming and shows the hand of the fiber artist.
Victoria Gertenbach's Boro Bobbles are just such a project. These tiny embellishments, made from fabric scraps and hand stitching, are the perfect thing to work on while you watch soccer games or TV. Victoria uses shot cotton that frays beautifully, but you could use any kind of fabric scraps you like.
Here's an abbreviated version of the directions.
1. For each bobble, cut two 2", 1", and ½" circles from three colors of fabric, respectively.
2. Place the 2 larger circles together with the wrong sides facing.
3. Using a single thread and a scant 1⁄8" seam allowance, hand stitch a small running stitch around the edge. (Begin by pulling the needle in between the 2 circles, so that the knot is hidden inside.) Stitch 3⁄4 of the way around the edge, then stop, but do not knot or cut the thread.
4. Take a palm-sized amount of fiberfill and roll it into a ball. Stuff the fiberfill through the opening between the 2 circles. If the amount seems to be too much, remove some, and if the amount seems to be too little, add a bit more.
5. Continue sewing the running stitch around the edge until the bobble is closed.
6. Still using the same colored thread, stitch around the entire bobble again, this time using a whipstitch on the raw edge of the seam. Stitch just past the running stitches, thus catching them in the edging.
7. Stitch the smaller circles each side of the bobble, using a small overhand stitch.
8. Using a contrasting thread, knot 1 end of the thread and insert the needle at the edge of 1 of the 1" circles. Bring the needle back up at the center of the 1⁄2" circle. Give a gentle pull to tuck and hide the knot underneath.
9. Imagining that the ½" circle is a clock face, stick the needle down at the 3 position, and bring it back up at the center. Repeat on the other side, sticking the needle in at the 9 position and again bringing it back up at the center. Do the same for the 12 and 6 positions, and then again in between each of the 4 stitches. When you are done, you will have 8 stitches radiating out from the center.
10. To finish, take the thread back down through the center of the 1⁄2" circle, and back up at the edge of the 1" circle. Knot the thread 1⁄4" from the edge of the 1" circle. Insert the needle at the edge of the 1" circle, and pull it back up on the other side of the circle, pulling the knot under. Cut off the excess thread.
11. Repeat steps 1-3 for the opposite side of the bobble.
Of course, you could use French knots in the center or edge the smaller circles in the buttonhole stitch. I'm sure you can think of creative ways to put your own spin on these bobbles.
This project is so much fun, we've included it in a new eBook, Hand Sewing: Projects and Techniques with Embroidery, Felt, and Embellishments. This eBook is full of easy sewing projects where you can indulge you love of hand sewing.
P.S. Do you love hand sewing? What's your favorite project? Leave a comment below. | <urn:uuid:59fe7877-3a75-4e56-b8b7-6658fa7fbf05> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.quiltingdaily.com/blogs/quilting-daily/archive/2012/08/28/hand-stitch-a-bevy-of-boro-bobbles.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00056-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.914136 | 876 | 1.71875 | 2 |
Back in 2012, amid "intense pressure from Obama" including an appeal for its passage in his 2012 State of the Union address, Congress passed the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act (with 96-3 theatrical votes in the Senate, and 417-2 even more theatrical votes in the House) - a bill prohibiting the use of non-public information for private profit, including insider trading by members of Congress and other government employees. It is unclear why until 2012 it was perfectly legal for congress to trade on inside information, something we pointed out in May 2011 when we wrote that a "A Hedge Fund Comprised Of Junior Congressional Democrats Should Outperform The Market By 9%" as it turned out flagrant insider trading abuse occurred mostly within the democrat ranks of the House (compared to a mere 2%+ outperformance by Congressional stock trading republicans). It turns out that any cynical skepticism regarding Congress' ability and willingness to police itself was well founded, as last night the House eliminated a "key requirement of the insider trading law for most federal employees, passing legislation exempting these workers, including congressional staff, from a rule scheduled to take effect next week that mandated online posting of financial transactions."
- JPMorgan Report Piles Pressure on Dimon in Too-Big Debate (BBG)
- Employers Blast Fees From New Health Law (WSJ)
- Obama unveils US energy blueprint (FT)
- Obama to Push Advanced-Vehicle Research (WSJ) - here come Solar-powered cars?
- BRICs Abandoned by Locals as Fund Outflows Reach 1996 High (BBG)
- Obama won't trip over Netanyahu's Iran "red line" (Reuters)
- Samsung puts firepower behind Galaxy (FT)
- Boeing sees 787 airborne in weeks with fortified battery (Reuters)
- Greece Counts on Gas, Gambling to Revive Asset Sales Tied to Aid (BBG)
- Goldman’s O’Neill Says S&P 500 Beyond 1,600 Needs Growth (BBG)
- China’s new president in corruption battle (FT)
- Post-Chavez Venezuela as Chilly for Companies From P&G to Coke (BBG)
David Stockman On "The Great Deformation" And The US Treasury As "The M&A Department Of Goldman Sachs"Submitted by Tyler Durden on 03/12/2013 12:54 -0400
The fiscal cliff is permanent and insurmountable. It stands at the edge of a $20 trillion abyss of deficits over the next decade. And this estimation is conservative, based on sober economic assumptions and the dug-in tax and spending positions of the two parties, both powerfully abetted by lobbies and special interests which fight for every paragraph of loophole ridden tax code and each line of a grossly bloated budget. Fiscal cliffs as far as the eye can see are the deeply troubling outcome of the Great Deformation. They are the result of capture of the state, especially its central bank, the Federal Reserve, by crony capitalist forces deeply inimical to free markets and democracy. Why we are mired in this virtually unsolvable problem is the reason I wrote this book. It originated in my being flabbergasted when the Republican White House in September 2008 proposed the $700 billion TARP bailout of Wall Street. When the courageous House Republicans who voted it down were forced to walk the plank a second time in betrayal of their principled stand, my sense of disbelief turned into a not-inconsiderable outrage. Likewise, I was shocked to read of the blatant deal making, bribing, and bullying of the troubled big banks being conducted out of the treasury secretary’s office, as if it were the M&A department of Goldman Sachs.
It has been yet another quiet overnight session, devoid of the usual EURUSD ramp, and thus ES, at the Europe open (although it is never too late), which has seen the Shangai Composite finally post a meaningful rise up 2.26%, followed by some unremarkable European macro data as Eurozone CPI came as expected at 2.0%, and German unemployment just a tad better, at -3K, with consensus looking for 0K. Italy continues to be the wildcard, with little clarity on just who the now expected grand coalition will consist of. According to Newedge's Jamal Meliani, a base case scenario of Bersani/Berlusconi coalition may see a relief rally, tightening 10Y BTP/bund spread toward 300bps. A coalition would maintain current fiscal agenda and won’t implement any major reforms with fresh elections being called within a year. A Bersani/Grillo coalition is least likely, may slow reforms which would see 10Y BTP/bund spreads widening to 375bps. Of course, everything is speculation now, with Grillo saying no to any coalition, and moments ago a PD official saying against a broad coalition. But at least the market has it all priced in already - for more see Italy gridlock deepens as Europe watches nervously.
Following today's sequester-delay-seeking, tax-hiking, close-the-loophole speech by the President, it would appear that fiscal policy debates will be balanced a little more to raising effective rates on corporates (as opposed to the 'statutory' rate so many discuss). The US has the second highest global 'statutory' tax rate but less than 10% of S&P 500 firms have paid this rate over the last decade. Somewhat shockingly, since 1975, taxes have had the largest cumulative positive impact on S&P 500 ROE as effective rates fell from 44% to 30%. They estimate each percentage point rise in effective tax rate would lower S&P 500 ROE by 22 bp and EPS by $1.50, all else equal. Closing all the loopholes would smash year-end 2013 expectations from Goldman's 1575 to around 1300 with Staples and Tech the hardest hit. With the 'market' the only policy tool left, it would seem not even the Fed could monetarily save us from this fiscally fubar action.
After more than two months of political grandstanding, finally the $60 billion pork-laden Sandy relief aid bill has passed through the House in a 241-180 vote (with 1 democrat and 179 republicans voting no), with the vote passing courtesy of just 49 republicans who voted with the democrats. The reminder objected in protest "against a bill that many conservatives say is too big and provides funding for things other than immediate relief for New York, New Jersey and Connecticut" Politico reports. Specifically, the House approved a $50 billion relief bill, after several hours of contentious debate in which scores of Republicans tried unsuccessfully to cut the size of the bill and offset a portion of it with spending cuts. $9.7 billion had been already voted on January 4th for a flood insurance lending facility.The biggest winner today? Chris Christie whose anti-Boehner soapbox rant drama two weeks ago may have been just the breaking straw that forced the passage of this porkulus bill.
Bank Of America On The "Trillion Dollar Tooth Fairy" Straight "From The Land Of Fiscal Make Believe"Submitted by Tyler Durden on 01/08/2013 20:47 -0400
A year ago, out of nowhere, the grotesque suggestion to "resolve" the US debt ceiling with a platinum dollar coin came, and like a bad dream, mercifully disappeared even as the debt ceiling negotiations dragged until the last minute, without this idea being remotely considered for implementation, for one simple reason: it is sheer political, monetary and financial lunacy. And yet there are those, supposedly intelligent people, who one year later, continue dragging this ridiculous farce, as a cheap parlor trick which is nothing but a transparent attempt for media trolling and exposure, which only distracts from America's unsustainable spending problem and does nothing to address the real crisis the US welfare state finds itself in. And while numerous respected people have taken the time to explain the stupidity of the trillion dollar coin, few have done so as an integral part of the statist mainstream for one simple reason - it might provide a loophole opportunity, however tiny, to perpetuate the broken American model even for a day or two, if "everyone is in on it." Luckily, that is no longer the case and as even Ethan Harris from Bank of America (a firm that would be significantly impaired if America was forced to suddenly live within its means), the whole idea is nothing more than "the latest bad idea" straight "from the land of fiscal make believe." We can only hope that this finally puts this whole farce to bed.
If you just want the facts, who can you trust?
-If you’re employed, you’re a loser.
We could say that news is actually relevant or matters in this "market" but we would be lying, just as we would be lying if we said that this market has not become so utterly predictable, with yesterday's late day market surge - on yet another ridiculous catalyst - visible from so far away, it was almost painful to watch it take place in real time. Sure enough, futures are now sliding back, and giving back much of yesterday's gains - but don't worry, in a day full of even more meetings and flashing red headlines, at least some combination of carefully phrased MSM words will set off today's algo-driven buying frenzy, guaranteeing yet another "retail investor" decides they have had it with this farcical "free market" casino for ever.
There are 16 days left before we all shoot over the falls and are plunged into the freezing water. The markets are pretending it will never happen and that some magical incantation will be found to set everything right in the moments before we take the dive. The lethargy is noticeable and the apathy is like someone has thrown the wet towel of complacency over everyone’s shoulders. The crowd meanders. In the best case scenario, according to most people, some agreement will be reached. This best case scenario however includes an assumption that I do not believe will be correct which is that something formulated by common sense will be the result and it is just there that I hold little hope - I am more frightened of what our political leaders might concoct than what we face at the cliff. Obama claims a mandate. Who gave him this mandate one may reasonable ask; the 47.5 million people on food stamps, the people living on the tax benefits of those that work, the people who game the system so that they never have to find a job and enjoy a life paid for by those that are gainfully employed? That is one heck of a mandate isn’t it and yet that is the basis of his claim. I am slowly coming to the opinion that the best that can be hoped for is that we do plunge off the cliff. Maybe that will wake up some of the intoxicated with themselves people we now find living in Washington. It also might have a further benefit of waking up the citizens of the country who seem to be traipsing around like nothing is amiss.
In a world in which the Fiscal Cliff, including headlines, rumors, leaks, and mere whispers thereof, is the main show, all other data points are at best supporting data actors. There was a lot of support overnight - for the futures, which once again closed the prior session at the lows - with a battery of PMIs released, starting with the December HSBC China Flash PMI which printed at a excel picture perfect 50.9 vs an expectation 50.8 and above 50 for the second straight month, which sent the Shanghai Composite up 4.32%, and wiped out the bitter aftertaste from the Japan December large manufacturer Tankan index which tumbled to -12 on expectation of a -10 print, confirming the Japanese recession is deteriorating at the worst possible time. Then after China, Markit released a bevy of European PMI data which came in mixed: Services PMI rose from 46.7 to 47.8 in December, beating expectations of a 47.0 print, while the Manufacturing PMI rose modestly from 46.2 to 46.3, missing expectations of a 46.6 result. The biggest wildcard once again was Germany, where the Service PMI, like in the US, posted a sizable rise, posting above 50 for the first time in months, or at 52.1 on expectations of 50.0, and up from 49.7 last, although more disturbing was the ongoing collapse in German manufacturing which dipped from 46.8 to 46.3, on expectations of a rise to 47.2. French manufacturing data did not help posting a tiny rise from 44.5 to 44.6, missing expectations of a 45.0 print. Economic data was further confounded when Spain released its quarterly home price update, which dipped 3.8%, accelerated last quarter's -3.3% drop, and sliding by a massive -15.2% in Q3, faster than the -14.4% drop in Q2, and confirming Spanish housing has a long way to go before it is fixed.
At 11:00 am Eastern, the GOP's John Boehner will continue the teleprompted farce, and in not so many words, will announce there has been no progress on a Fiscal Cliff compromise. Alternatively, he may have bought some deep OTM SPY calls expiring shortly, and will misrepresent the situation behind the scenes in hopes for a quick trend reversal, just as he did back on November 16, providing the only "goalseeked" catalyst that could halt a drop in the SPX on its way to unchanged for the year, and, in collaboration with Nancy Pelosi, preventing AAPL from sliding below $400.
Any legacy that Obama might have had will have been converted into something like Herbert Hoover’s.
Two Fridays ago, just as AAPL was in danger of plunging below the absolute last support level of $500 after which freefall for it and the entire market begins, a truly unexpected deus ex machina appeared for those still clinging to long stock positions: politicians, in this case John Boehner and Nancy Pelosi, who held a press conference in which they defined the recently launched "Fiscal Cliff" talks as "constructive." In reality, this appearance was nothing but a photo opportunity for talking heads (as explained in "Risk Ramp on Boehner Banality"), and one which as Nancy Pelosi herself admitted later, served simply to halt what then looked like an assured free fall in the markets. Since then the ongoing rally in stocks and the EURUSD has been predicated on the "constructiveness" of the talks actually being real. Judging by the latest update from Reuters, Goldman will likely be right, if only in the short term. As Reuters admits, " U.S. lawmakers have made little progress in the last 10 days toward a compromise to avoid the harsh tax increases and government spending cuts scheduled for Jan. 1, a senior Democratic senator said on Sunday." That this update comes after the "big" market swoon into the recent lows from November 16, is certainly cause for alarm, because it means that at least one more violent market whipsaw to the downside will have to take place before there is any cliff progress to report. | <urn:uuid:39e057bd-b48e-4fae-8a62-66bfa1e384ec> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.zerohedge.com/taxonomy/term/8620 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00044-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957351 | 3,146 | 1.5 | 2 |
Michael Oren, senior fellow at the Shalem Center, an academic research institute in Jerusalem, runs down the list:
In its 1948 War of Independence, Israel defeated six Arab armies and yet at the end of the fighting merely achieved armistice agreements that denied it recognition and perpetuated the state of war.But this time, things could be different. In the past, the West did not want to risk its relationship to the Arab countries and access to their oil. Each time the Arabs were defeated by Israel, they were compensated by forcing Israel to return territory won in defensive battles. Israel developed into a power that could defend its interests alone. This time is different, says Oren.
In 1956, the Israel Defense Forces vanquished Egypt's Soviet-supplied army, but was then forced to evacuate Sinai and Gaza.
Israel's unqualified victory in the 1967 Six Day War produced United Nations Resolution 242, which, contrary to conventional belief, does not explicitly require Arab rulers to recognize the Jewish state even in return for territory.
Israeli forces rebounded from initial setbacks in the 1973 Yom Kippur War to rout the Egyptian and Syrian armies only to receive U.N. Resolution 338, a reiteration of 242. When, in 1982, Israel drove the PLO out of Lebanon, the Reagan administration responded with a plan for Israel to withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza. Israel quelled two Palestinian insurgencies but ended up retreating from Gaza and acceding to the creation of a Palestinian state.
Israel's inability to make military capital yield diplomatic dividends reflected the international community's reluctance to jeopardize its relationship with the Arab world and imperil its access to oil. Indeed, much of the world felt compelled to compensate the Arabs for their every defeat by qualifying, if not vitiating, Israel's diplomatic gains. This did not, however, prevent Western governments from tacitly applauding Israel for protecting moderate Middle Eastern regimes from Nasserists, Baathists and Islamists.
Clearly, the United States and its allies can no longer rely on Israel alone to check the Iranian threat. Realizing that, the Security Council is poised to adopt a resolution laying the groundwork for the U.N.'s first-ever armed intervention in the Middle East. In contrast to the toothless peacekeeping missions that have impotently watched -- and sometimes inflamed -- Arab-Israeli borders, the proposed mandated force can expel all terrorist elements from the area between the border and the Litani, and enforce "an international embargo on the sale and supply of arms" to Hezbollah.Over at The Corner, Rich Lowry sees a similar potential for an unprecedented Israeli diplomatic victory in the absence of a military victory--and he has company.
At the same time, Israel will receive the "unconditional release" of its kidnapped soldiers while, under Chapter VII of the U.N. Charter, reserving the right to "self-defense if an armed attack occurs." An incomplete military victory promises to produce an unprecedented diplomatic achievement for Israel and a new multinational machinery for confronting terror. [emphasis added]
One fascinating aspect of the current conflict is that, for the first time in history, it is an Arab force that has the upper hand military, and a U.N. resolution contemplates disadvantaging it anyway. It has always been the other way around. This occured to me when I saw this bit in the New York Times today:Oren says this victory for Israel depends on the language of the cease-fire remaining undiluted. Of course, this also depends on Hezbollah actually accepting its terms. If the cease-fire really is the diplomatic victory Oren and Lowry say it is--that is unlikely. On the other hand, in an analysis of the cease-fire, Dore points out there are elements of it that do go Hezbollah's way, such as agreeing that the status of Shebaa Farms is a genuine dispute. But Hezbollah needs a clear victory just as much as Israel does.
"Arab analysts and diplomats in the Middle East were skeptical about the resolution having any chance of halting the fighting. 'They are attempting to gain diplomatically what they failed to achieve militarily,' said one diplomat with long experience in the Middle East. 'I expect the cease-fire to be rammed through, but it will turn into a war of attrition.' "
This report in the Arab press gets at the same thing:
"According to the Lebanese government and the Arab League, the point is that the US-French draft, if voted, would practically substitute a non-existent military victory of Israel with a Security Council decision which, discharging the request of amendment by the Lebanese government, would practically ascribe defeat to Lebanon in the absence of an Israeli victory by casting the Israeli military goals into the form of a UN Resolution."
That is Lowry's thinking too, who does not see Hezbollah agreeing to the cease-fire:
Why would it? It's had a pretty good war, then it's supposed to turn around and disarm and leave southern Lebanon?Why not?
Israel's been doing that for over 50 years. | <urn:uuid:a2bd0df8-dabb-4c2a-87e6-b45d602822b0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://daledamos.blogspot.com/2006/08/is-israel-about-to-win-what-it-has.html | 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 | 0.955465 | 1,037 | 2.5625 | 3 |
March 11, 2004
Unemployment rates declined in January 2004 in three of the four regions and in most states.
The South had the lowest unemployment rate among the four regions in January, 5.2 percent, followed by the Midwest, 5.5 percent, and Northeast, 5.7 percent. The West continued to report the highest rate, 5.9 percent, despite a 0.4-percentage point decline from December 2003. The Midwest and South also recorded over-the-month rate decreases of 0.4-percentage point each. The unemployment rate for the Northeast was unchanged.
These data are from the BLS Local Area Unemployment Statistics program. The above data are seasonally adjusted. Data for January 2004 are preliminary and subject to revision. To learn more, see "Regional and State Employment and Unemployment: January 2004" (PDF) (TXT), news release USDL 04-378.
Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, The Editor's Desk, Changes in unemployment rates by region in January on the Internet at http://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2004/mar/wk2/art04.htm (visited May 23, 2013).
This edition of Spotlight on Statistics examines labor productivity trends from 2000 through 2010 for selected industries and sectors within the nonfarm business sector of the U.S. economy. Read more » | <urn:uuid:d7150405-5948-4275-bfb7-a54320c291f9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/print.pl/opub/ted/2004/mar/wk2/art04.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940365 | 288 | 2.3125 | 2 |
McDonald's will phase out pork suppliers who cage their animals over the next 10 years. (Humane Society of the U.S.)
McDonald's unveiled a 10-year plan Thursday to phase out the use of gestational crates in its U.S. supply chain.
The Oak Brook-based burger giant's decision comes three months after a promise to assess the situation in concert with its pork suppliers.
Sow confinement has been standard agricultural practice for decades, based on the reasoning that the pregnant animals become aggressive around food. Animal rights activists have argued that the practice is unnecessary, unsanitary and cruel.
The food industry has been under fire to end the practice, particularly in recent months. Burger King announced plans to eliminate use of the crates by 2017, and Wendy's also plans to do so, with an unspecified time table. Both buy less pork than McDonald's, which will phase out the crates by the end of 2022.
"We value our relationship with our suppliers and our shared commitment to animal welfare," Dan Gorsky, senior vice president of McDonald's North America Supply Chain Management, said in a statement. "Our approach seeks to build on the work already in place, and we are also sensitive to the needs of the smaller, independent pork producers in phasing out of gestation stalls."
In a statement, animal welfare scientist and McDonald's consultant Temple Grandin said the decade-long phase out is necessary "to research and identify better housing alternatives and ensure proper training of employees."
"This is really good forward thinking, and I commend McDonald's for doing it," she said.
By 2017, McDonald's said it will purchase pork only from suppliers that "share its commitment to phase out gestation stalls." The company will be working with producers to develop systems that trace pork and verify that sows were not confined, and assess ways to move farmers to other practices.
"The move by McDonald's further shows that gestation crate confinement has no place in the pork industry's future," Paul Shapiro, vice president of farm animal protection for the Humane Society of the United States said in a statement. "Rather than defending the perpetual confinement of pigs in cages barely larger than their own bodies, pork industry leaders should listen to the public and their largest customers, like McDonald's, by actively converting to higher welfare group housing systems."
[email protected] | twitter: @emilyyork | <urn:uuid:9c59ef96-4d0e-4416-8073-b60c1c0121e9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-05-31/business/chi-mcdonalds-to-phase-out-pork-from-suppliers-that-cage-pigs-over10-years-20120531_1_dan-gorsky-pork-suppliers-animal-welfare | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00044-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955285 | 489 | 2.015625 | 2 |
No More Period Pain!
Posted by Editor
Been feeling a little grumpy, moody or bitchy? Yep, periods are something we wish we could say good riddance to. But what if women could manage the symptoms so that unwanted side effects such as moodiness, irritability, puffiness, bloating or stomach cramps wouldn’t rear their ugly heads too?
“Women don’t have to suffer from painful periods and most definitely shouldn’t put up with them," leading Sydney based naturopath Victoria O’Sullivan. "But before you go reaching for short-term fixes such a paracetamol and a hot water bottle, start thinking long term. By making just a few small changes you can permanently manage the symptoms in as little as three cycles,” says Victoria.
Victoria’s top tips for reducing period pain in as little as three cycles:
1. Are you a sugar or caffeine addict?
“Processed sugar can create a yeast overgrowth in the stomach, causing bloating and stomach cramps. Limit the sugar intake to natural sugar, and have no more than two pieces of fruit a day. Caffeine contains a compound called xanthine which aggravates inflammation in the body, causing the muscles to spasm which is what happens when we experience stomach cramps. Avoiding caffeine altogether will make it more likely for the period pains to reduce. If you can’t go without caffeine, have 1-2 cups of green tea a day instead,” Victoria says.
2. Herbs can help
“Ginger and turmeric both contain anti-inflammatory properties and can work as natural painkillers. They are also a lot less hard on the stomach than regular painkillers, which can eliminate good bacteria. Another important herb when dealing with period pains is chaste berry, also known as vitex agnus castus. This works well with balancing out the hormones oestrogen and progesterone,” Victoria says.
3. Don’t neglect those delicious greens
Vegetables of the broccoli family such as broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage and brussels sprouts are high in indoles which makes them excellent for maintaining a hormonal balance. “Ideally, women should have 6-7 cups of veggies a day and I encourage all my clients to measure this out to get an idea of how much we need daily,” Victoria says.
4. Feeling stressed?
“Stress is very much linked with period pain,” Victoria says. “When stressed, our body produces increased levels of the stress hormone cortisol and lower-than-healthy levels of progesterone. This causes a hormonal imbalance between our oestrogen and progesterone levels.” Victoria says a good solution is to work on decreasing stress. “A great reliever of stress is exercise, which releases the feel-good hormone endorphins in the body. Endorphins reduce pain and affects emotions,” Victoria says.
5. Don’t go overboard on the salt
Salt will draw fluids, causing you to retain water and bloat. Water retention in the body is also often the cause of sore breasts, which a lot of women experience in connection with their period. “The limit for women is 3-5 grams of salt a day,” Victoria says.
6. Essential fatty acids
“Period pain is a sign that the body is inflamed, and fish oil is high in Omega 3 essential fatty acids, which is an excellent anti-inflammatory. Other foods high in essential fatty acids are primrose oil, nuts, seeds and chia. We do not produce essential fatty acids internally which makes it quite important that we eat foods that contain them, if we are trying to reduce the inflammation in the body,” Victoria says.
7. Get a check-up
“It is important for me to underline that no woman should accept pains in connection with their period. If these tips do not relieve your pains or if the pains are becoming increasingly more painful, there could be underlying issues such as endometriosis or fibroids and you should go see your doctor or a health specialist such as a naturopath,” Victoria says.
For more information visit www.victoriaosullivan.com.au. | <urn:uuid:0c3cfe61-c9b1-4977-965a-305a377591a6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.shesaid.com.au/article.aspx?n=45209705&v=0 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00024-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941657 | 904 | 1.84375 | 2 |
This image shows evidence for running water on the surface of Mars.
Click on image for full size
Image from: NASA
There seems to be no running water on the surface of Mars today even though there is evidence for running water, including river channels such as those shown here, and there are frozen, icy polar caps. Features such as the streams shown here suggest that there was water present near the surface at some time in the Martian past. The atmosphere of Mars seems to contain a little water too. There are clouds and fog. Water in the atmosphere suggests that water still cycles between the ground and atmosphere today. Fog rises out of the ground and condenses back again, and water vapor in the atmosphere condenses and evaporates. In most respects, however, the possible Martian water cycle is nothing like it counterpart on Earth because Mars is so cold. Much of the water of Mars is frozen into the ground, and can only be released when Mars experiences a warming change in climate.
Mars is much smaller than the Earth, and Mars is farther from the sun that either the Earth or Venus. These facts mean that the surface of Mars cooled off more rapidly than the other two planets. In fact, recent measurements of the Martian surface show just how cold it can be. Because Mars is colder, it fits what some scientists call the "Goldilocks" phenomenon when it comes to the suitability of Mars to support life.
Future exploration of Mars will be directed at answering questions about exactly what has happened to the Martian water. Answers to these questions will help scientists better understand the Martian climate history.
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Unlike the Martian outflow channels, these Martian river valleys have many tributaries. These river valleys do not resemble their terrestrial counterparts either, however. The tributaries are very short,...more
The North and South Poles on Mars are a lot like the polar regions on Earth. They are the coldest places on the planet. The temperatures in the winter can drop to -150° C (about -238° F). Both poles have...more
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In spite of the fact that Mars has an atmosphere, the environment of Mars seems unfriendly toward life as we know it on earth. Mars is small, so there is not much gravity. For this reason, much of the...more | <urn:uuid:3134e814-33af-430f-b4c8-c190abbf7431> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.windows2universe.org/mars/interior/Martian_water.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00035-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949737 | 743 | 3.875 | 4 |
(AP) -- Microsoft founder and philanthropist Bill Gates was in China on Saturday to raise awareness of the dangers of secondhand smoke in the country with the world's largest smoking population.
Gates is partnering with Robin Li, chief executive of Baidu Inc., which operates China's most popular search engine, in a foundation using traditional and online media to pinpoint the dangers of inhaling smoke from the cigarettes of others.
"Both (media) let people know about the damage of forced smoking and give some education about how in a very polite way they can ask people not to put them in that situation," Gates said at a news conference in Beijing.
According to government statistics, smoking is linked to the deaths of at least 1 million people in China every year, making it one of the greatest health threats the country faces. Nearly 30 percent of adults in China smoke - about 300 million people, a number roughly equal to the entire U.S. population.
More than double that number are estimated to suffer exposure to the risks of secondhand smoke, which include increased asthma attacks, ear and respiratory infections, and cancer, according to the Health Ministry.
The annual number of smoking-related deaths could rise to 3 million by 2030 without greater efforts, Vice Health Minister Huang Jiefu said, warning that tobacco control efforts in China face a "serious challenge."
"Our country has made progress in controlling smoking, but speaking overall, we still have a tough road ahead," Huang said at Saturday's news conference. "The effect on our country's future could be great."
New rules banning smoking in venues like hotels and restaurants took effect in May, but still exclude workplaces and fail to specify punishments for violators.
China has already missed a Jan. 9, 2011, deadline to ban smoking at public indoor venues in accordance with a WHO-backed global anti-tobacco treaty. Experts say huge revenues from the state-owned tobacco monopoly hinder anti-smoking measures.
Explore further: New rice contamination reported in China | <urn:uuid:8f8024cb-d1fb-49d9-984e-46a3e4a2b12e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://phys.org/news/2011-06-bill-gates-china-secondhand.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962864 | 409 | 2.40625 | 2 |
"We encourage coaches to take patients to physical therapy for the first week or two when they can't drive."
A family room is provided on site where patients and coaches may visit with others and grab a bite to eat.
"The fridge is well stocked with juice, pop, yogurt, fruit cups," she said. "We have cereal, soup, chips, fruit, and peanut butter. It keeps them away from vending areas and ill patients."
Owens does not want anything to slow progress as patients work through the recovery process.
Patients ranging in age from 20s to 90s have had joint replacements.
Some patients have told her surgical pain is less than the pain of arthritis endured over the years.
How hard patients work at physical therapy plays an important role in the healing process.
Patients "have to be motivated," she said. "They see success so quickly.
"We get so much satisfaction because the patients are happier when they leave here," she said. "They get a new hip, knee or shoulder and it will give them a new life."
For more information about the Joint Connection Program, call 304-766-5444. | <urn:uuid:f56a88db-9bcc-4310-abc7-fff068f6a7cf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dailymail.com/foodandliving/201302140271?page=2&build=cache | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971255 | 241 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Don’t fear the stylus comeback
There’s a trend in smartphones, and some might call it disturbing. Hand-in-hand with the recent surge of phones with gigantic screens comes a surprise visitor, poking its way out of the technological past to stab at us here in the present: the stylus.
First there was the Samsung Galaxy Note, a phone with a massive, 5-inch screen and a pull-out stylus called the S Pen. Now, straight from the Mobile World Congress show in Barcelona, LG just debuted its answer to the Note, the Optimus Vu, another 5-inch phone that sports a stylus. Tablets are getting in on the action, too: The Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 rocks an S Pen, and the new PadFone from Asus has a stylus that also doubles as a Bluetooth headset!
One phone that includes a stylus is an odd throwback. But four devices — that’s a clear pattern, one that is rubbing many people the wrong way. Commentators from Computerworld to Wired to BetaNews have all chimed in to point out what an anachronistic addition a stylus is to a modern smartphone. It’s also the wrong attitude. It still has a place in technology.
First of all, let’s remember that the two platforms that were synonymous with the stylus — Palm OS and Windows Mobile (the precursor Windows Phone) — are gone and won’t be coming back. Once multi-touch capacitive touch screens like the iPhone’s arrived, it was a huge relief to be rid of such frustrating, clunky technology — and stylii all but disappeared.
So why would anyone want to go back to the using an accessory when phones have evolved enough to be instantly sensitive to finger touches? Simple answer: accuracy.
“I like it for its precision,” says technologist Adrian Calderon. “Even working on an iPhone, I can often tap with my stylus much faster than I can type with my finger.”
The stylus lets Calderon draw with more care in apps like SketchBook; but when the hardware is matched to the stylus, there’s even more potential to unlock. The Galaxy Note, for example, has handwriting-to-text ability, letting you transform your dashed-off notes into something practical. Although it’s not always dead-on, it’s far better then transcription.
More from Mashable
UPlanMe Calendar Fills Itself Up Based on What You Like | <urn:uuid:2db3ff15-9940-4681-8d3a-85ae6b3f65da> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.metro.us/boston/lifestyle/2012/02/28/dont-fear-the-stylus-comeback/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00066-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.928737 | 531 | 1.539063 | 2 |
Students in the MBA program may pursue an optional area of specialization in accounting, finance, technology and information management, marketing, or supply chain management. An area of specialization requires twelve credit hours of approved MBA elective coursework. Each specialization normally consists of nine credits of coursework within the specific field of study plus a three credit complementary course.
Students may take all twelve credit hours within a particular field, eliminating the complementary course, if sufficient courses are offered in the discipline, and students maintain reasonable breadth in their MBA program of study. Elective coursework must cover at least three distinct fields of study in College of Business.
Students may pursue a double specialization which requires a minimum of seven elective courses. One elective must be outside the two specialization areas.
Students may take more than one complementary course within their specialization as long as reasonable breadth is maintained. Students may select a complementary course not listed with approval from their major professor.
The accounting specialization is designed to equip the accounting professional with the necessary knowledge and skills to work effectively within today's technology-driven, global economy. Issues and challenges facing the accounting profession today are explored.
The finance specialization will provide you with an understanding of the theoretical and practical aspects of corporate financial management and investments strategies. Coursework is offered in advanced financial analysis and decision-making, portfolio management, derivative markets, and real estate finance.
The marketing specialization will help you acquire skills in analyzing and using existing data to make effective marketing decisions. Marketing coursework provides you with an understanding of various marketing concepts, models, and tools to examine how consumers behave and markets function.
Supply chain management (SCM) is one of the fastest growing areas in business today. Increased globalization and rapidly advancing information technology tools are prime factors affecting the movement of parts, management of inventory flow, fulfillment of customer orders, and whether dealer requirements and deadlines are met in a timely manner. SCM integrates global information and processes across all business functions including supply management, operations, information technology, and logistics.
The Technology and Innovation Management (TIM) specialization examines issues related to the development and management of information and knowledge-based technologies. Topics include decision support and data-mining, human-computer interaction, system security and integrity, and project management. The TIM specializtion also focuses on the management of innovation and the commercialization of new technologies. | <urn:uuid:1fab77e4-f0e8-4f37-8ddb-42df7a09528a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.business.iastate.edu/masters/mba/specializations | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.922386 | 477 | 1.78125 | 2 |
Informal Agriculture Council Discusses Climate Change and Agriculture
EU Agriculture Ministers met from 13 - 15 September for an Informal Agriculture Council in Växjö, Sweden. Talks were hosted by the Swedish Minister for Agriculture Eskil Erlandsson, and focused on the theme of agriculture and climate change. Member States emphasised the need for an increase in support for research and development and additional funding for incentive payments within rural development programmes for tackling climate change. Although no legislative proposals were put on the table, further debates on these issues were seen as critical in the run up to the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen in December.
Earlier discussions had centered around the continuing ‘dairy crisis’ in response to which the Commission has subsequently published a new package of short and long term measures. In addition, the Swedish Presidency, under pressure from some Member States, has just announced an additional informal meeting of Agriculture Ministers on 5 October.
Climate Spotlight Turns to Agriculture
On the final day of the informal Agriculture Council, Ministers turned their attention to the future role of EU agriculture in mitigating and adapting to climate change. Recognition of agriculture’s potential to cut greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions was made at the Council, with discussions leading to general support for the need for increased research and development, as well as voluntary style incentive measures, such as those within Rural Development Programmes (RDPs), to promote the delivery of climate friendly farming.
Debates were guided by the Swedish Presidency’s pre-Council paper on climate change and agriculture, building on an earlier report entitled ‘The challenge for European agricultural and rural areas’ published in April alongside the Commission’s White Paper on adaptation (COM(2009)147), in addition to a July working document on agriculture and climate change mitigation. The three day talks were hosted by the Swedish Minister for Agriculture Eskil Erlandsson, whilst his colleague Carl-Johan Lindén, who chairs Special Committee on Agriculture (SCA), stated in the run up to the meeting ‘that the issue of how the CAP should be structured to combat climate change will become central in the next few years’.
Agriculture as ‘Part of the Solution’
With the Swedish Presidency placing a priority on climate change issues, Agriculture Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel was keen to stress that agriculture is ‘part of the solution as well as the problem’, recalling that a 20 per cent reduction in GHG emissions has already been achieved since 1990 (largely attributed to declines in the numbers of EU livestock, particularly in the beef and dairy sectors).
A 20 per cent reduction in GHG emissions has already been achieved since 1990...
However, pressure remains on EU agriculture to produce more food while simultaneously reducing GHG emissions. As such, Member States agreed that research and development, focusing particularly on the development of innovative solutions, should play a vital role in helping to meet these future challenges. Particular areas flagged as a focus for future research and development by Member States included the production of biomass in both the forestry and farming sectors, and an exploration of the carbon storage potential of soils, especially carbon rich soils such as grasslands.
Voluntary Framework to Prevail
Pillar Two measures were commended by several Member States as a means to promote climate and eco-friendly farming, with examples of incentive based measures working well to address climate change being cited by Sweden, Poland and the UK. Talks then turned to the desirability of an increase in funding attributed to Pillar Two, with Swedish Farm Minister Eskil Erlandsson going so far as to say that there is no reason why it should not outweigh Pillar One in the future, although concerns were raised by some Member States over the provision of further resources to Pillar Two. Mariann Fischer Boel highlighted that an additional €4.2 billion will already become available from January 2010 for use within Rural Development Programmes on the ‘new challenges’ as a result of the CAP Health Check, although no indication of what proportion of this funding will be dedicated to climate change was given.
The subject of introducing binding measures to ensure the farming sector’s contribution to climate change mitigation was notably treated with caution, however there were calls for agriculture to be included in the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), thus requiring obligatory limits on farm emissions.
There were calls for agriculture to be included in the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS).
Fischer Boel reacted by suggesting that an ETS should be considered as a viable option for agriculture in the future, but also expressed concern over the regulatory burden it may place on the farming sector. Some Member States took the opportunity to showcase national measures illustrating other possible regulatory approaches. For example, Sweden, Slovenia and Finland stressed the role of forests in providing carbon sinks while Portugal highlighted their forthcoming national water tax as an option the EU might want to consider.
Links to Copenhagen
In the run up to the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen in December, the issue of agriculture and its role in helping to combat climate change was considered an inevitable feature of the discussions.
Mariann Fischer Boel confirmed that no legislative proposals are planned ahead of the Copenhagen conference.
While Mariann Fischer Boel confirmed that no legislative proposals are planned ahead of the Copenhagen conference, the message that agriculture will have to play its part in meeting the climate change challenge was the key outcome of the Informal Agriculture Council. Farmers will be expected to pull their weight with regards to climate change in the future, facilitated in the short term by the opportunities presented by additional funding made available for the ‘new challenge’ of climate change through increased rates of compulsory modulation as a result of the 2008 CAP Health Check.
However, it was made clear that action at the EU level needed to take place within a much broader response at the international level. Member States agreed that the climate change challenge is one that needs to be addressed by all, but continued to voice caution on the need to avoid decreasing the EU’s competitiveness on the international stage through the imposition of increased regulation.
- Press release IP/09/1333 (17/09/09) ‘Milk: Commission proposes further measures to help dairy sector in short, medium and long term’
- Press release (13/09/09) ‘Meet the chair: climate important issue for the future of agriculture’
- Agra Europe
29 Sep 2009
The Institute for European Environmental Policy coordinates CAP2020. It is an independent not for profit institute which undertakes research in a number of policy areas including agriculture and rural development. | <urn:uuid:91bdd7f4-7257-4075-bab9-532d72ddf70a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cap2020.ieep.eu/2009/9/29/informal-agriculture-council-discusses-climate-change-and-agriculture?s=2&selected=archive&y=2009&m=9 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00035-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961866 | 1,346 | 2.453125 | 2 |
The big talking point around the interwebs lately has surrounded the Google/Verizon (GooVer) net neutrality proposal–or, at least their version of net neutrality. First, let’s start with the text of their proposal (or just skip past it):
A joint policy proposal for an open Internet
Monday, August 9, 2010 at 1:38 PM ET
Posted by Alan Davidson, Google director of public policy and Tom Tauke, Verizon executive vice president of public affairs, policy, and communications
The original architects of the Internet got the big things right. By making the network open, they enabled the greatest exchange of ideas in history. By making the Internet scalable, they enabled explosive innovation in the infrastructure.
It is imperative that we find ways to protect the future openness of the Internet and encourage the rapid deployment of broadband. Verizon and Google are pleased to discuss the principled compromise our companies have developed over the last year concerning the thorny issue of “network neutrality.”
In October, our two companies issued a shared statement of principles on network neutrality. A few months later we submitted a joint filing to the FCC, and in an April joint op-ed our CEOs discussed their common interest in an open Internet. Since that time, we have listened to all sides of the debate, engaged in good faith with policy makers in multiple venues, and challenged each other to craft a balanced policy framework. We have been guided by the two main goals:
1. Users should choose what content, applications, or devices they use, since openness has been central to the explosive innovation that has made the Internet a transformative medium.
2. America must continue to encourage both investment and innovation to support the underlying broadband infrastructure; it is imperative for our global competitiveness.
Today our CEOs will announce a proposal that we hope will make a constructive contribution to the dialogue. Our joint proposal takes the form of a suggested legislative framework for consideration by lawmakers, and is laid out here. Below we discuss the seven key elements:
First, both companies have long been proponents of the FCC’s current wireline broadband openness principles, which ensure that consumers have access to all legal content on the Internet, and can use what applications, services, and devices they choose. The enforceability of those principles was called into serious question by the recent Comcast court decision. Our proposal would now make those principles fully enforceable at the FCC.
Second, we agree that in addition to these existing principles there should be a new, enforceable prohibition against discriminatory practices. This means that for the first time, wireline broadband providers would not be able to discriminate against or prioritize lawful Internet content, applications or services in a way that causes harm to users or competition.
Importantly, this new nondiscrimination principle includes a presumption against prioritization of Internet traffic – including paid prioritization. So, in addition to not blocking or degrading of Internet content and applications, wireline broadband providers also could not favor particular Internet traffic over other traffic.
Third, it’s important that the consumer be fully informed about their Internet experiences. Our proposal would create enforceable transparency rules, for both wireline and wireless services. Broadband providers would be required to give consumers clear, understandable information about the services they offer and their capabilities. Broadband providers would also provide to application and content providers information about network management practices and any other information they need to ensure that they can reach consumers.
Fourth, because of the confusion about the FCC’s authority following the Comcast court decision, our proposal spells out the FCC’s role and authority in the broadband space. In addition to creating enforceable consumer protection and nondiscrimination standards that go beyond the FCC’s preexisting consumer safeguards, the proposal also provides for a new enforcement mechanism for the FCC to use. Specifically, the FCC would enforce these openness policies on a case-by-case basis, using a complaint-driven process. The FCC could move swiftly to stop a practice that violates these safeguards, and it could impose a penalty of up to $2 million on bad actors.
Fifth, we want the broadband infrastructure to be a platform for innovation. Therefore, our proposal would allow broadband providers to offer additional, differentiated online services, in addition to the Internet access and video services (such as Verizon’s FIOS TV) offered today. This means that broadband providers can work with other players to develop new services. It is too soon to predict how these new services will develop, but examples might include health care monitoring, the smart grid, advanced educational services, or new entertainment and gaming options. Our proposal also includes safeguards to ensure that such online services must be distinguishable from traditional broadband Internet access services and are not designed to circumvent the rules. The FCC would also monitor the development of these services to make sure they don’t interfere with the continued development of Internet access services.
Sixth, we both recognize that wireless broadband is different from the traditional wireline world, in part because the mobile marketplace is more competitive and changing rapidly. In recognition of the still-nascent nature of the wireless broadband marketplace, under this proposal we would not now apply most of the wireline principles to wireless, except for the transparency requirement. In addition, the Government Accountability Office would be required to report to Congress annually on developments in the wireless broadband marketplace, and whether or not current policies are working to protect consumers.
Seventh, and finally, we strongly believe that it is in the national interest for all Americans to have broadband access to the Internet. Therefore, we support reform of the Federal Universal Service Fund, so that it is focused on deploying broadband in areas where it is not now available.
We believe this policy framework properly empowers consumers and gives the FCC a role carefully tailored for the new world of broadband, while also allowing broadband providers the flexibility to manage their networks and provide new types of online services.
Ultimately, we think this proposal provides the certainty that allows both web startups to bring their novel ideas to users, and broadband providers to invest in their networks.
Crafting a compromise proposal has not been an easy process, and we have certainly had our differences along the way. But what has kept us moving forward is our mutual interest in a healthy and growing Internet that can continue to be a laboratory for innovation. As policy makers continue to formulate the rules of the road, we hope that other stakeholders will join with us in providing constructive ideas for an open Internet policy that puts consumers in charge and enhances America’s leadership in the broadband world. We stand ready to work with the Congress, the FCC and all interested parties to do just that.
As you can imagine, there has been a lot of discussion and shouting about what was said, what wasn’t said, and what it all means. The general consensus is that GooVer is setting up the foundation for a tiered Internet structure in the U.S.: If you can pay, then you’ll get to play. There is some classic Orwellian doublethink, but the gist is that this is a document by two very large corporations who want to maximize and perpetuate their own largeness. I’m not going to rehash a lot of the talk here; this is the Internet, so here are some links that you really should read:
- How the Google/Verizon proposal could kill the internet in 5 years (IO9)
- A Review of Verizon and Google’s Net Neutrality Proposal (Electronic Frontier Foundation)
- Google-Verizon plan: Why you should worry (Salon)
- There’s Only One Internet (Public Knowledge)
- Verizon & Google Proposal Is Just a Proposal Not (Yet) a Federal Law (The Huffington Post)
While I’m sure there are some who think that this is just commercial technicalities, or that it’s the unregulated marketplace finding its natural level… you’re wrong. In the Information Age, those who have the power are those who have the access to the information. The GooVer proposal is about who has their hand on the spigot: the whole of the internet community (i.e. the spigot is always open), or a few “fatcats” (a/k/a LOLceos) who won’t care in the long run if Mr. or Ms NotRich get access to their share. Oh sure, they’ll get splashed on from time-to-time to keep the naysayers at bay, but mostly they will be left out in the “public Internet” dust bowl.
It’s important to note that this is just a proposal by two companies. That’s all. It’s not law. It’s not regulation. Right now, it’s mostly just a piece of (electronic) paper. So, if you care about keeping open your access to the Internet. If you want to watch TV shows or movies, watch videos on YouTube, or torrent some (legal) files, or Tweet, Skype, or do almost all of those other things you now do without thinking about whether or not you have access to that tier that’s outside the “public Internet”; then now is the time to let your voice be heard.
While it’s good to spread the word through the social nets, it’s not enough. You need to contact the people in government who have the power to actually enact change–and by-and-large, they don’t pay that much attention to Twitter, Facebook, and the like. You need to write or call them and let them know how you feel. How? I’m glad you asked.
To contact members of the U.S. Senate, you can find them here: Senators Members http://senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
If you can think of other relevant targets, feel free. The point is, if you want your way, you’re going to have to rise up and let the government know. They might not be the ideal solution, but it’s likely to be more equitable than what the GooVers will give us. Tell them that the Internet is a public trust, a tool that brings us together more than it will ever drive us apart–that is, unless corporations are allowed to do to the Internet what the airlines have done for air travel…charging fees right and left in the name of “customer service”. Enough. No more.
The Internet is a public pipe–no vested-interest cartel should be allowed to choose how to distribute the flow. | <urn:uuid:5c49bfd4-39d2-4ef9-8ef0-4ef4cba3ec23> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://tib.cjcs.com/6139/dont-just-talk-about-net-neutrality-do-something/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00058-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943308 | 2,200 | 2.046875 | 2 |
What I don’t like about Halloween…
I hope you won’t call me a spoil sport if I crab about features of Halloween I dislike:
- Money spent on candy and costumes. According to the Wall Street Journal about $66.28 per person or $5.9 billion (up a billion from last year).
- Kids being encouraged to take candy from strangers.
- Tubs of candy around before, during, and after the holiday.
It’s not that I don’t like to party or have fun, but what I remember of Halloween was digging through my parents’ closets or going to Goodwill looking for items to make a costume. Sometimes my mom and I worked together to make my costume, and it was fun working with her. Instead of trick or treating, my family attended a neighborhood party. We worked together to make special Halloween treats to take to the party, and some years we helped decorate for it. At the party we would run around outdoors playing hide and seek or scavenger hunt. We would carve pumpkins, paint faces, dunk for apples, have a scarf tied over our eyes and stick our hands into bowls of eyes, brains, etc. I don’t remember all the details, but I do remember my parents and siblings all having fun together.
If you are interested in some great party activity and food ideas, Clemson Extension has a new publication, Healthy Halloween Parties and Meals for Children.
-pointers from Peggy | <urn:uuid:aa7baa98-4132-459a-88e3-702be0ca12bd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.extension.iastate.edu/foodsavings/2010/10/25/it-is-almost-halloween/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956015 | 308 | 1.609375 | 2 |
A-Z of health
You can search for full details of a range of treatments or conditions simply by selecting a letter.
Diagnosing vaginal thrush
Vaginal thrush can usually be easily diagnosed.
If you visit your GP because you think that you may have vaginal thrush they will ask you about:
- your symptoms
- whether you've had thrush before
- whether you've already used any over-the-counter medications to treat thrush
- whether you're prone to developing thrush – for example, if you're taking antibiotics for another condition
It is likely that you have thrush if you have the typical symptoms of vulval itching and a thick, creamy discharge. However, you may need to have further tests to be absolutely sure of the diagnosis.
Your GP may want to carry out some further tests if:
- you've already used anti-thrush treatment but it hasn't worked
- the thrush keeps returning
- your symptoms are particularly severe
- you may have a sexually transmitted infection (STI)
Some possible tests are described below.
A vaginal swab is similar to a cotton bud. It is used to take a sample of the secretion from inside your vagina so that it can be analysed in a laboratory.
The results of the analysis will show whether you have a yeast infection or whether your symptoms are being caused by an STI, such as trichomoniasis.
A vaginal swab can also establish the type of fungus that is causing your thrush.
You may have a blood test to check whether you have a condition that increases your risk of developing thrush.
For example, your GP may test the level of glucose in your blood if they think you might have diabetes.
If you have diabetes, you will probably have other symptoms such as an increased thirst and you may urinate more often.
Testing the pH (acid/alkaline balance) of your vagina may be recommended if the treatment for thrush hasn't worked and it keeps returning.
To do this, a swab is taken from inside your vagina and wiped over a piece of specially treated paper. The paper will change colour depending on the pH level.
A pH level of 4-4.5 is normal. A pH above 4.5 may be a sign of a common vaginal infection called bacterial vaginosis.
Read about how thrush is treated. | <urn:uuid:3e0bb31d-a166-43c5-8102-7086d793d293> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cheshirewestandchester.gov.uk/residents/health_and_social_care/health/a-z_of_health.aspx?atoz_symptompage=Thrush/Diagnosis | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00046-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948339 | 494 | 2.765625 | 3 |
The slightly unconstitutional treatment being given citizens of Japanese ancestry has finally reached the American Civil Liberties Union, my agents report, but from a source which caused Director Ernest Besig to fall out of his chair in a dead faint the Filipino Community of San Francisco, Inc., Miguel Ignacio, secretary.
Until that moment it had
never occurred to Besig or anybody else much that there might be Japanese
women living with Filipino husbands in this combat zone. Well, Ignacio knows
of four Filipino-Japanese familes right here
These women, according to
Ignacio, are no longer Japanese in the sight of Hirohito or any sub-
Happily, Besig was not asked to bring a habeas corpus action on behalf of these women who are not Japanese and not quite American. For my men have it on high authority that the question whether evacuees are entitled to habeas corpus is one about which everybody will be more cheerful if it doesnt come up.
What the Filipino Community of San Francisco, Inc., is asking is a small but separate location for Japanese wives of Filipino men. Thats something Besig can suggest to authorities without getting his head in a sling clear down to the heels.
The San Francisco News
April 18, 1942
Go to the Japanese Internment page. | <urn:uuid:d0c78b5c-25c8-4e8a-8ca3-31fba843ae14> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sfmuseum.net/hist8/caylor3.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934084 | 266 | 1.671875 | 2 |
Expert Tips for Parenting Tech-Savvy Kids
Do you sometimes feel overwhelmed in the ever-changing, ever-growing worlds of technology and media?
Most parents today work hard to find a proper balance between keeping up, and staying ahead of the kids. With gadgets like cell phones that can access the Internet, and video game consoles as powerful as yesterday’s home computers, and with all of this increased exposure to media, how can we make sure that our children are only being exposed to appropriate content?
Fortunately, there are many things parents can do to help our children and teens navigate the worlds of technology and media.
Consider the tips below, for all ages and stages of parenthood, and when you’re ready to learn more, head over to the Technology and Media sections of ParentFurther.com, where you’ll find more tips and research-based advice on popular media and technology topics like social networking, mobile technology, and video game addiction.
Tips for . . .
- Television: Limit screen time to 2 hours a day or less for children over the age of 2. Pediatricians recommend no screen time for children under 2. Practice “appointment” television. Use your TV guide, and decide in advance what’s good to watch.
- Cell Phones: Pay attention to the messages you model—stay off the cell phone, personal digital assistant (PDA), and other electronic devices when you’re driving or engaged in other activities that deserve your full attention.
- Online Safety: Content blockers and filters are great tools to use with younger kids. They allow you more control over where they go and what they do online. A content blocker blocks sites with explicit material or limits a child’s search to a predetermined set of sites. A content filter scans sites and images and blocks those that contain certain words, key phrases, or content.
- Cell Phones: Some single parents and working parents find it essential for their young child to get a kid-friendly cell phone that can be programmed with five numbers (such as for home, your work, the next-door neighbor, grandparents, and another significant adult). It’s a great way to have your child check in with you to let you know he or she caught the bus or has safely gotten home.
- Online Safety: Remember that not all adult sites post an industry rating that can be identified by blocker, filter, or tracker software. That’s why it’s important to talk to your kids about what to do when something inappropriate or scary pops up.
- Television: Watch what your kids watch. Talk about what they’re seeing. Ask provocative questions such as, “What do you think of that character drinking all that alcohol?” State your values clearly. “I don’t like it when people swear. I don’t want you to swear either.”
- Cell Phones: Just because your child has a cell phone doesn’t mean that you know where your child is (or that you’ll be able to get a hold of him). The batteries can run out. Kids can call and say they’re at the library when they’re actually at a friend’s house. Cell phones are not foolproof. Talk about the importance of honesty.
- Online Safety: Consider tracking software for older teenagers. This software enables you to see which sites your children have visited, tracking their path online. This tool gives young people more freedom to explore the Internet, but it also allows you to verify that they are using the internet responsibly. Let your teenagers know that you trust them, but that you will be periodically verifying that they are visiting appropriate sites online.
- Cell Phones: Talk to your kids about “sexting” (sending sexually-suggestive photos or comments through text messages). Make sure they understand that sexually inappropriate language and pictures are not allowed.
- Social Networking: Most social networking sites feature strong privacy settings that enable your child to decide which information to share with all other users of that site can see, and which is restricted only to friends. Understanding and using these settings is important not only for your child’s safety, but also to prevent any unwanted embarrassment or vulnerability.
- Remember: nothing can replace involvement and supervision by adults. Keep monitoring how your kids use the media and technology on a regular basis without becoming an “Internet Cop”.
Tips From the ExpertOur media and technology expert, Dr. David Walsh, is the founder of National Institute on Media and the Family and a nationally recognized brain development expert and authority on media. Much of the material for this section has been adapted from the National Institute on Media and the Family's MediaWise Parenting.
Smart Parenting, Smarter Kids
By: Dr. David Walsh
Filled with helpful quizzes and checklists, Smart Parenting, Smarter Kids gives specific advice about how to make the best decisions for kids. When children are guided to eat, sleep, play, exercise, learn, and connect with others in healthy ways, their minds blossom and they are able to reach their full potential—academically, socially, physically, and emotionally. These real-life applications in Dr. Walsh’s new book put science into practice with a personal plan that explains how to parent with the brain in mind. Learn more > | <urn:uuid:f3fb5e4e-f294-415e-9ec9-834a9ce45f7d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.parentfurther.com/resources/enewsletter/e-parenting | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.92465 | 1,121 | 2.875 | 3 |
Steve C Smith and Peter Phillips
Victoria's 'Requiem' Mass (as we now call it) has for many decades and for many people typified Spanish Renaissance music. Its mystical intensity of expression, achieved by the simplest musical means, obviously sets it apart from contemporary English and Italian music, and has led to comparisons of it with the equally intense religious paintings of Velazquez and El Greco. There is no doubt that this masterpiece conveys much of the highly individual Spanish view of religion and death, and this is the more valuable since their vision is largely unfamiliar outside Spain herself.
In fact Victoria was just one of a very substantial school of Spanish Renaissance composers; and one of the least prolific amongst them. Many of these deserve to be considered along with Victoria, though none wrote a mass quite as mature as this. One possible reason for their collective lack of fame is that they travelled very little, unless it were to the New World, unlike their Netherlandish contemporaries. Victoria was lucky in this respect. Having been born in Avila in 1548 and brought up there in the tradition of Morales, Espinar and Ribera, he went to Rome probably in 1565 to study at the Jesuit Collegio Germanico. Once there he must surely have met Palestrina, and was possibly taught by him. The subtleties of Palestrina's polyphonic idiom are regularly to be found in Victoria's music, unlike that of his Spanish contemporaries, and it gave him an extra dimension of technique when it suited him. In fact in this Requiem there is very little imitative polyphony and the lack of it allows its Spanish flavour to speak all the more strongly. Victoria stayed in Rome until 1587 at the latest, by which time he had been ordained priest (by Bishop Thomas Goldwell, the last surviving member of the pre-Reformation English Catholic hierarchy in Rome), and published several anthologies of his work. By the end of his life he had succeeded in publishing just about his entire output in eleven sets, most in luxurious format, which was a great deal more than Palestrina ever did. This 6-part Requiem appeared by itself in 1605, and was the last of the series.
From 1587 until his death in 1611 Victoria was employed in Madrid, initially as chaplain to the sister of Philip II: the Dowager Empress Maria, daughter of Charles V, wife of Maximilian II and mother of two emperors. It was for her funeral in 1603 that this Requiem was written. After her death Victoria became organist to the convent where the Empress had lived. Since he was by profession almost as much a priest as a musician, it will be understood why Victoria only wrote sacred music, though it should not be assumed that it is all sombre. By his contemporaries Victoria was held to be an essentially joyful composer and there are many motets to prove this, some of them in polychoral style. In addition much of his music has quite strongly madrigalian features, with liberal use of accidentals, diminished intervals, and word-painting (witness the rising scales on 'surge' in the motet Nigra sum recorded on Gimell CDGIM 003).
This recording of the 6-part Requiem follows the edition prepared by Bruno Turner, published by Mapa Mundi. In his preface to this edition Mr Turner explains that the 1605 print of the music carried some extra motets and liturgical items, as was customary at that time, which would have been added in performance to the Missa pro defunctis proper. These were the 4-part Taedet animam meam (the second lesson of Matins of the Dead) which has been moved to the very beginning to serve as a simple introduction; the motet Versa est in luctum, which may well have been sung as the dignitaries and clergy assembled at the catafalque before the Absolution; and the Absolution itself, for which Victoria wrote the full Responsorium, Libera me, Domine, with its final 'Kyrie eleison'. The only peculiarity of the print is the omission of a setting of the usual verse 'Hostias et preces' and the consequent repeat of 'Quam olim Abrahae' in the Offertorium. Although it may be possible to find a suitable chant setting of these words, and thus satisfy full liturgical demands, it is not musically convincing to do so and these words are omitted here.
All the music of this setting, except the initial Taedet animam meam, is scored for SSATTB. The second soprano part unusually carries the cantus firmus, though it very often disappears into the surrounding part-writing since the chant does not move as slowly as most cantus firmus parts and the polyphony does not generally move very fast. Victoria himself printed most of the unaccompanied chant incipits, though the editor has provided the short second 'Agnus Dei' and the final 'Requiescant in pace'. This scoring also holds true for Alonso Lobo's beautiful setting of Versa est in luctum, which was written for the funeral of Philip II of Spain, the brother of the recipient of Victoria's own setting. Lobo (c.1555-1617) was widely held to be the finest composer in Spain during his lifetime, and there is evidence that Victoria thought so too.
© 1987 Peter Phillips | <urn:uuid:b53f12fc-22a5-4fe8-93b7-913389c4d76e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gimell.com/recording-victoria---requiem.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982521 | 1,128 | 2.21875 | 2 |
April 26, 2012
The first time the dog ran free and cornered Shellie in their gated community in Sanford, Florida, George called the owner to complain. The second time, Big Boi frightened his mother-in-law’s dog. Zimmerman called Seminole County Animal Services and bought pepper spray. The third time he saw the dog on the loose, he called again. An officer came to the house, county records show.
“Don’t use pepper spray,” he told the Zimmermans, according to a friend. “It’ll take two or three seconds to take effect, but a quarter second for the dog to jump you,” he said.
“Get a gun.”
That November, the Zimmermans completed firearms training at a local lodge and received concealed-weapons gun permits. In early December, another source close to them told Reuters, the couple bought a pair of guns. George picked a Kel-Tec PF-9 9mm handgun, a popular, lightweight weapon.
April 26, 2012 | Categories: 2012 Election, Amendment Rights, America's Freedoms, Corruption, Corruption in Government, Deficit, Due Process of Law, Education, Election 2012, Elections Politics, Electorate, Freedom Justice and Liberty, Government, Individual Rights and Freedoms, Learn from History, Manufactured Crisis, Media Corruption, Most Americans Reject Socialism, New Media News, Politically Intentioned Crisis, Politics, Poll Numbers, POTUS Deception, POTUS Elibility Issue, Privacy for Citizens, Progressives pushing for Marxism/Socialism, Race Relations, Rejecting Political Correctess, Religious Freedoms, Reverse Discrimination, Scandals, UNION Corruption | Tags: Big Boi, cared for two African-American girls, Catholic, Fairfax County, fall of 2009, FLA, George and Shellie Zimmerman, George Zimmerman, married in Alexandria, media bias, mixed household, pit bull, politics, premature judgement, Sanford, self-defense, Trayvon Martin, Zimmerman U. S. Army veteran | 1 Comment »
By Joshua Rhett Miller
Published August 02, 2010
Residents in Virginia’s Fairfax County should watch for homemade chemical bombs placed in residential mailboxes or on front lawns, authorities say.
Anthony Barrero, battalion chief of the Fairfax County Fire and Rescue Department’s Fire and Hazardous Material Investigative Services unit, said 11 such crude devices have been found in Reston, Great Falls and West Springfield since May. No injuries have been reported and the incidents are thought to have been spread by “word of mouth,” Barrero said.
“These events tend to occur in clusters,” he said. “We suspect they are placed by young adults or juveniles. We don’t believe there’s any correlation to them other than word of mouth. They’re just pranks.”
August 2, 2010 | Categories: America's Freedoms, Education, National Security, New Media News, Science & Technology | Tags: Battalion Chief Anthony Barrero, chemical bombs, Fairfax County, home-made mailbox bombs, suspects, Virginia Authorities, warning residents, word of mouth, young adults or juviniles | 1 Comment » | <urn:uuid:3031e8b5-e4da-4fba-8630-65289c3dd77b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://conservativewatchnews.com/tag/fairfax-county/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.918415 | 670 | 1.6875 | 2 |
- Written by D.J. Waldie
21 Jun 2011
COMMENTARY - Rick Caruso - billionaire developer of retail romance - made money by reimagining Los Angeles one shopping center at a time. He may get a chance to reimagine the entire city if he decides to run for mayor in 2013. (Mayor Villaraigosa is term-limited out.)
Recasting the city's image has been the collective "art" of Los Angeles from the moment its American occupiers settled down to run their small, vulgar, and dangerous town. In 1847, the image of Los Angeles was "our Mexico."
In the boom years around 1900, it was "our Spain" and then "our Italy" and a romantically exotic retreat in the sunshine. Los Angles became "our future" around 1945 as the region transformed itself into the suburban everywhere of modern America.
By the mid-1990s, the city, marginalized by its suburbs, had become the sum of the suburbs' greatest fears.
The image of Los Angeles today merges all of these places: barrio, suburban bunker, Blade Runner stand-in, and threatened paradise.
To these, Rick Caruso would like to add regional mall - an amalgam of the Grove and The Americana at Brand, including a street trolley. Here's how Tim Rutten put it the other day in the Los Angeles Times:
“Last week, Caruso spoke to a San Fernando Valley audience and repeated not only his familiar critiques -- opposition to the subway, a desire to break up the Los Angeles Unified School District, a call to abolish the gross receipts tax -- but also a sketch of the city's future as he envisions it.
Speaking from "the developer's point of view on how to make Los Angeles more livable," he envisioned neighborhoods each organized around its own shopping center, all of which would be connected by an above-ground light-rail system.”
A developer's image of the city - safe, leisurely, and entertaining - isn't far from what Los Angeles wanted to make of itself in 1900, when electric railways, street trolleys, funiculars, and even cable cars connected the city's neighborhoods.
Los Angeles succeeded in mirroring its early developers' image at least until the 1930s, but at the cost of civil liberties, racial equality, honest politics, labor solidarity, adequate public recreation and so much else.
What the cost of recreating that image might be troubles Rutten:
“Perhaps that is what people want: a Los Angeles in which the last distinctions between public and commercial spaces are swept away; a new sort of city in which the old American notion of lives lived in pursuit of happiness is redefined as an endless chain of convenient commercial transactions.”
Businessmen who run for office are fond - as Caruso is - of redefining citizens as "customers." That shows their lack of imagination. Customers have no moral obligations to each other; citizens do.
(Mathew Fleischer takes a look at these issues from a public transit perspective here.)
(D. J. Waldie, author, historian, and as the New York Times said in 2007, "a gorgeous distiller of architectural and social history," writes about Los Angeles every Monday and Friday at 2 p.m. on KCET's SoCal Focus blog. This commentary was posted first at KCET.org) Photo credit: flickr user R.E. –cw
Tags: The Grove, Rick Caruso, DJ Waldie, developer, Los Angeles, barrio, Blade Runner, street trolley
Vol 9 Issue 49
Pub: June 21, 2011 | <urn:uuid:c2eb0bf8-8c8d-43b1-9df1-68d157be2f92> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://citywatchla.com/lead-stories/1818-the-billionaire-developer-and-the-reimagining-of-la | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954053 | 761 | 1.898438 | 2 |
NEWS & PRESS RELEASES
Online Master of Arts program adds Literature concentration
Developing the ability to understand, evaluate, and use literature in life and ministry is the focus of a new concentration in BBC's Master of Arts program.
The totally online Literature program expands students' analytical and interpretation skills in literary content and criticism and broadens their ability to think critically in a range of contexts.
Led by Dr. Janet Hicks, chair of BBC's English and Communications Department and director of the Master of Education program, the graduate-level concentration enables students to:
- Use communication skills to think, write, and speak clearly and effectively about Christian and non-Christian worldviews through literary analysis.
- Read and interpret literature literally, grammatically, and historically.
- Demonstrate critical thinking skills to recognize and evaluate literature and the perspective from which it is written, assessing its contribution to critical thought.
- Show information literacy skills to retrieve, evaluate, and synthesize information for the development of a thesis.
Learn more about Literature at BBC online at www.bbc.edu/graduate.
Special program, special opportunities
Graduates of online Master of Arts program's Literature concentration will be able to study and learn from the Bible with greater thoroughness and intensity. Their greater capacity for study will vastly broaden their skills and career options.
The 30 credit hour program can be completed in two years online. Details on classes, options, and pricing are online.
The flexible, affordable online Master of Arts offers concentrations in several areas, including Bible, Church/Ministry Education, Counseling, Intercultural Studies, Literature, Professional Writing, Organizational Leadership, Social Entrepreneurship, Urban Ministry, and Worldview Studies.
For details, contact Graduate Admissions at [email protected].
Baptist Bible College & Seminary offers an outstanding Christian education through on-campus, online, and other distance learning options. Students go beyond the ordinary, learning to learn and serve with excellence as they gain critical leadership and life skills.
To learn more, go to www.bbc.edu or call 570.586.2400.
Posted on: 8/2/2011 8:53:00 AM | <urn:uuid:badee332-ce96-4043-89d6-6f60bc9dea5d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bbc.edu/news.asp?ID=2230 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.906232 | 453 | 1.734375 | 2 |
Programs » Student Body
The teen years are an ideal time to establish healthy attitudes and habits to last a lifetime. Unfortunately, many of our youth are not physically fit, have poor eating habits, and are often bothered by a lack of self-esteem. Student Body gives teens the facts and incentives they need to build a healthy body, both today and in the future.
To help members focus their projects, Student Body addresses three units. Members may complete projects in one or several units:
Deadline: Applications must be submitted online to FCCLA national headquarters by March 1. The online award system will automatically close March 1, 11:59 p.m. EST.
Student Body Preview Application (.pdf)
Action for Healthy Kids - Engaging diverse organizations, leaders, and volunteers in actions that foster sound nutrition and good physical activity in children, youth, and schools.
American Cancer Society - A nationwide, community-based, voluntary health organization dedicated to eliminating cancer as a major health problem by preventing cancer, saving lives, and diminishing suffering from cancer, through research, education, advocacy, and service.
March of Dimes - Improving the health of babies by preventing birth defects, premature birth, and infant mortality. Each mission is carried out through research, community services, education and advocacy to save babies' lives. March of Dimes researchers, volunteers, educators, outreach workers and advocates work together to give all babies a fighting chance against the threats to their health: prematurity, birth defects, low birth weight.
National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy - Improving the lives and future prospects of children and families and, in particular, to help ensure that children are born into stable, two-parent families who are committed to and ready for the demanding task of raising the next generation. Our specific strategy is to prevent teen pregnancy and unplanned pregnancy among single, young adults.
National Dairy Council - Provides timely, scientifically sound nutrition information to the media, physicians, dietitians, nurses, educators, consumers and others concerned about fostering a healthier society.
National Sleep Foundation - An independent nonprofit organization dedicated to improving public health and safety by achieving understanding of sleep and sleep disorders, and by supporting sleep-related education, research, and advocacy.
Don't have Adobe Acrobat Reader? | <urn:uuid:88a4a15d-846e-43e7-8bb4-ddc63c68a92b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.fcclainc.org/content/student-body/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94168 | 468 | 2.765625 | 3 |
Provisioning an EC2 Instance
EC2 images are bare bones propositions, so you have to provision them that is, install whatever software you want running on them. Thus, you'll need to log into the EC2 images via SSH. And to do so, you'll need an EC2 private key pair created before you fire up an image. The easiest way to get the keys is to create them via the AWS management console.
For example, once you've signed into the AWS Management console, select the EC2 tab. From there, you should see a Key Pairs link in the left-hand navigation bar, as shown in Figure 1.
If you click the Key Pairs link, you will be presented with a view containing a button labeled Create Key Pair, which if you click, will allow you to name a key pair and consequently download it. Alternatively, you can also create a key pair using AWS's command-line tools. Configuring these tools is fairly simple, provided you're comfortable with the command line and altering your path. Once you've installed these tools, you can create a key pair effortlessly; like so:
This script will output an RSA private key, which you'll need to copy and paste into a file in this case, I'd call the file "my_new_keypair.pem"; don't forget to run chmod 600 on the file, so that it is indeed kept private.
Next, you'll need to create a security policy for your running image. In EC2 terms, this means specifying what ports are open to traffic. For the purposes of this article, I'll be enabling SSH and HTTP/HTTPS. If you need other services, like FTP or non-standard ports for HTTP (like 8080) open to the outside world, you'll need to explicitly enable those ports.
To define a security group, click the Security Groups link in the left-hand navigation bar of the EC2 tab. As with key pairs, there will be a button labeled Create Security Group, as in Figure 2.
Click it and you'll be asked to name your security group; what's more, you can then create rules for inbound traffic.
Security group rules are a bit confusing at first, but they are simple to define. For instance, a source of 0.0.0.0/0 means from any outside request, which is probably what you want for now. You can see though that you can fine tune your security policies using this scheme (Figure 3).
Once you've defined a security policy and created a private key pair, you are ready to fire up an EC2 AMI in one of two ways. You can programmatically fire one up or you can start an EC2 AMI via the AWS management console.
As I mentioned earlier, there are several languages to choose from when it comes to programmatically interacting with AWS and you are free to use AWS provided SDKs or open-source independent implementations.
Using the AWS Java SDK, for instance, is fairly easy to start an AMI all you need to do is tell AWS which AMI you'd like to start, what type of instance you'd like to provision, what security policy to apply, and finally what private key pair (Figure 4) to use:
AmazonEC2 ec2 = new AmazonEC2Client(new BasicAWSCredentials("....", "...")); RunInstancesRequest runInstancesRequest = new RunInstancesRequest() .withInstanceType("t1.micro") .withImageId("ami-46f4092f") .withMinCount(1) .withMaxCount(1) .withSecurityGroupIds("AMI-Def") .withKeyName("my_key"); RunInstancesResult runInstances = ec2.runInstances(runInstancesRequest);
Alternatively, you can sign into the AWS management console, and within a few clicks, launch an AMI. The provided wizard makes it very simple to select an AMI, an instance type, and you're free to select existing key pairs or even create them then and there.
For instance, from the Instances link on the left navigation bar, you can click the Launch Instance button, which starts a handy wizard (Figure 5).
Finally, you can also provision an instance via the command line using the
ec2-run-instances command, you can specify an AMI, key pair via the
-k flag, and security group via the
-g flag, to name a few of the available options.
ec2-run-instances ami-46f4092f -k dr_dbs_pair2 -g AMI-Def
It should be noted that with the command line, you can start an EC2 instance without any security group (in which case the default group will be added, which is to say no port is open!). You later add authorized ports via the
The EC2 AMI that I tend to favor these days is ami-46f4092f, which is an Ubuntu image provided by the Ubuntu team. Ubuntu has quite a few official AMIs to choose from running various versions of Ubuntu as well as AMIs for i386 or AMD64 architectures.
Of course, firing up an AMI on EC2 is the easy part making use of it is another story. When you provision a Linux AMI with EC2, like ami-46f4092f, you can SSH to it using the key pair you assigned to that instance. To do so, you tell SSH which key to use:
ssh -i .ec2/dr_dobbs.pem [email protected]
Most AMIs provide instructions on whom to SSH as, for instance, Ubuntu images use the ubuntu user, who has sudo privileges. Of course, once you're on your EC2 instance, you need to do something with it. In this case, I'm going to install a few packages namely, Java 1.6, Git, and a few system utilities.
Installing core libraries and platforms, such as Java or Ruby on an Ubuntu image can be somewhat of a pain; consequently, I ended up creating a series of scripts that make this process pretty simple. The project containing the scripts is hosted on Github and is dubbed ubuntu-equip. To install Java, for example, once you are on your desired EC2 instance via SSH, type
wget --no-check-certificate https://github.com/aglover/ubuntu-equip/raw/master/equip_java.sh && bash equip_java.sh
This script will install a few core libraries along with the official Sun (now Oracle) Java 1.6 JDK; what's more, this script also installs Git. At this point, you've got an EC2 instance running in the cloud ready for deployment of a Java application!
EC2, like the rest of AWS, is a game changer. The ability to rapidly provision a wide range of computing resources on a pay-as-you-go basis has ushered in a new era of innovation. Whether you're tinkering in a garage or working for a large company, you have a low-cost option to put working software into production. And should that application become the next Twitter or Facebook, it can quickly scale it to meet user needs.
In a future article, I'll get into the topic of running your own apps on the AWS instances.
Andrew Glover is the CTO of App47, a company specializing in enterprise mobility. He also is the author of easyb, a BDD framework that won the Jolt Award in 2009. Previously, he was the President of Stelligent. | <urn:uuid:4371dd0d-cdd6-4445-af5a-d9ca730ddede> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.drdobbs.com/cloud/getting-started-with-the-cloud-amazon-we/231601598?pgno=2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.906503 | 1,618 | 2.171875 | 2 |
Duluth, MN (NNCNOW.com)
Hartley Nature Center in Duluth has been making most of its own electricity for ten years now via solar panels.
The system has been virtually trouble free for a decade.
"It's pretty much hands off. For us here, the system runs itself." said Brett Amundson of Hartley Nature Center.
Several other public buildings in Duluth are on the solar bandwagon as well.
"It's surprising if you look around town, the Duluth Public Library has solar panels on the roof. Saint Louis County has been a real leader; their parking garage." said environmentalist Andrew Slade.
There are also a few private homes in the Northland that are off the power grid or are feeding homemade electricity into said grid.
A group called Minnesota 20/20 wants more of that.
Their spokesman, Matt Entenza, states only two percent of our power is solar.
"Entenza says if more people start putting solar panels up in their backyards, we could drastically raise the amount of solar energy feeding Minnesota's power needs." said Dave Anderson near one of Hartley's solar panels.
"We would like to see over ten percent solar in the next ten years and we can do that because Minnesota is a great solar resource." said Matt Entenza of MN 20/20.
Entenza tells us that Minnesota gets as much annual sunshine as Rome, Italy.
But, the state has laws prohibitive to financing solar systems to private homes and others that restrict how much surplus electricity that can be sold back to the power companies.
Entenza feels people need to contact their legislators so we can further tap into nature's purest energy source.
"Other states have done this. We should make it happen here because a solar future keeps more jobs and money here in Minnesota and it'll help our future and have a better environment." said Entenza.
In Duluth, Dave Anderson, KBJR 6 and Range 11.
Minnesota 20/20 is a nonpartisan, progressive think tank that focuses on the issues like education, health care, transportation and economic development as well as environmental issues.
They are based in the Twin Cities. | <urn:uuid:9cabfa23-ecf7-4f71-a5e7-00a7041c9ea9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.northlandsnewscenter.com/news/outdoors/Nature-Matters--MN-2020-Wants-More-Solar-Power-189871371.html?vid=a | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961007 | 451 | 2.3125 | 2 |
Extending Manufacturing Extension
The time has come to refine and strengthen the successful federal program to help small companies tap new technology.
At the start of this decade, U.S. efforts to help smaller manufacturers use technology were patchy and poorly funded. A handful of states ran industrial extension programs to aid companies in upgrading their technologies and business practices, and a few federal centers were also getting underway. Eight years later the picture has changed considerably. Seventy-five programs are now operating across the country under the aegis of a national network known as the Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP). This network has not only garnered broad industrial and political endorsement but has also pioneered a collaborative management style, bringing together complementary service providers to offer locally managed, demand-driven services to small manufacturers. That approach contrasts markedly with the fragmented "technology-push" style of previous federal efforts. Most important, early evidence indicates that the MEP is helping companies become more competitive. But to exert an even more profound impact, the MEP needs to pursue a strategic, long-term approach to ensuring the vitality of small manufacturers.
When proponents advanced ideas in the late 1980s for a national system of manufacturing extension, U.S. firms were facing stiff new competition from other countries. A wrenching decade of restructuring followed by strong domestic growth has boosted the competitive position of the U.S. economy. Yet most of the gains in U.S. manufacturing performance have occurred among larger companies with the resources to reengineer their industrial processes, introduce new technologies and quality methods, and transform their business practices. The majority of small firms lag in productivity growth and in adopting improved technologies and techniques. Indeed, in recent years, per-employee value-added and wages in small U.S. manufacturers have fallen increasingly behind the levels attained in larger units.
Industrial extension focuses mainly on these small manufacturers. There are some 380,000 industrial companies in the United States with fewer than 500 employees. Small manufacturers frequently lack information, expertise, time, money, and confidence to upgrade their manufacturing operations, resulting in under-investment in more productive technologies and missed opportunities to improve product performance, workforce training, quality, and waste reduction. Private consultants, equipment vendors, universities, and other assistance sources often overlook or cannot economically serve the needs of smaller firms. System-level factors, such as the lack of standardization, regulatory impediments, weaknesses in financial mechanisms, and poorly organized inter-firm relationships, also constrain the pace of technological diffusion and investment.
The MEP addresses these problems by organizing networks of public and private service providers that have the resources, capabilities, and linkages to serve smaller companies. Manufacturing extension centers typically employ industrially experienced field personnel who work directly with firms to identify needs, broker resources, and develop appropriate assistance projects. Other services are also offered, including information provision, technology demonstration, training, and referrals. Given the economy-wide benefits of accelerating the deployment of technology and the difficulties many companies face in independently implementing technological upgrades, the MEP is a classic example of how collective public action in partnership with the private sector can make markets and the technology diffusion process more efficient. For example, rather than competing with private contractors, as some critics feared, the MEP helps companies use private consultants more effectively and encourages firms to implement their recommendations.
The federal effort began when the 1988 Trade and Competitiveness Act authorized the Department of Commerce's National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to form regional manufacturing technology centers. The first few years brought just a small increase in federal support; only with the Clinton administration's pledge to build a national system did the MEP take off. Under a competitive process managed by NIST, resources from the Technology Reinvestment Project--the administration's defense conversion initiative--and the Commerce Department became available. The states had to provide matching funds, with private industry revenues expected as well. Existing state manufacturing extension programs were expanded and new centers were established so that, by 1997, the MEP achieved coverage in all fifty states. In FY97, state monies plus fees from firms using MEP services matched some $95 million in federal funding. Congress has endorsed a federal budget of about $112 million for the MEP in FY98--more than a sixfold increase over the 1993 allocation.
MEP centers directly operate more than 300 local offices and work with more than 2,500 affiliated public and private organizations, including technology and business assistance centers, economic development groups, universities and community colleges, private consultants, utilities, federal laboratories, and industry associations. Through this network, the MEP services reach almost 30,000 firms a year. (Some two-thirds of these companies have fewer than 100 employees.) The program is decentralized and flexible: Individual centers develop strategies and services appropriate to state and local conditions. For example, the Michigan Manufacturing Technology Center specializes in working with companies in the state's automotive, machine tool and office furniture industries. Similarly, the Chicago Manufacturing Center has developed resources to address the environmental problems facing the city's many small metal finishers.
Originally, Congress envisaged that NIST's manufacturing centers would transfer advanced cutting-edge technology developed under federal sponsorship to small firms. But MEP staff soon realized that small companies mostly need help with more pragmatic and commercially proven technologies; these firms often also needed assistance with manufacturing operations, workforce training, business management, finance, and marketing to get the most from existing and newly introduced technologies. Most MEP centers now address customers' training and business needs as well as promote technology. In general, centers have found that staff and consultants with private-sector industrial experience are better able than laboratory researchers to deliver such services.
Most manufacturing extension projects result in small but useful incremental improvements within firms. But in some cases, much larger results have been produced. A long-established pump manufacturer with nearly 130 employees was assisted by the Iowa Manufacturing Technology Center to gain an international quality certification; subsequently, the company won hundreds of thousands of dollars in new export sales. In western New York, a 14-employee machine shop struggled with a factory floor that was cluttered with machinery, scrap, and work in progress. The local MEP affiliate conducted a computer-aided redesign of the shop floor layout and recommended improved operational procedures, resulting in major cost savings, faster deliveries, freed management time, and increased sales for the company. In Massachusetts, manufacturing extension agents helped a 60-employee manufacturer of extruded aluminum parts address productivity, production scheduling, training, and marketing problems at its 50-year old plant. The company gives credit to MEP assistance for tens of thousands of dollars of savings through set-up time reductions, more timely delivery, and increased sales.
Systematic evaluation studies have confirmed that the MEP is having a positive effect on businesses and the economy. For example, in a 1995 General Accounting Office survey of manufacturing extension customers, nearly three-quarters of responding firms said that improvements in their overall business performance had resulted. Evaluations of the Georgia Manufacturing Extension Alliance reveal that one year after service, 68 percent of participating firms act on project recommendations, with more than 40 percent of firms reporting reduced costs, 32 percent reporting improved quality, and 28 percent making a capital investment. A benefit-cost study of projects completed by the Georgia program found combined net public and private economic benefits exceeded costs by a ratio of 1.2:1 to 2.7:1. A Michigan study using seventeen key technology and business performance metrics found that manufacturing technology center customers improve faster overall than comparable firms in a control group that did not receive assistance. A 1996 study of New York's Industrial Extension Service (an affiliate of the MEP) also found that the business performance of assisted firms was improved when compared with similar companies that did not receive assistance. Finally, a recent Census Bureau analysis indicates that industrial extension assisted firms have higher productivity growth than non-assisted companies, even after controlling for the performance of firms prior to program intervention.
Challenges and issues
The MEP has achieved national coverage and established local service partnerships; most important, the early evidence indicates that MEP services are leading to desired business and economic goals. However, now that the MEP has completed its start-up phase, several challenges and issues need to be addressed to enable the program to optimize the network it has established and to improve the effectiveness of manufacturing extension services in coming years.
Strategic Orientation. Although MEP affiliates are helping firms become leaner and more efficient, lower costs and higher efficiency are only part of a strategic approach to manufacturing and technology-based economic development. A continuing concern is that although the number of small manufacturing firms in the United States is growing, their average wages have lagged those of larger companies. Part of the problem is that many small companies produce routine commodity products with relatively low added value that are subject to intense international competition. If these firms are to offer higher wages, they must not only become more productive but also find ways to become more distinctive, responsive, and specialized. These capabilities may be promoted by deploying more advanced manufacturing processes, initiating proactive business strategies, forming collaborative relationships with other companies, or developing new products. But to help small firms move in these directions, the MEP will need to adjust its service mix to offer assistance that goes well beyond short-term problem solving for individual firms.
For instance, to help more small firms to develop and sell higher value products in domestic or export markets, the MEP should increase services that focus on new product design and development, and develop even stronger links to R&D centers and financing and marketing specialists. Already under way is a "supply-chain" initiative that aims to upgrade suppliers of firms or industries that are located across state boundaries. The MEP should do more along such lines by supporting initiatives that help suppliers and buyers talk to one another. The MEP has sponsored pilot projects to offer specialized expertise in crosscutting fields such as pollution control or electronic commerce. Again, such efforts should be expanded to stimulate the adoption of emerging technologies and practices, such as those involved with environmentally conscious manufacturing methods, the exploitation of new materials, and the use of new communication technologies. These efforts should be coupled with a greater emphasis on promoting local networks of small firms to speed the dissemination of information and encourage collaborative problem solving, technology absorption, training, product development, and marketing. | <urn:uuid:9ae31ddc-845c-4728-8846-dfe127f92ca8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.issues.org/14.3/shapira.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00047-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957113 | 2,072 | 2.109375 | 2 |
for National Geographic News
One size didn't fit all for the early dinosaur Plateosaurus, a new study suggests.
Fossils show the giant plant-eaters experienced sudden growth spurts, with some adults dwarfing others.
The study team estimates that the biggest individuals measured 33 feet (10 meters) in length and weighed almost 4 tons. Other dinos of the species were twice as small, managing an adult body length of only 15 feet (4.8 meters).
Researchers say the animal, which lived some 200 million years ago, had growth patterns like those seen in living reptiles but unlike those of other, later dinosaurs.
Scientists at the University of Bonn in Germany analyzed growth rings found in the fossilized leg and pelvic bones of Plateosaurus, a long-necked, two-legged dino once common across Europe.
The study, which appears tomorrow in the journal Science, suggests that adults grew at different rates and that their growth occurred either in rapid spurts or slow stretches depending on environmental conditions.
The scientists add that this growth model in such a large dino species means that Plateosaurus possibly marks an initial step in the evolution of genuinely warm-blooded dinosaurs.
Mammals grow "in accordance with a genetically programmed blueprint," said Martin Sander, a University of Bonn palaeontologist and lead study author.
Humans, for example, can reach different sizes as adults, but individuals' growth rates will be fairly predictable over time.
Dinosaurs were thought to have had steady growth patterns similar to mammals, but "our findings have thrown this conception into disarray, at least for one dinosaur," Sander said.
Sander and his colleagues say Plateosaurus probably had a similar metabolism to living reptiles. Like today's lizards, crocodiles, and turtles, the dinosaur's growth "was affected by environmental factors such as climate and food availability," the researchers report.
SOURCES AND RELATED WEB SITES | <urn:uuid:bae9b25c-4f2a-40ee-a781-7d1d23061709> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/12/1215_051215_dino_growth.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00073-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946293 | 403 | 4.1875 | 4 |
Because they aren't a community:
[I]t won't be easy for secular Americans to become better organized as a political force, even as they increase in number. The major impediment to that kind of organization is the fact that it is very difficult for secularists to conceive of themselves in tribal terms. Most tribes, whether of nations or ethnicities or sports fandom, can easily demarcate their membership—it's the people who look like us, or talk like us, or dress like us. Tribes organized around religious belief have rituals, sacred texts, and physical spaces that all serve to bind the participants together. Atheism has none of these things—most of the time it's an individual choice, made and kept alone. | <urn:uuid:e116af8e-046c-41c5-b112-c30faa23a748> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2012/03/29/why-atheists-cant-organize/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975829 | 150 | 1.765625 | 2 |
~ BOBTAILS ~
Imoen Boxers has introduced Bobtail Boxers into the bloodlines due to the Tail docking ban in Australia. This allows us to continue to breed the Boxer in its original fashion by having short tails.
Here is a short summary on the history of the Boxer with a naturally short tail, the Bobtail.
In 1992 Dr Bruce Cattanach "reinvented" the Boxer with a naturally short tail, the Bobtail Boxer. It began with the crossing of one of Dr. Cattanach’s Boxer bitches to a Pembroke Corgi with a dominantly inherited bobtail, Vaquera of Pemwell.
Dr. Cattanach is a geneticist by profession, with a specialty in the cause and analysis of genetic defects. He is a well respected breeder & exhibitor of Boxers in the UK under the Steynmere prefix established in 1949.
In a series of articles on Dr Cattanach's website - the creation of naturally short tailed (bobtail) Boxers as carried out over a series of generations is documented.
To answer the question on the possibility of Corgi characteristics reappearing in progeny, Dr Cattanach undertook a "double up" mating with a dog and bitch that were both only four generations removed from the Corgi. The four puppies were all short backed, had decent heads with obvious Boxer chins. None showed any trace of the short legs and longer coat type of the Corgi. The matings taking place in Australia now at least eight generations away from the Corgi and have less than 0.5% Corgi in their pedigree, the only gene being transferred is the Bobtail.
The length of a Bobtail can be in all variations, some even have a kink in the tail. A Bobtail can be identified by the feel of the end part of the tail. If there is no graduation to smaller bones towards the tip of the tail & fleshy part at the end of the tail - it is not a Bobtail. All of our Bobtails have veterinary documents verifying that they are in fact natural Bobtails.
Bobtail Boxers can now be found in the UK, Europe, America and Australia, and have competed successfully in the show ring with both long tailed and docked dogs. The disadvantage of the tail gene used is that it will not breed true, there will only be a percentage of puppies in a litter with Bobtails.
Following is information about our Bobtails....
Flame is out of Imoen's first Bobtail litter. Flame shows the true characteristics of the Boxer. She is pictured here at almost 8 months of age.... | <urn:uuid:13f2787a-27f4-4679-a035-5043f57011eb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://webspace.webring.com/people/ti/imoenboxers/aBOBTAILS.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956357 | 569 | 1.875 | 2 |
Source: Pat Pesci, 785-532-2210, [email protected]
Web site: http://www.k-state.edu/media/mediaguide/bios/pescibio.html
News release prepared by: Nellie Ryan, 785-532-6415, [email protected]
Monday, Nov. 9, 2009
K-STATE'S 'MR. MANNERS' OFFERS THANKSGIVING ETIQUETTE TIPS FOR KIDS AND ADVICE FOR PARENTS
MANHATTAN -- Sitting down to a big Thanksgiving dinner can be quite intimidating for a child who might be questioning which fork to pick up first or which direction to pass the rolls.
According to Pat Pesci, director of Kansas State University's hotel and restaurant management program and known as K-State's "Mr. Manners," there are several ways parents can help prepare their children for proper etiquette at a Thanksgiving dinner.
A practice dinner would be ideal, Pesci said, but it may be unrealistic as today's families are so busy. However, just talking about the event with your kids can be helpful -- just don't do so too far in advance or younger children might not understand or might forget what you told them, he said.
"Talking about it in the car on the way to Thanksgiving dinner and setting some rules or expectations for the child can be very positive," Pesci said. "As a parent, tell other adults at the gathering that your kids might need some help during the meal so the kids are not embarrassed to ask for help. Also, tell your kids to slow down with their food, ask questions and follow an adult's lead."
Kids also should be encouraged to ask if they can do anything to help, whether it is setting the table, decorating the house or helping in the kitchen, Pesci said.
"While sometimes the adults like taking care of it all, it is good practice for kids to start offering to help -- and it also impresses grandma," he said.
When it is time for the meal to start, Pesci said children should ask the host where they are supposed to sit. After sitting down, they should pick up their napkin, which usually will be located on their left, and place it on their lap.
When children see their place setting, they might be a little intimidated if there is more than one fork or a small plate and a large plate. Knowing what these items are for is confusing to children -- and some adults, too, Pesci said.
"It is perfectly OK for the child to ask for help," he said. "If they don't know which fork to use or the platter of turkey is to heavy for them to pass, kids should not be afraid to ask for help. Somebody will be there to instruct them."
When it comes to passing food, the person closest to the food passes it to the right at the start of the meal, Pesci said. The salad should be passed first. If a child wants a salad, the salad plate should be located to their right above the spoon. If two forks are at the place setting, the outside fork is the one they should use to eat their salad, he said.
Another issue for children is there might be food at Thanksgiving that they are unaccustomed to. Pesci said the correct thing to do is ask what is in it, and take a small sample.
"It would be impolite for a child to say 'I don't like this' or 'this doesn't taste good' when somebody at the table put a lot of work into cooking the meal," Pesci said. "Kids don't have to try all the food offered, but they should eat a variety."
Once the meal has started it is important for kids to remember to eat slowly. Often times, kids are in a rush to finish their meal, but for a special occasion like Thanksgiving, people are at the table to talk, share stories and enjoy each other's company, so it might last longer than a normal meal, Pesci said.
"Sometimes kids, especially teenagers, go to these meals and try to eat as fast as possible," Pesci said. "I always tell them to slow down -- it is not a race."
It is no secret that kids have growing bodies and often will dig in for seconds. Pesci said asking for seconds is OK, but there are some guidelines to follow.
"You don't want to be asking for seconds when the rest of the table hasn't even finished half their meal yet," Pesci said. "This goes back to the reason why kids should take their time while eating."
Pesci also offered these general rules for kids -- and adults -- to follow at Thanksgiving dinner:
* No hats at the dinner table;
* No chewing with your mouth open;
* No talking with food in your mouth; and
* No talking or texting on your cell phone at the dinner table.
When the meal is over, kids should offer to help cleanup, whether it is picking up the napkins and silverware from the dinner table or taking out the trash. The adults who prepared the meal will be very appreciative of this, Pesci said. | <urn:uuid:7fdc9446-a7e2-4878-b61a-a19e8817fc1d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.k-state.edu/media/newsreleases/seasonal/manners110909.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00073-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970903 | 1,094 | 2.390625 | 2 |
Texas Instruments Inc's chairman, Tom Engibous, has made a phone call from India to Europe on a live cellular network to demonstrate the company's next step strategy to deliver a single-chip cell phone solution for ultra-low-cost handsets in emerging markets, such as India.
According to the GSM Association, 80% of the world's population has wireless coverage; however, only about 20% subscribe to wireless services due largely to the cost of mobile phones. This represents a huge opportunity for delivering mobile services to large sections of the world's population. In India alone, roughly 11% of its total population has telecom connectivity with a mobile subscriber base of 58 million.
TI's cost-effective single-chip cell phone solution enables handset manufacturers to capitalize on the burgeoning opportunities in India and other emerging markets worldwide.
"The mobile phone is already indispensable in established markets, and wireless will become even more useful in countries where today the availability of wired communication is limited," said Engibous. "TI developed its single-chip cell phone solution specifically to narrow the digital divide. Our customers can use this technology to make ultra-low-cost handsets affordable in largely untapped consumer markets such as India, China, South America, Eastern Europe and other emerging markets."
TI announced last December that it had delivered the industry's first single-chip solution for mobile phones. Typical mobile phones require multiple chips to operate, which add to the overall cost. Developed through TI's advanced 90nm CMOS manufacturing technology, the single-chip solution is now sampling and targets the mass-market voice-centric marketplace. Leveraging TI's DRP (digital RF processor) technology, TI's single-chip cell phone solution integrates the bulk of handset electronics onto a single chip to dramatically reduce cost, power requirements, board area, and silicon area -- performance factors that are crucial for high-volume entry-level mobile phones.
Developed initially for GSM/GPRS handsets, TI's single-chip cell phone solution is paving the way for future single-chip solutions for additional air interfaces. With a roadmap designed to even further reduce system costs, TI is committed to continuing to drive down overall handset costs for emerging markets.
Recognizing the need for affordable handsets in developing countries, the GSM Association introduced its Emerging Markets Initiative earlier this year. With a goal of delivering up to six million handsets in the first six months, GSMA is working with manufacturers to deliver products at a price point below US$40, with the potential to add 100 million connections per year.
From NE Asia Online | <urn:uuid:a0e748bf-3b59-4da7-8284-b63314c63733> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cdrinfo.com/Sections/News/Details.aspx?NewsId=14684 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930431 | 528 | 1.789063 | 2 |
Originally posted on The Religion Beat, April 28, 2010
It’s the end of term and I’ve been overwhelmed with the hectic activities of marking and . . . well, marking. I’ve barely watched the news. There was a volcano or something that erupted, right? For the past few days my whole life has been consumed by marking final exams. With this in mind, I thought that instead of writing something new I would hit two birds with one stone and blog about my final exam.
My students think I’m cooler than I am. Or at least I like to think they do. This is because I try to bring the study of religion into conversation with phenomena that is socially relevant to what I imagine are the daily musings of an undergraduate student. Usually, I fail miserably: like the times I told them that Jonathan Z. Smith is the Tom Cruise of religious studies, referred to Gilgamesh and Enkidu as BFFs, and passed around Kool-Aid Jammers while screening a documentary on Jonestown.
But I think I got things right this time.
In my third year ‘Religion and the City’ course we looked at theories surrounding the ways that civic sites and identities become invested with ‘sacred’ meaning. Primarily we discussed the narratives that individuals and communities create in order to represent their relationships to, what one might term, non-conventional sacred spaces. All semester, we built theories involving North American religious identity; the ways, à la J. Z. Smith, that religions endorse locative or utopian worldviews; and the manner through which those on the margins subvert urban structures in order to articulate new or different ontologies.
I tried to draw connections between our material and the so-called “real world.” I showed them clips of Sarah Palin and Disney cartoons and attempted to argue that the hit movie Avatar is really a re-creation of Paul’s project in Rome.
Twenty-minutes into their three hour exam, I turned down the lights and announced that it was time for the audio-visual component of the exam. They smiled (or maybe smirked?) as the image of the Grammy-winning rapper Jay-Z (who I like to call “the other J-Z”) appeared in on the screen.
The exam question was as follows:
You have just been shown the music video for “Empire State of Mind” by hip hop artist Jay-Z, featuring guest contribution by R&B and soul singer-songwriter Alicia Keys. The lyrics have also been distributed to you. Making reference to both the lyrics and the images in the video, please answer the following questions.
- Identify the “speaker(s)” and the intended audience. Of what does the “speaker(s)” wish to persuade the audience?
- Is this a locative or utopian worldview? What leads you to your conclusion and why?
- What does the song suggest about human identity, civic/urban spaces and (potential) transcendence?
- How does the narrative of the song represent the city of New York? What does it suggest about American identity? Is it necessary that New York serve as the protagonist in this song (for example, could the same song feature Toronto or Istanbul or another major urban center?). Do you think that the lyrics would have been different if the song had been released prior to September 11th, 2001?
- Imagine that Jay-Z has asked you to adapt this song to Toronto. What themes and images would you include in your version of the song? Provide some sample lyrics of your song.
The students’ answers were brilliant! Absolutely brilliant!!!
They drew comparisons between Jay-Z’s text and the texts that we examined this term (The Epic of Gilgamesh, Augustine’s City of God, Orhan Pamuk’s Istanbul: Memories and the City, John Winthrop’s “City on a Hill” and Michael Ondaatje’s In the Skin of a Lion), our case studies (which examined the early Jesus Movement, Mormonism, Jonestown and the Salvation Army’s Gateway Shelter in Toronto’s downtown core) and our major theoretical interlocutors (Benedict Anderson, Eric Hobsbawm, Harold Bloom, Belden C. Lane, Michel Foucault, David Sibley and Mark Kingwell).
Their own attempts at rapping were innovative and definitely, in my opinion, give Jay-Z a run for his money (of which he has a lot). They mostly looked towards the identity of Toronto as a city of neighbourhoods, a multicultural haven for new immigrants to Canada and a place where diverse lifestyles are embraced. My students spoke to elements of Toronto that both evoke pride and inspire change—in some instances they even found time to suggest ways that they would like to change some of the negative aspects of our city.
I learned a lot from them, lessons which can only make me cooler for future pedagogical efforts. | <urn:uuid:159f8bf1-864a-41b3-96b3-84acd953e874> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://rebekkaking.wordpress.com/2010/08/31/take-my-exam-trust-me-its-cool/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00040-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962485 | 1,059 | 1.648438 | 2 |
Welcome to the Kansas School Nurse Organization
School nursing is a specialized practice of professional nursing that advances the well-being, academic success and lifelong achievement and health of students. To that end, school nurses facilitate positive student responses to normal development; promote health and safety, including a healthy environment; intervene with actual and potential health problems; provide case management services; and actively collaborate with others to build student and family capacity for adaptation, self management, self-advocacy and learning. (NASN, 2010)
KSNO Board with Linda Davis-Alldritt, RN, President, National Association of School Nurses
2012 Summer Conference for Kansas School Nurses
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National Association of School Nurses | <urn:uuid:66253c77-5b48-4223-a4ab-a10215bc9d3b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ksno.org/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.905758 | 248 | 2.078125 | 2 |
June 21, 2001 In the July issue of the journal Geology, a team of researchers has suggested that the climate phenomenon known as El Nino has been a contributing factor in the rise and fall of ancient civilizations in Peru. Using archeological evidence from sites along the Peruvian coast, scientists from the University of Maine, Yale University, University of Pittsburgh and University of Miami suggest that the fate of organized Peruvian societies may be related to environmental changes caused by flood cycles starting about 5,000 years ago.
Daniel Sandweiss of the UMaine Department of Anthropology and Institute for Quaternary and Climate Studies (IQCS), is lead author of the article which describes changes in mollusk assemblages in midden heaps. Co-authors are Kirk Maasch of the UMaine Dept. of Geological Sciences and IQCS, Richard L. Burger of Yale University, James B. Richardson III and Harold B. Rollins of the University of Pittsburgh and Amy Clement of the University of Miami.
“We found that there was a change in the frequency of El Nino events about 3,000 years ago and that this correlates in time with cultural change,” says Sandweiss.
Other researchers have reported similar evidence from Central and North America, Greenland and the Middle East that suggests a relationship between climate and culture. “We don't argue that climate is the driving force behind cultural development, but the evidence points to a strong contributory role,” says Sandweiss.
Mollusks are good environmental indicators, Sandweiss adds, because they are sensitive to rising temperatures. Since 1982, one species, Mesodesma donacium, has been driven further south, likely as a result of El Nino events. Researchers have shown that another species that lives further south along the Chilean coast, Choromytilus chorus, dies at an increasing rate when faced with water temperatures similar to those brought on by El Nino.
In ancient Peruvian sites, these two species were common in middens between 9 and 7 degrees south latitude but had disappeared by about 2,800 years ago. “The rapid disappearance of these species from northern Peruvian archaeological sites probably reflects an increase in the frequency of strong El Nino events to within the modern range of variability,” the Geology paper states.
Early cultural development in coastal Peru has been dated to just after the apparent onset of El Nino about 5,800 years ago. It is marked by large temple complexes and elaborate public art. These systems had collapsed by the period between 2,900 and 2,800 years ago. The longest lasting of the temple complexes is also the only one in which evidence of flood mitigation has been found.
“By doing something proactive about El Niño, the leaders of this site (Manchay Bajo) appear to have been making an appropriate response to changes in their environment. Whether or not it really worked for the most serious effects of El Niño we can't say, but if it did, that could have given them more long-lasting control,” Sandweiss suggests.
“The close temporal correlation between these changes in El Nino frequency and the construction and abandonment of monumental temples in this region suggests that climate and culture are here linked in a complex causal network,” the authors wrote.
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Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead. | <urn:uuid:b0e9278e-badb-4280-a009-d761117d862f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/06/010619074302.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951713 | 725 | 3.78125 | 4 |
The Speed of Matter
Barry Setterfield, March 25, 2006
In TJ 19(3) 2005, there was an article entitled "The Speed of Matter" by Justin K. Taylor in which he argues that time dilation is the answer to the problem of the extensive streams of matter which form bridges between galaxies and similar formations. Because these formations cover hundreds and thousands of light years in distance, they would have taken a long time to form under gravitational interactions. Therefore he concludes that Russell Humphrey's white hole cosmology with its time dilation effects must be correct for a young creation.
Because we have been refused publication in the standard creation journals, even though the article is evidently being written to directly oppose the Setterfield model by name, here is our response to this article in TJ.
Since writing this response in January of 2006, some considerable developments have occurred regarding the initial condition and creation of the cosmos, particularly with regard to an initial plasma condition of matter. This approach, when examined in detail, answers all of the questions that have been raised in the article in a very tight and concise way. There are a number of articles now available in the Research Papers section as well as lay explanations in Setterfield Simplified and the Genesis study.
* * * * *
In a recent TJ article (TJ 19(3) 2005, pp. 91-95), Justin K. Taylor of the US wrote an article entitled “The speed of matter.” He concluded from the evidence that he had presented that “Observations thus favour Humphrey’s and Hartnett’s cosmologies above Setterfield’s theory.” The evidence that Mr. Taylor presented includes jets from active galaxies that span millions of light years, along with colliding, merging or interacting galaxies, and galaxies with wakes or tails of matter that extend for large distances. In his section on the implications of these observations, Mr. Taylor concludes that “These observational data indicate that distant parts of the universe really are very old. This confirms that some sort of time-dilation has occurred in our near vicinity, as proposed by Humphreys and Hartnett. These data also indicate that the already-questioned cDK hypothesis, proposed by Barry Setterfield, is not sufficient to solve the entire problem.”
In view of that comment, it is interesting that Mr. Taylor came to all of his conclusions on the basis that the speed of light has remained unchanged throughout the history of the cosmos. Therein may lie part of the problem. For example, if he had admitted the possibility of a higher value for the speed of light, c, when discussing the jets from active galaxies, another option may have emerged. He mentions that the jets extend over 800,000 light years from the centre of the elliptical galaxy Centaurus A. He then goes on to state that if material from its active nucleus “had left the galaxy with an initial speed close to the [present] speed of light, it would have taken it several hundred million years (taking deceleration into account) to reach its present position.” Let us look at this.
Note first that the processes in the cores of these host galaxies are certainly capable of accelerating particles in plasmas to these extreme speeds. Also note that, in some cases, those processes may be more energetic with higher c values. Second, the reason that these particles cannot go any faster than c is the limitation imposed upon them by the speed of light itself, as outlined by Einstein’s Special Relativity. According to Relativity theory, particle mass increases as particle velocity increases until, at the speed of light, particle masses become infinite. This is therefore the limit velocity for any particle. However, if the speed of light was higher, so too would be this upper limit on particle velocity. Therefore, if the speed of light was higher, the accelerating process would allow much higher speeds to be achieved before any mass increase limited this. Now Centaurus A is about 11 million light years away. My recent work indicates that c was roughly 1 million times its current speed when the light we see today was emitted from Centaurus A. With the limit velocity therefore significantly higher, and the accelerating process thereby more energetic, the particles making up the jets could travel up to a million times faster. In other words, the jets in question could reach a distance of 800,000 light years in considerably less than 10,000 years, and the problem is thereby resolved.
As far as colliding or interacting galaxies, and galaxies leaving wakes are concerned, the higher speed of light in those earlier days would again have allowed faster movement of material. But there are two other points in addition to that. First of all, Mr. Taylor’s discussion about these objects assumes that the gravitational tidal forces from these objects caused the interaction. This may not necessarily be so. Some years ago, Hannes Alfven, who received the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1970, pointed out that these wakes and streamers may in fact have originated in magnetic fields associated with the plasma out of which these galaxies formed. Admittedly, the study of cosmic magnetism has started to grow only recently, but one can nonetheless discern that examining the problem from this approach opens up possibilities that unchanging gravitational interactions cannot. It promises to be a fruitful line of enquiry, since Alfven predicted in 1963 the large-scale filamentary structure of the universe which was confirmed in 1991, to the dismay of many involved in Big Bang cosmology.
The second point about interacting galaxies that needs to be made comes from the emerging variable light speed model. Obviously, this is not the place to give a detailed explanation of that model, but some points are relevant. If the universe is created as a high density water plasma, Professor Ed Boudreaux has shown that all the elements can be formed in their known abundances in something less than 30 minutes. As the universe is stretched out (which God says in the Old Testament twelve times that He did), the plasma cools and supersonic turbulence acts to concentrate the cooling plasma to form the proto-galaxies, stars and planets. There would thus be a multitude of various size whirlpools within larger whirlpools. The whirlpools that formed the galaxies would initially be very close together, with some interpenetrating. But as the cosmos was expanded out, these interacting galaxies would be rapidly separated, leaving wakes and streamers as a result of magnetic interaction in the plasma. The rapidity of the expansion of the cosmos during Creation Week was possible with a very high speed of light initially. It also allowed very rapid motion in the turbulent eddies that formed the proto-galaxies, stars and planets etc. Without the initial high speed of light, these processes would take significantly longer than one week. But the variable c scenario, coupled with the rapid expansion of the cosmos that started as a water plasma, does allow an explanation for some of the otherwise enigmatic features that Mr. Taylor noted. | <urn:uuid:9f082e07-1275-4473-a3a8-1830d74d6e37> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://setterfield.org/000docs/speedofmatter.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00041-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96017 | 1,438 | 2.875 | 3 |
Rapid technological advances have made possible interventions that have significantly improved the survival of sick infants and children. Notable among these is the use of intravascular catheters in the treatment of critically ill pediatric patients, particularly premature infants and other high-risk neonates. These advances have led to improved survival; unfortunately, they have been associated with multiple complications that result in morbidity and mortality. The increasing list of complications is extended by Daniels et al1 in this issue of the AJDC in a report on paroxysmal supraventricular tachycardia, resulting from right atrial positioning of a central venous catheter in a neonate.
The complications of arterial and venous catheters fall into several causal categories: perforation, sepsis, vessel scarring, improper placement, thrombotic and embolic events, and other causes. The relative risks of arterial v venous placement and the preferable position of the tip of umbilical arterial catheters will not be discussed beyond | <urn:uuid:35f18348-7eba-4123-ab75-8375a6da085b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://archpedi.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=511433 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00046-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.918603 | 209 | 2.15625 | 2 |
Ten More Cliches Christians Should Avoid
After writing up my first list of Ten Cliches Christians Should Never Use, some folks wrote me with other suggestions. After simmering on it for a while, I came up with a second list of ten to supplement the first.
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And as there was some confusions from a handful of fellow Christians about the intent of the articles: these are not intended to tell you to believe or not believe a certain set of things. Christians have a Public Relations problem; that much is self-evident. So in as much as I can respond to that, I want to offer these as advice on how to change the way we approach people about our faith.
On to the next ten cliches for Christians to avoid …
- Love the sinner, hate the sin.
This is a backhanded way to tell someone you love them, at best. It also ignores the command by Jesus not to focus on the splinter in our neighbors’ eyes while a plank remains in our own. Bottom line: we all screw up, and naming others’ sin as noteworthy while remaining silent about your own is arrogant.
- The Bible clearly says…
Two points on this one. First, unless you’re a Biblical scholar who knows the historical and cultural contexts of the scriptures and can read them in their original languages, the Bible isn’t “clear” about much. Yes, we can pick and choose verses that say one thing or another, but by whom was it originally said, and to whom? Cherry-picking scripture to make a point is called proof-texting, and it’s a theological no-no. Second, the Bible can be used to make nearly any point we care to (anyone want to justify slavery?), so let’s not use it as a billy club against each other.
- God needed another angel in heaven, so called him/her home.
Another well-meaning but insensitive thing to say. This assumes a lot about what the person you’re speaking to believes, and it also ignores the grief they’re going through. The person who died is, well, dead. Focus on the needs of the living right in front of you.
- Are you saved?
I’ve addressed the theological understandings of hell and judgment in other pieces, but regardless of whether you believe in hell, this is a very unattractive thing to say. First, it implies a power/privilege imbalance (i.e., “I’m saved, but I’m guessing you’re not based on some assumptions I’m making about you"), and it leaps over the hurdle of personal investment and relationship, straight into the deep waters of personal faith. If you take the time to learn someone’s story, you’ll likely learn plenty about what they think and believe in the process. And who knows? You might actually learn something too, rather than just telling others what they should believe.
- The Lord never gives someone more than they can handle.
What about people with mental illness? What about people in war-torn countries who are tortured to death? What about the millions of Jews murdered in the Holocaust? And this implies that, if really horrible things are happening to you, God “gave” it to you. Is this a test? Am I being punished? Is God just arbitrarily cruel? Just don’t say it.
- America was founded as a Christian nation.
Honestly, I find it hard to believe we are still having this conversation, but here we are. Anyone with a cursory understanding of history understands that we were founded on the principle of religious liberty – not just the liberty to be a Christian – and that many of the founding fathers explicitly were not Christian. Thomas Jefferson, anyone?
- The Bible says it; I believe it; that settles it.
If ever there was a top-shelf conversation killer this is it. You’re not inviting any opinion, response, thought or the like. You’re simply making a claim and telling others to shut up. Also, I’ve yet to meet someone who takes EVERY WORD of the Bible literally. Everyone qualifies something in it, like the parts about keeping kosher, wearing blended fibers, stoning adulterers, tossing your virgin daughters into the hands of an angry mob … you get the point.
- It was Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.
This is a little “joke” some Christians use to assert the superiority of opposite-sex unions over same-sex ones. But here’s the thing: if you really believe the first and only two people on the planet at one point were Adam and Eve, who did their kids marry and have babies with? This, my friends, is incest (happened again if you believe Noah’s family members were the only survivors of the great flood). This just demonstrates the selective moral blindness many of us Christian have and seriously compromises our credibility about anything else.
- Jesus was a Democrat/Republican.
Seems to me that, when pressed, Jesus was happy to keep church and state separate. Remember the whole thing about giving to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and giving to God what is God’s? And if we choose to, we can pick and choose anecdotes to support Jesus being a liberal (care for the poor, anti death penalty) or a conservative (challenge government authority, practice sexual purity). Jesus was Jesus, and if it was as simple as pegging him to one of two seriously flawed contemporary forms of government, I can promise you I would not be a Christian.
- (Insert sin here) is an abomination in the eyes of God.
Almost always, when this phrase is invoked, it has something to do with sex or sexuality. Seldom do folks care to mention that divorce and remarriage is in that list of so-called abominations. Also, there are several words translated in English Bibles as ‘abomination,’ many of which don’t imply the sort of exceptionalism that such a word makes us think of today. And while we’re on the thread of things scripture says God “hates,’ let’s consider this from Proverbs:
"These six things doth the LORD hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him: A proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, An heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, A false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren."
I’m going to go out on a limb and propose that telling someone that who they are or what they are doing is an abomination to God is tantamount to sowing discord among your brothers and sisters. And this, according to the text above is itself an abomination.
Christian Piatt is an author, editor, speaker, musician and spoken word artist. He co-founded Milagro Christian Church in Pueblo, Colorado with his wife, Rev. Amy Piatt, in 2004. Christian is the creator and editor of "Banned Questions About The Bible" and "Banned Questions About Jesus." His new memoir on faith, family and parenting is called "PREGMANCY: A Dad, a Little Dude and a Due Date."
What Would Jesus Do? Post-its photo. Keith Bell / Shutterstock.com | <urn:uuid:0eaae181-26e7-4330-a30c-e96ef2606c46> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://sojo.net/blogs/2012/07/09/ten-more-cliches-christians-should-avoid?quicktabs_blog_homepage_tabbed_block=2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958283 | 1,570 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Super Pit struggles take the shine off gold production
GOLD production in Australia slumped in the September quarter, as the nation's mines lagged under both planned and unplanned equipment outages.
Statistics compiled by gold experts Surbiton Associates show the amount of gold produced in Australia was lower than in the June quarter of 2012 and the September quarter of 2011.
The 62 tonnes produced across the nation was well below the 67 tonnes produced in the same period last year, and the 64 tonnes in the three months to June.
A Surbiton director, Dr Sandra Close, said the result was disappointing and influenced by the fact Kalgoorlie's ''Super Pit'' produced its lowest quarterly total in nearly five years.
Jointly owned by North American giants Barrick and Newmont, the Super Pit mined through lower-than-average grades during the period.
As a result, it was eclipsed by Newmont's Boddington mine - also in Western Australia - as the nation's biggest gold-producing mine.
A planned shutdown at Newcrest's Telfer mine also contributed.
But Dr Close said there was room for optimism, with several large projects, including Newcrest's Cadia East Underground expansion, ready to start producing gold within the next month or so.
The benchmark gold price spent most of last week hovering around $US1720 ($1649) an ounce. | <urn:uuid:c569b4f9-67dd-4ed6-a18a-1a9ac5fa2750> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.smh.com.au/business/super-pit-struggles-take-the-shine-off-gold-production-20121202-2aoyu.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00047-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963124 | 285 | 1.65625 | 2 |
As a first-semester student in Presidio School of Management’s MBA in Sustainable Management program, I’ve been learning quite a bit about what sustainability really means, and what it will take for business and our economy to become sustainable. One topic that gets discussed quite a bit is how to encourage people and business to use natural resources more efficiently, while encouraging them to use more of the one resource that isn’t in short supply: human labor. Inevitably, the discussion turns to tax policy, specifically, how the US income tax system makes labor more expensive while discouraging savings and encouraging consumption. One professor suggested that a possible solution is to stop taxing labor and begin to tax things that we want less of, like carbon emissions.
This really caught my attention, because I have been a long-time advocate of the FairTax legislation, which would replace the Federal income tax and payroll taxes, and many other federal taxes with a consumption tax. It occurred to me that enacting the FairTax would, in addition to a myriad of other benefits, solve one piece of the puzzle, namely untaxing labor and making labor more attractive in the marketplace. I also realized that there are a number of other benefits of the FairTax which apply to sustainability, such as encouraging savings and discouraging consumption, encouraging purchases of used items (re-use), encouraging investment in education, and creating a safety net for the poor. In the remainder of this article, I will explain how the FairTax can be a positive tool in the effort to make the U.S. more sustainable.
I would like to start by stating a couple of things straight away: I am currently a volunteer community coordinator for American for Fair Taxation, the organization whose mission it is to get the FairTax bill passed, and, as such, I would not consider myself a disinterested observer by any means. I am very passionate about changing our tax system.
Secondly, I do not believe that the FairTax is some “magic bullet” that can solve all sustainability problems. I firmly believe that enacting the FairTax is the first step in moving towards a tax system that works positively for people and the environment. It will mostly affect labor and consumption. I believe that the next step would be to start implementing taxes on natural capital, so-called “eco-taxes“, so that the price of finished goods more accurately reflects their real cost to society and the environment. If eco-taxes were done right, the FairTax rate could be gradually reduced as these new systems are implemented, and the final price of goods could stay the same, and would accurately reflect their “true” price.
I also want to mention that the FairTax does not try to address waste in government spending. (It only removes the waste from income tax collection) It is designed to be “revenue-neutral”, so that it exactly replaces the current levels of government spending. What this means is that under the new system, all government expenditures would be fully funded, including Social Security and Medicare. While these are important issues that need to be addressed, the writers of the legislation felt that they would overly complicate things, and make it impossible to otherwise implement the needed tax reforms.
The FairTax legislation is a nonpartisan effort to create a simple, fair and transparent tax system which does not favor any particular ideology. Here is a particularly good explanation of the FairTax from Wikipedia.org:
The FairTax (H.R.25/S.1025) is a proposal in the United States Congress for changing tax laws to replace the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and all federal income taxes (including AMT), payroll taxes (including Social Security and Medicare taxes), corporate taxes, capital gains taxes, gift taxes, and estate taxes with a national retail sales tax, to be levied once at the point of purchase on all new goods and services. The proposal also calls for a monthly tax rebate to households of citizens and legal resident aliens, to “untax” purchases up to the poverty level. The sales tax rate, as defined in the legislation, is 23% of the total register price (23¬¢ of every $1 – calculated the same way as income taxes), which is comparable to a 30% traditional state sales tax (30¬¢ on top of every $1). Because the U.S. tax system has a hidden effect on prices, it is expected that moving to the FairTax would decrease production costs from the removal of business taxes and compliance costs, which is predicted to offset a portion of the FairTax effect on prices.
Due to the rebate, the effective tax rate is progressive on consumption and could result in a tax burden of zero or less…the plan’s supporters argue that it would increase purchasing power, and decrease tax burdens by broadening the tax base and effectively taxing wealth. Many mainstream economists and tax experts believe consumption taxes, such as the FairTax, would have a positive impact on savings and investment (not taxed), ease of tax compliance, increased economic growth, incentives for international business to locate in the U.S., and increased U.S. international competitiveness (border tax adjustment in global trade).
The FairTax bill was first introduced into Congress in 1999, and has been re-introduced in each successive congress, substantially unaltered. The FairTax has been the most successful tax reform legislation to date, garnering 56 co-sponsors in the 108th Congress, 61 in the 109th, and 64 in the 110th Congress (2007). By comparison, the Freedom Flat Tax bill, has only 4 cosponsors in the 110th Congress. Very recently, several 2008 presidential candidates have expressed support for the FairTax.
I am sure you are painfully aware of the many problems with the IRS and the income and payroll tax system in general, so I will not bore you with a lengthy discussion of those. This article give a good overview of the costs of compliance inherent in the current system and this article talks about the origins of the income tax.
The greatest benefits of moving away from an income and payroll tax based system lie in the effects on wage earners. Under the current system, employees have income and payroll taxes (social security and medicare) deducted from their paychecks, before they get a chance to decide what to do with that money. In addition, employers pay a share of payroll taxes which is equal to the amount that employees pay. Since this costs is borne fully by the employer, this
essentially a tax on labor. The effects of a labor tax are decreased employment, decreased pay and increased prices on goods. It should also be noted that payroll taxes disproportionately affect low- and middle- income workers, because the tax is only applied to the first $90,000 of wages. By eliminating the income and payroll taxes, real wages will increase, employment will increase as the cost of labor goes down, and consequently, the price of goods will decrease as well.
My personally favorite benefit of the FairTax is having more control over how much tax I pay and how much I can save. By eliminating the income and payroll taxes, and enacting a sales tax, I now have taken back control of my money from the government, who currently considers it “their” money first. Now, I don’t have to worry about 401(k)s, medical savings plans, etc., because everything is now pre-tax!! Now, if I want to save my money to buy a house, I can save as much as I want, and not have to pay any tax on it, at least until I buy the house (if it’s used, I won’t have to pay any tax…more on that later). If I simply want to pay less taxes, I can endeavor to purchase less. So, you can see how keeping the income tax in place is discouraging people to save, which, in turn, encourages them to consume more, and we all know that consuming more is a bad thing.
Encouraging people to reuse products instead of purchasing new products is a great way to reduce waste and also resource consumption and emissions, because reuse removes the demand for a new product and also keeps a previous product from being disposed of. By only taxing new goods, and only taxing them once at the initial point of purchase, the FairTax will create a new incentive for consumers to purchase used goods, including houses which are not new construction.
When many people think about a sales tax, they assume that the sales tax will not be progressive, and will negatively affect the poor, since poor people spend a much higher percentage of their income on necessities. This is not so under the FairTax plan, because each legal taxpayer in the U.S. will receive a monthly check, called the “prebate”, for the amount of tax they would pay on purchases up to the poverty level of spending. This would protect all families from paying sales tax on the necessities of life. Thus, a couple with two children receives a prebate of $6,297 per year, allowing them to consume $27,380 free of tax and reducing the effective tax rate on a family spending $54,760 to 11.5 percent. In contrast, all families today, even the poor, pay 15.3 percent in payroll taxes. The FairTax is the only tax reform plan that entirely eliminates taxes for the poor because it is the only tax reform plan that repeals the high and regressive payroll tax. In addition, taxpayers who earn well below the poverty level wage will see their effective tax rate drop, up to the point where they actually have a negative tax rate. This is commonly known as creating a “floor” for the worst off in our society, such as homeless persons, by providing them with a basic level of income.
The FairTax considers education to be an investment, and, as such, is not taxed. This makes it much easier for people to afford to pay for college, and, with the previously mentioned incentive to save, helps them to save for college as well. In creating a sustainable world, we want to begin to use people more instead of natural resources, and I can think of no better way to do this than by having more people go to college.
On a final note, elimination of the IRS and the income tax, and implementing a consumption tax will have one very direct environmental impact: a massive reduction in the use of paper. Reportedly, the IRS sends out 8 billion pages of forms and instructions each year. Laid end to end, they would stretch 28 times around the earth. Nearly 300,000 trees are cut down yearly to produce the paper for all the IRS forms and instructions. A consumption tax, administered by the states, has a much smaller bureaucracy and a greatly reduced need for paper consumption.
There are so many benefits to a consumption tax over an income tax, and so many detriments to the IRS and our current tax system that I could go on indefinitely, which, I’m sure would bore the pants off of you! You may also find that a lot of my points may bring up more questions than they answer. I will gladly answer any and all questions which you may have.
I find that the income tax challenge seems as insurmountable as the sustainability challenge. I would like to put forth that they are actually the same struggle, the struggle for a fair and equitable world, with an economy that takes into account the real costs of production to the world when it prices its goods.
Steve Puma is currently pursuing an MBA in Sustainable Management from Presidio School of Management while also working as an IT consultant in San Francisco. Steve’s interests include green building, New Urbanism, renewable energy and thinking about the big picture.
He is also a big supporter of the FairTax Act of 2007, which abolishes the IRS and replaces it with a national retail sales tax. | <urn:uuid:c26a039f-21b9-4005-ad4b-b6b884ecf840> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.triplepundit.com/2007/06/promote-sustainability-by-rethinking-the-income-tax/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968871 | 2,453 | 2.515625 | 3 |
by Anton Shilov
09/16/2010 | 06:02 PM
The PCI special interest group (PCI SIG) is on track to ratify the final version of the PCI Express 3.0 standard in November, 2010. Moreover, according to a media report, Intel Corp. is already gearing up to implement the new high-speed interconnection into its Sandy Bridge generation processors aimed at servers.
The PCI SIG released in mid-August a version 0.9 of the specification of the new PCI Express link with a plethora of new features and massively improved transfer-rate. It is expected by the executives of the standard setting organization that after sixty days (e.g., by November) that the SIG would release a final version of the base spec, reports EETimes web-site.
Earlier this year the organization said that it would begin testing prototypes of products featuring PCI Express 3.0 interconnection in early 2011, therefore, the group is in line with its schedule. Still, according to the report the PCI SIG does not anticipate to complete a specification for testing PCIe 3.0 products until late in 2012 and will only release tools to validate designs and start interoperability workshops in mid-2011.
Manufacturers of 100Gb and 40Gb Ethernet cards, high-end graphics cards, next-generation Infiniband interconnects, ultra high-end solid-state drives will be among the first to implement PCI Express 3.0 into their chips. What is interesting is that Intel's Xeon chips based on Sandy Bridge micro-architecture are also rumoured to feature PCIe 3.0 controller. At this point it is uncertain whether Sandy Bridge chips for multi-processor or dual-processor systems are to get the new type of interconnection to connect to high-speed peripherals and, perhaps, the company's Knights Corner accelerators for high-performance computing applications.
The third-generation incarnation of PCI Express has numerous advantages over existing bus specifications. The PCIe 3.0 will operate at 8GT/s (8.0GHz) speed, will have different electrical models and will move to 128-bit and 130-bit encoding schemes (from 8- and 10-bit schemes). In 2008 Advanced Micro Devices and Hewlett Packard proposed a number of extensions for PCI Express 3.0. One of the extensions is protocol multiplexing, a feature that would allow chips to dynamically switch between seven different protocols in addition to PCIe using the shared set of pins. This would allow creation of chips that would be compatible with PCIe, HyperTransport, QuickPath Interconnect, Ethernet and other buses at the same time. Another extension is called lightweight notification and would allow co-processors or peripheral chips to talk to each other through system memory using a PCIe transaction without interrupting a host processor. For example, an Ethernet switch could respond to commands to encrypt and decrypt specific data packets while a host processor is inactive. | <urn:uuid:a05939b0-3033-49d9-810e-f1ab9fc7c411> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/other/print/20100916180228_PCI_Express_3_0_Specification_Expected_to_Be_Finalized_by_November.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.929112 | 593 | 1.679688 | 2 |
Headphones are an ideal way to listen to music or TV without disturbing others in the room. They can also help shut out the surrounding ambient noise, letting you enjoy your latest album or movie without having to turn the volume up too much. Unfortunately, a standard pair of headphones with a cable can limit where you listen – a problem if you are watching TV and want to sit a few metres away.
CHOICE tested 12 headphones that use wireless technology to transmit audio from a television, music system or radio to the listener, with some of the models allowing you to move around the room or throughout your home while you listen. Households with one or two members who are hearing impaired can use wireless headphones with the volume levels set to suit, while the rest of the house listens to the TV at normal volume levels.
Some loss in audio quality when using wireless headphones compared to the same-quality headphones with a cable is inevitable. However, the overall sound quality of the top-performing models in this test is still surprisingly good.
CHOICE's experts independently test a wide range of products and services to bring you unbiased reviews, product comparison tools and buying advice that is trusted by 140,000+ members.
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- AKG K912
- Creative Labs WP-300
- Jaybird SB2
- Philips SHD8600
- Philips SHC5100
- Philips SHC2000
- Sennheiser RS110
- Sennheiser RS170
- Sennheiser PX 210 BT
- Sony MDR-RF4000K
- Sony MDR-RF925
- TDK WR700
How we test
All 12 headphones were given to six trialists (three male, three female) with ages ranging from 25 to 71 to determine how the headphones perform for comfort, ease of use and ability to keep out ambient noise. Each user wore the headphones for a period of at least one hour to simulate normal use.
Technical tests take into account internal noise, passive noise reduction, frequency response and total harmonic distortion.
Range is tested by measuring the maximum distance at which the signal can be received without noticeable interference or degradation.
Ease of use is assessed on how easy the controls are to use, and how easy the headphones can be adjusted and cleaned. The headphones are also assessed for comfort and the score is a combination of scores submitted by a user trial as well as our tester’s evaluation.
Energy Our tester measures the energy consumption of the power adapter both on standby and during use. Where applicable, products may meet legal requirements even if we score them 0%; however we believe that if even if one product can maintain less than 1 W on standby, then all the others should be able to.
Get access to our independent testing reports and save yourself time and money. | <urn:uuid:83f5e4de-faa3-44d3-bdc2-f3d6a96a506d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.choice.com.au/reviews-and-tests/entertainment/sound/headphones-and-earphones/wireless-headphones-review-and-compare.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932302 | 579 | 1.648438 | 2 |
Pakistan: Sargodha Catholic High School
Saint Rita of Cascia
International Day of Biodiversity (ONU)
Actual translators: Br. Josep Roura, coordenador - French
Br. Aloísio Kuhn - Portuguese | Br. Edward Clisby - English
A number of years ago the Institute adopted four official languages: French, English, Spanish and Portuguese. This means that the majority of documents produced by the GA are published in these four languages. Translation work is carried out by a secretary for each one of them. For internal needs in the General House, translations can be done into Italian as well.
Principal texts to translate: | <urn:uuid:90beb412-562f-4740-a9f0-e45253bf23f2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://champagnat.org/000.php?p=72 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.905308 | 142 | 1.554688 | 2 |
A cow catcher is not a person but a device. It is a contraption attached to the train’s front side. The cow catcher’s function is to clear any obstacles that may litter the train track. The cow catcher was invented in 1838 by Charles Babbage, a British engineer. The cow catcher is still in use today in North America. The device is not used as much in Europe anymore because the modern European railway systems now have tracks that are fenced off. This makes it less likely to get any kind of obstacles or objects on the tracks. A cow catcher is also known as a pilot.
The cow catcher’s shape is generally a shallow wedge with a V shape. The design is to maximize the deflection of any kind of object that may get on the tracks but perform it in such a way that it will not affect the speed of the train and also push the objects to the side easily. The cow catcher’s shape will allow the object to be lifted up and then pushed towards the sides of the train. The earliest cow catchers were made of a number of metal bars welded on to a frame. But over the years the construction of the cow catchers has changed. It is now made of sheet metal or cast steel because it performs its functions more smoothly.
With the popularity of steam powered locomotives, cow catchers received additional new innovations. For example, the front coupler is a device that was employed in attaching railroad cars to one another. The design of the coupler was made in such a way that it will hinge up and out in order to clear itself off obstacles. | <urn:uuid:b881b9eb-b235-4db6-b18e-29f7ebac8fe7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://brainz.org/what-cow-catcher/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00038-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977234 | 334 | 3.703125 | 4 |
Is it possible to convert an English literature PhD candidate into a marketing professor? What about an economics professor into one who teaches corporate finance? According to John Fernandes, president of the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business, the answer is Yes.
What's in it for a math PhD, who could become an accounting professor?
"A math professor makes $70,000 a year, while an accounting professor makes $115,000 and will make much more than that over the course of his lifetime. There’s a big economic incentive. Some liberal arts disciplines are way overproducing PhD candidates. They can’t possibly be absorbed by academia,” he says. “A business degree has a lot of portability.”
But some academics soooo don't want to change!
However, Mr Fernandes admits the programme has got off to a slower start than he had envisaged. He recognises that perhaps the bump in salary might not inspire the average philosopher to embark on the programme.
What a surprise! | <urn:uuid:4b0ab480-3761-45b6-a50a-8f5a92ffb991> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://nanopolitan.blogspot.in/2008/05/so-you-have-math-phd-would-you-like-to.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965327 | 213 | 1.5 | 2 |
Mind mapping. concept mapping, or brainstorming are three different names with almost the same meaning : collecting,organizing , and representing ideas, tasks, words, or other items linked to and arranged around a central key word or idea into a mind map diagram . Whichever kind of mapping you want to label it , web 2.0 has some free tools for you to help you perform it. I have meticulously compiled a list of some of the best free mapping tools for teachers and students to use.
Some pluses of using mind mapping tools in education :
The following are some of the advantages of using mind mapping tools in education :
- Mind mapping enables teachers to manipulate ideas and concepts with great ease and flexibility
- It helps present information in a visually attracting and comprehensive way
- Its organizational structure helps students understand and communicate their knowledge effectively
- Teachers can use it to manage their classes and activities
- It helps teachers summarize, organize, and present lecture information
- It can be used by both teachers and students to create tutorials and explain difficult concepts
- Visual maps gets students attention and focus
- It promotes active note taking, thinking, and learning skills
- It fosters inquiry and problem solving
Here is a list of free mind mapping tools for teachers :
This is a great mind mapping tool that allows users to easily visualize their ideas by connecting various pieces of information together and create free style maps. It also combines elements like text, images, files, calendar events and geographic locations.
Edistorm is a great web2.0 tool for educators. It allows you to work on your ideas during a structured brainstorming and organize them into sticky notes for others to see . It has two plans one is fre and limited and the other is paid.
Wridea is an idea management service and a brainstorming tool . It allows its users to Create new idea entries in seconds, update details, discuss in depth with your friends and organize your data under different categories. Wridea can be a very useful tool for teachers and students .
Bubbl.us is another great mind mapping and brainstorming web2.0 tool . It allows its users to create concept maps in such an easy way with the minimum tools possible .You can create your project and invite your colleagues to join you in editing its content and when done you can share it with others via a generated link .
5- Wise Mapping
Wise Mapping is a free online mind maps editor that allows you to create and share your mind maps with others. It also lets its users create and edit colourful and complex mind maps using just mouse and keyword.
6- Lucid Chart
Lucid Chart is a flowcharts and mind map making tool . It uses simple drag and drop technique to draw charts and even lets users upload their images into diagrams. It has both free and pro plans. Free as you know is always limited.
7- Text 2 Mind Map
Text 2 Mind Map is a cool website . It is an application that converts texts to mind maps .
It allows its users to create a visually attractive nodes for their blogs, websites or wikis . Nodes are visually displayed pieces of information that helps visitors easily navigate the content of your site so that they find what they are looking for with the minimum time possible . Check out this example of a Spicynode I created for this blog.
This is a browser-based online mind mapping application that allows you to keep track of all your ideas and create easy mind maps .It does not require any download or installation software , just log to your browser and launch the application .
It is one of the best applications for visual ideas . It combines presentations , mindmapping and online bulletins. It also allows users to integrate text, image, video, and Google maps and use it as a bulletin board to use it to record thoughts and many more.
ChartTool is a great tool from Google. This is basically a free service that allows users to create awesome charts and graphics. It has a rich gallery of charts of varying formats. Users can choose from Line charts, Bar charts, Pie charts, Map charts, Scatter charts, Venn charts, QR codes, and Google-O-Meter charts. Once you select a chart you can then customize it the way you want.
Chartle is a great web tool that allows users to easily and instantly create interactive charts. These charts can be used on your classroom blog or website and can also be printed out. Chartle has some very interesting features and is very easy to use.The only thing yo will need to start using Chartle is to have Java activated on your browser.
Slatebox is another great presentation and online mind mapping tool . It allows its users the freedom to create as many nodes and maps as possible . It has both free and pro accounts
Gliffy is a diagram making web2.0 tool . It allows you to create great looking diagrams and drawings in a snap . It is similar to Bubbl.us .
Creately is an online diagraming and design application that is very easy to use . It offers a great way of working with teams in multiple locations and on several projects .It has both a free and premium version and of course the paid version has always more features to work with .
Diagram.ly is a free product of Jgraph , a company devoted to developing graph visualization software and web services. Diagram.ly is a very handy and useful tool for creating diagrams using clip arts and pre drawn shapes .
This one here has several other features such as including a clipart library, importing images from Google images or Flickr , and using video straight from YouTube. It has has both free and pro accounts.
This is also a great mind mapping tool that allows users to include icons,notes, links, attachment, and images into their diagrams. The free version has several ads and allows only for three maps. | <urn:uuid:11cc4c73-6866-4310-ba79-acde891a3617> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2012/06/18-free-mind-mapping-tools-for-teachers.html?goback=.gde_2811_member_124997439 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00032-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.915967 | 1,209 | 3.375 | 3 |
News: Law and Justice
Victims of 2002 Coup in Venezuela Seek Justice
Demanding justice for the families and friends of those murdered during the Venezuelan opposition’s attempted overthrow of President Hugo Chavez nine years ago, thousands of residents took to the streets last Monday to commemorate lives lost and celebrate the popular uprising that derailed a right-wing dictatorship in the country.
The march began at the Llaguna bridge where more than a dozen people were killed on April 11, 2002 by snipers stationed in the high rise buildings that surround the streets near the presidential palace of Miraflores in the capital of Caracas.
The deaths, part of a calculated plan to fabricate a violent government crackdown on peaceful marchers, provided the impetus for the Venezuelan private media to incite a rebellion against the democratically elected Chavez administration and lend legitimacy to the coup leaders.
Although the opposition succeeded in occupying the presidential palace for some 24 hours, the efforts to mislead the public eventually failed as thousands of ordinary Venezuelans descended upon Miraflores, demanding Chavez’s return to power.
Through a combination of street and military action, the ousted president was re-installed as the nation’s head of state on April 13th, in a turn of events unparalleled in Latin American history.
Yet, despite the Venezuelan people’s victory over the repressive and authoritarian opposition supported and financed by Washington, the deaths that occurred on April 11 have yet to see closure.
The Association of Victims of the Coup D’Etat of A-11 (ASOVIC), has headed up the efforts of family members and friends of those killed and injured to seek justice for the murders that have remained unpunished.
“Nine years ago we were here defending the revolutionary process and today we commemorate the fallen and ask for justice for them”, said ASOVIC spokesperson Yessica Fuentes from the Llaguna Bridge on Monday.
According to some residents, the violence that took place on Llaguna Bridge also extended to other areas of the capital and lasted for a number of days.
“The repression wasn’t just the 11th of April, but it also went on until the 14th in [the Caracas] sectors of Catia, Petare, Agua Salud, 23 de Enero. The security forces repressed demonstrations of citizens who were demanding the restitution of President Chavez”, said Jorge Rodriguez, resident of the 23 de Enero neighborhood.
During Monday’s march, organized by the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) under the banner “Against Impunity and Forgetting”, members of ASOVIC presented their demands to the Venezuelan National Assembly where they were received by Assembly President, Fernando Soto Rojas.
“We are asking that [the National Assembly] discuss article 30 of the constitution so that family members of the dead can have a better quality of life”, Fuentes, who was also shot during the coup attempt in 2002, told Rojas.
Article 30 of Venezuela’s constitution obliges the state to indemnify victims of human rights abuses, including payment for damages and suffering.
In their fight against impunity, members of ASOVIC have also demanded the prosecution of current opposition legislators who were involved in the planning and carrying out of the actions of April 11th.
“The opposition constantly talks about the violation of human rights in the country when it’s they who have violated constitutional order like what happened in 2002 and continues to happen in the country”, said Antonio Molina, lawyer of the victims’ association. As such, an appeal has been made to indict National Assembly representatives who not only walk freely on the streets but are carrying out the functions of lawmakers in the country’s highest legislative body.
“We can’t allow for people like [congress members] Enrique Mendoza, Maria Corina Machado, Julio Borges, and Miguel Angel Rodriguez, who actively participated in the coup d’etat where innocent people lost their lives, not to be in prison. They are enjoying parliamentary immunity when they should be punished”, Fuentes said.
Monday’s march ended at the offices of the Public Attorney, the government institution in charge of investigating and prosecuting in the courts, where a document was presented to the Attorney General Luisa Ortega Diaz.
“I am receiving this document with much love and I promise that I will continue with the investigation. But it has to be remembered that the state granted amnesty in December of 2007 [to some of those accused of perpetrating the coup]”, Diaz said.
Although the main political and military actors behind the events of April 11, 2002 have remained free, 9 members of the recently disbanded Caracas Metropolitan Police were convicted in 2009 for their role in carrying out the massacre.
A recent lawsuit in the state of Aragua, where the members of the Metropolitan Police were convicted, may also see proceedings carried out against private media outlets that colluded with the Venezuelan opposition to deliberately mislead the public on the events taking place between April 11th – 13th.
Hamos Ramos Allup, leader of the opposition party Democratic Action (AD) and a key player in the coup, affirmed during a recent interview with the newspaper Ciudad CCS that private television, print and radio outlets had been involved in the planning of the coup for weeks before its execution.
With reference to the events in the lead up to April 11th, Allup stated that “there had not been a single important event that didn’t have the participation of the owners of the [private] media”.
The 4th Tribunal Court in the State of Aragua, the Venezuelan News Agency reports, will continue with its investigations of the media’s role in the coup and Attorney General Diaz announced the creation of a special commission to receive and process complaints of human rights violations that occurred as a result of the violence on April 11th.
Published on Apr 15th 2011 at 1.03pm
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The meeting lasted almost one hour, and President Obama addressed issues including the of the Palestinian Authority's anti-Israel resolution at the United Nations Security Council, the ongoing changes taking place in the Middle East and prospects of peace between Israel and its neighbors. He then fielded questions from the leaders.
“We appreciate the extraordinary session we had with President Obama today during which we were able to engage in an open dialogue relating to issues of concern to the Jewish community,” said Conference of Presidents Chairman Alan Solow and Executive Vice Chairman Malcolm Hoenlein following the meeting.
“The President reaffirmed his deep commitment to Israel's security and set out his view as to how the United States can promote the values it shares with Israel as the region undergoes change,” they added. “The open lines of communication with President Obama and his Administration are highly valued and provide us with the opportunity to articulate the views of American Jewry on issues that face our country.”
The 50-member delegation also met other American leaders including David S. Cohen, the Department of Treasury’s Acting Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence regarding sanctions against Iran; Dennis Ross, Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for the Central Region; and Daniel B. Shapiro, Senior Director for the Middle East and North Africa at the National Security Council. They also met with Republican and Democratic congressional leaders including House Speaker John Boehner, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy and House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer.
“The strong bipartisan support for strengthening the U.S.-Israel relationship in all its aspects was evident from the meetings with the congressional leaders,” said Solow and Hoenlein. “They also spoke of concerns regarding the U.N. continuing to single out Israel in one-sided resolutions, the status of foreign aid to Israel and other countries, and other issues on the congressional agenda. We believe that the discussions are of great importance to inform the leadership of our member organizations, and have the leaders of our country hear their perspectives and concerns.”
Hoenlein and said that he believes that the relations between the United States and Israel are very strong.
“I think the day-to-day relationships between the United States and Israel are very strong,” he said. “You saw the visit of Admiral Mike Mullen, you heard the words he used, that the relationship between the militaries is probably the best it’s been. There are tensions. There are differences and that’s natural in every relationship, but our hope is that the overriding interests and the commonality of values and goals will overcome any differences that arise.” | <urn:uuid:34012bb2-8564-427a-833c-97297447a3ba> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.israelifrontline.com/2011/03/obama-meets-us-jewish-leaders.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964883 | 550 | 1.554688 | 2 |
And he came to Derbe and Lystra: and behold, a certain disciple was there, by name Timotheus, son of a Jewish believing woman, but [the] father a Greek,
who had a [good] testimony of the brethren in Lystra and Iconium.
Him would Paul have go forth with him, and took [him and] circumcised him on account of the Jews who were in those places, for they all knew his father that he was a Greek.
And as they passed through the cities they instructed them to observe the decrees determined on by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem.
The assemblies therefore were confirmed in the faith, and increased in number every day.
And having passed through Phrygia and the Galatian country, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia,
having come down to Mysia, they attempted to go to Bithynia, and the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them;
and having passed by Mysia they descended to Troas.
And a vision appeared to Paul in the night: There was a certain Macedonian man, standing and beseeching him, and saying, Pass over into Macedonia and help us.
And when he had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go forth to Macedonia, concluding that the Lord had called us to announce to them the glad tidings.
Having sailed therefore away from Troas, we went in a straight course to Samothracia, and on the morrow to Neapolis,
and thence to Philippi, which is [the] first city of that part of Macedonia, a colony. And we were staying in that city certain days.
And on the sabbath day we went outside the gate by the river, where it was the custom for prayer to be, and we sat down and spoke to the women who had assembled.
And a certain woman, by name Lydia, a seller of purple, of the city of Thyatira, who worshipped God, heard; whose heart the Lord opened to attend to the things spoken by Paul.
And when she had been baptised and her house, she besought [us], saying, If ye have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house and abide [there]. And she constrained us.
And it came to pass as we were going to prayer that a certain female slave, having a spirit of Python, met us, who brought much profit to her masters by prophesying.
She, having followed Paul and us, cried saying, These men are bondmen of the Most High God, who announce to you [the] way of salvation.
And this she did many days. And Paul, being distressed, turned, and said to the spirit, I enjoin thee in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her. And it came out the same hour.
And her masters, seeing that the hope of their gains was gone, having seized Paul and Silas, dragged [them] into the market before the magistrates;
and having brought them up to the praetors, said, These men utterly trouble our city, being Jews,
and announce customs which it is not lawful for us to receive nor practise, being Romans.
And the crowd rose up too against them; and the praetors, having torn off their clothes, commanded to scourge [them].
And having laid many stripes upon them they cast [them] into prison, charging the jailor to keep them safely;
who, having received such a charge, cast them into the inner prison, and secured their feet to the stocks.
And at midnight Paul and Silas, in praying, were praising God with singing, and the prisoners listened to them.
And suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison shook, and all the doors were immediately opened, and the bonds of all loosed.
And the jailor being awakened out of his sleep, and seeing the doors of the prison opened, having drawn a sword was going to kill himself, thinking the prisoners had fled.
But Paul called out with a loud voice, saying, Do thyself no harm, for we are all here.
And having asked for lights, he rushed in, and, trembling, fell down before Paul and Silas.
And leading them out said, Sirs, what must I do that I may be saved?
And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved, thou and thy house.
And they spoke to him the word of the Lord, with all that were in his house.
And he took them the same hour of the night and washed [them] from their stripes; and was baptised, he and all his straightway.
And having brought them into his house he laid the table [for them], and rejoiced with all his house, having believed in God.
And when it was day, the praetors sent the lictors, saying, Let those men go.
And the jailor reported these words to Paul: The praetors have sent that ye may be let go. Now therefore go out and depart in peace.
But Paul said to them, Having beaten us publicly uncondemned, us who are Romans, they have cast us into prison, and now they thrust us out secretly? no, indeed, but let them come themselves and bring us out.
And the lictors reported these words to the praetors. And they were afraid when they heard they were Romans.
And they came and besought them, and having brought them out, asked them to go out of the city.
And having gone out of the prison, they came to Lydia; and having seen the brethren, they exhorted them and went away.
And having journeyed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, where was the synagogue of the Jews.
And according to Paul's custom he went in among them, and on three sabbaths reasoned with them from the scriptures,
opening and laying down that the Christ must have suffered and risen up from among the dead, and that this is the Christ, Jesus whom *I* announce to you.
And some of them believed, and joined themselves to Paul and Silas, and of the Greeks who worshipped, a great multitude, and of the chief women not a few.
But the Jews having been stirred up to jealousy, and taken to [themselves] certain wicked men of the lowest rabble, and having got a crowd together, set the city in confusion; and having beset the house of Jason sought to bring them out to the people;
and not having found them, dragged Jason and certain brethren before the politarchs, crying out, These [men] that have set the world in tumult, are come here also,
whom Jason has received; and these all do contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying, that there is another king, Jesus.
And they troubled the crowd and the politarchs when they heard these things.
And having taken security of Jason and the rest, they let them go.
But the brethren immediately sent away, in the night, Paul and Silas to Berea; who, being arrived, went away into the synagogue of the Jews.
And these were more noble than those in Thessalonica, receiving the word with all readiness of mind, daily searching the scriptures if these things were so.
Therefore many from among them believed, and of Grecian women of the upper classes and men not a few.
But when the Jews from Thessalonica knew that the word of God was announced in Berea also by Paul, they came there also, stirring up the crowds.
And then immediately the brethren sent away Paul to go as to the sea; but Silas and Timotheus abode there.
But they that conducted Paul brought him as far as Athens; and, having received a commandment to Silas and Timotheus, that they should come to him as quickly as possible, they departed.
But in Athens, while Paul was waiting for them, his spirit was painfully excited in him seeing the city given up to idolatry.
He reasoned therefore in the synagogue with the Jews, and those who worshipped, and in the market-place every day with those he met with.
But some also of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers attacked him. And some said, What would this chatterer say? and some, He seems to be an announcer of foreign demons, because he announced the glad tidings of Jesus and the resurrection [to them].
And having taken hold on him they brought [him] to Areopagus, saying, Might we know what this new doctrine which is spoken by thee [is]?
For thou bringest certain strange things to our ears. We wish therefore to know what these things may mean.
Now all [the] Athenians and the strangers sojourning there spent their time in nothing else than to tell and to hear the news.
And Paul standing in the midst of Areopagus said, Athenians, in every way I see you given up to demon worship;
for, passing through and beholding your shrines, I found also an altar on which was inscribed, To the unknown God. Whom therefore ye reverence, not knowing [him], him I announce to you.
The God who has made the world and all things which are in it, *he*, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands,
nor is served by men's hands as needing something, himself giving to all life and breath and all things;
and has made of one blood every nation of men to dwell upon the whole face of the earth, having determined ordained times and the boundaries of their dwelling,
that they may seek God; if indeed they might feel after him and find him, although he is not far from each one of us:
for in him we live and move and exist; as also some of the poets amongst you have said, For we are also his offspring.
Being therefore [the] offspring of God, we ought not to think that which is divine to be like gold or silver or stone, [the] graven form of man's art and imagination.
God therefore, having overlooked the times of ignorance, now enjoins men that they shall all everywhere repent,
because he has set a day in which he is going to judge the habitable earth in righteousness by [the] man whom he has appointed, giving the proof [of it] to all [in] having raised him from among [the] dead.
And when they heard [of the] resurrection of the dead, some mocked, and some said, We will hear thee again also concerning this.
Thus Paul went out of their midst.
But some men joining themselves to him believed; among whom also was Dionysius the Areopagite, and a woman by name Damaris, and others with them. | <urn:uuid:d0de9591-bfaa-4308-83d4-cdcf5ba41175> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.biblestudytools.com/dby/acts/passage.aspx?q=acts+16;acts+17 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00047-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.984711 | 2,293 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Weekend downpour boosts dry dams
Tasmanian dam levels are predicted to rise after heavy rain at the weekend.
Luncheon Hills in north-west Tasmania received 34-millimetres, Frankford in the north received 30, Ringarooma in the north-east 28 and Hobart 27.
The Weather Bureau's Damian Everett says the rain was steady enough to have a positive impact on drought-affected farms.
"I'm sure it's put a bit of a dent in, or topped up some dams and helped out the farmers in those dry areas," he said.
The Channel Highway was closed briefly last night because of minor flooding.
The Bureau has now cancelled flood warnings for the southern river and north esk basins.
There has been less rainfall than predicted.
River levels have peaked are now on the way down. | <urn:uuid:b78bf1f2-c669-4a9d-908f-2c2b42332ed1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.abc.net.au/news/2009-04-27/weekend-downpour-boosts-dry-dams/1663608 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00055-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973 | 176 | 1.820313 | 2 |
Let’s come up with a better name! I suggest the “swirly-A” or the “AHHHHH!”
Lifted from Huffington Post because bullets are better than photo slideshows:
- Denmark: Elephant’s Trunk
- Germany & Poland: Monkey’s Tail
- Greek: Little Duck
- Hebrew: Strudel
- Italy: Snail
- China: Mouse
- Kazakhstan: Moon’s Ear
- Russia: Dog Face
- Finland: Sleeping Cat
- Korea: Sea Snail
- Hungary: Maggot
In short: Americans are unimaginative.
Time Stands Still
Tonight’s “leap second” and why the Earth sucks at keeping time
If you stand very still tonight, holding your breath in the still of midnight darkness, you’ll hear the sound of all the clocks in the world pausing for one second. Actually, you probably won’t hear anything, but you should know that today will be one second longer than a normal day. Why?
When trains began to make long-distance travel possible, with schedules dependable down to the minute, there was a worldwide demand for standardized time. So we got Greenwich Mean Time, which defined the measure of a day as the average time of a single rotation of the Earth from the perspective of one Englishman staring up at the sky in Greenwich. In 1820, this just so happened to be 86,400 seconds, or 24 hours.
The problem is that the Earth’s rotation is slowing down, and a “solar day” isn’t exactly 86,400 seconds anymore. The Earth doesn’t care about our time system one bit, apparently.
How does that work? The Moon pulls on the Earth due to its own gravity. When that’s combined with the natural gravity of the Earth, we get two “high-tide” bulges on opposite sides of our planet. But the bulges don’t line up perfectly with the equator, and the Moon actually pulls on the ocean enough to create a tiny amount of friction. That friction is slowing our rotation by about 0.002 seconds per day per century. Eventually the Earth and Moon will be “tidally locked” and each will have a constant face to the other (like the Moon does to Earth today). Phil Plait explains this all pretty well here. Moreover, earthquakes and all sorts of other stuff mean that this “slowing” business is also irregular.
Earth sucks as a timepiece.
Since the 1970’s, our “official time” has been kept by atomic clocks, accurate to one second every 250 million years. We actually changed the official definition of a second to be based on atoms instead of 1/86,400th of a day. But many traditional clocks, not to mention our bodies, are basing their day on day/night averages, and the atomic clocks are basing it on cesium atoms (far more accurately). The day/night clocks are lagging behind! So on a regular basis, the Time Lords of Earth let the atomic clock time pause for one second to bring them closer to sync. That’s a leap second.
If we didn’t do this, and just let the clocks go their separate ways, we might cause serious problems to systems like GPS software that depend on super-super-accurate time-keeping.
So tonight, the official clocks will show 23:59:60 before rolling over to tomorrow, and everything is in its right place. Don’t worry if you forget to sync your watch. You’ll just be a second early everywhere tomorrow. | <urn:uuid:3eb6cb69-3f59-493f-8982-df558c30531b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://thesandspur.tumblr.com/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00048-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.926087 | 784 | 2.765625 | 3 |
Typeset labels change the nature f your files and your relationship to
them. Labeled files feel comfortable on a boardroom table; everyone
can identify them; you can easily see what they are from a distance
and in your briefcase; and when you open your file drawers, you get to
see what looks almost like a printed index of your files...
The main argument by David Allen is that in his GTD system, the brain need to feel relaxed at all times and that is an inherent advantage of having neat, clean, uniformed labels on your files. When the brain can relax about things other than what is the task at hand, the system is effective. A lot of what he teaches is all about repetition and relaxation, despite it being about actually getting things done.
The secondary argument for a labeler by DA is:
If you have to wait to do your filing or labeling as a batch job,
you'll most likely resist making files for single pieces of paper, and
it'll add the formality factor...
So you need something formal, fast, easy and (as always) fun. That's what a labeler can do for you. | <urn:uuid:f843b1ac-37cf-45e6-8c95-fab8c0056bdb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://productivity.stackexchange.com/questions/2801/advantages-of-a-label-printer?answertab=active | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961626 | 242 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Short Answer Questions
Directions: Answer each question with the appropriate short response.
Short Answer Questions - Chapters 1-5
1. In what year was Reymundo born?
2. Where was Reymundo born?
3. Reymundo's father died before Reymundo turned what age?
4. Who was Reymundo's mother's second husband?
5. How old was Reymundo when he was raped by a cousin?
6. Who was the person who raped Reymundo?
7. Where did the family move when they left Puerto Rico?
8. Which of the following was NOT something that fascinated Reymundo about his new city?
9. Who did Reymundo's mother take up with after her second husband left her?
10. To what neighborhood did Reymundo's family move?
11. What was the name of the store where Reymundo and his friends stole candy?
This section contains 2,158 words|
(approx. 8 pages at 300 words per page) | <urn:uuid:f5320de6-2fab-4c83-b8dd-f25199f80620> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bookrags.com/lessonplan/my-bloody-life/shortanswer.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00035-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972622 | 218 | 2.96875 | 3 |
Bouton, IA Real Estate
According to census data in the year 2000 there were 57 housing units in Bouton.
This represents a 8.1% decline from 62 in 1990.
Of those housing units, none were located in either urbanized areas or urban clusters, and 57 were located in what is classified as a rural area.
Homeownership rate in Bouton is about 72.7%.
Bouton's vacancy rate, including seasonal lodging, is about 3.5%.
Average household size is 2.18 people.
The majority of houses, apartments or condos in Bouton were built after 1939.
|Housing Units by Size|
|Five Bedrooms or more||1.80%|
Owned Homes, Apartments and Condos
|Average Household Size||2.25|
|Median year structure was built||1943|
|Median Value of occupied units||$27,500|
Rented Homes, Apartments and Condos
|Average Household Size||2|
|Median year structure was built||1939|
Owners Finance Status
|Second Mortgage & Equity Loan||0%|
|Home Equity Loan||2.90%|
|Median part of Monthly Household Income dedicated to covering home ownership costs||13.5%| | <urn:uuid:4937fadc-06d9-4b86-a45d-b9dc67d01f66> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.idcide.com/realestate/ia/bouton.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947439 | 274 | 2.25 | 2 |
How to Make a Sci-Fi Movie
There are only two types of science fiction films: ones which take place in a bleak, post-apocalyptic future, and ones which take place in a bleak, non-post-apocaplyptic future. However, don't lose hope just because the only two props you own are a lamp you stole from your grandmother's attic and a set of broken crutches! It's easy to recreate "the future" in science fiction films! Follow this easy guide and you'll have yourself a genuine science fiction set in no time!
1) Post-apocalyptic movie: Film in the desert. One of the most deadly futuristic military weapons is the "Atomic Sandbomb," which is able to reduce entire cities to sand (literally) within seconds. Luckily, these weapons aren't very radioactive at all, and the contaminated areas are often well-marked with signs and a green camera filter to let the audience know that there's something really radioactive going on there. The "mutants" who inhabit the area should look like normal human beings, only with a slightly more noticable drooling problem.
2) Non post-apocalyptic future: Film in downtown Canada. Canada has a few cities which are really clean, thereby depicting the "Big Brother" motif. You know, because Big Brother is an obsessive-compulsive who spends a few billion dollars each year for robots that fly around and dump wading pools full of cleaning wax all over the floors of business buildings (which also double for shopping malls).
The optimal shape for aliens are "humanoid," except for slight mutations. Like a big fucking apple fritter on their head.
You see, science fiction movies are all about extremes; either the future is really fucking dirty or it's really fucking clean. The cars are either junked-up 1970's scrap heaps with 15 tons of metal bolted to the top or they're expensive and meticulous VW Beetles (although I'm not sure why everybody in the future drives cars manufactured in 1999). The people either dress up in cheap rags and shirts covered in dirt or they wear cheap rags and shirts they bought in Target and tore the collars off of. Okay, maybe the last one was a bad example.
In movie-making terms, the phrase "Science Fiction" means "the future." This means that any film taking place more than 15 minutes past the current time is considered science fiction. Keep this in mind next time you want to make a movie and you're not within walking distance of a major desert. Or Canada.
Starring actors need not be classically trained. In fact, most science fiction actors are capable of portraying only three different emotions per movie, and two of them are "confusion." Determine what the coveted "third emotion" your movie is about by examining the script and figuring out what your movie is about and writing down the corresponding emotion:
Aliens - Rage
Time Travel - Fury
Cloning - Seething hatred
Fighting for Survival Amidst a Post-Apocalyptic Landscape of Destruction - Bloodlust
Killer Robots - Explosive ferociousness
As mentioned above, there are five major themes for all science fiction movies. Try to stick to one of these themes or else the Science Fiction Network won't pick up the rights for your movie and you'll miss out on the $12 + bus fare that they offer.
Alien Movie - Hostile aliens have invaded the Earth and it's up to some guy with a huge jaw and thick eyebrows to save the planet! Every single alien in the universe comes in the following forms:
Skinny grey alien with huge head. Although this type of alien is supposedly based off "real life" descriptions from witnesses who enjoy brewing their own moonshine and shooting at street lights, feel free to take creative liberties and modify it to your liking. After all, a movie about aliens who can't be stopped and have no weakness probably wouldn't be that entertaining, unless you're marketing it to the aliens. And who knows what the hell aliens like to watch. Probably reality TV.
Many up and coming directors choose to downplay the "invulnerability" factor by making the aliens susceptible to all kinds of inane things, such as shotgun blasts, empty warehouse explosions, and hand to hand bludgeoning with a fire extinguisher. Despite the aliens' superior intellect, they should also fall prey to laughably puerile "traps" such as hiding in the dark shadows of a hallway and rigging a plastique-laden car to drive into their parked UFO. The greys should also have slender arms which flail around spastically throughout every scene, providing no real purpose except to showcase the fancy black sticks which your prop guy / caterer / brother spray painted to animate it with.
Bug parasite. These parasitic creatures ride to Earth on a watermelon-sized meteor (NOTE TO FILMMAKERS: use a watermelon) and breed quickly, infecting any human they can crawl into. Since the alien has a total of approximately three seconds of film time, you can save time and energy by repeatedly cutting to stock footage of a silverfish or a millipede or a comb with cat whiskers glued to it, instead of actually building an alien puppet. To ensure maximum flexibility, film the parasite in front of a backdrop that can be worked into every scene, like a generic floor or a table. This also makes life easier for your actors, who only need to memorize the following lines:
SCENE: The alien spaceship.
ACTOR #1: "Look out! It's an alien!" (pointing to some area off camera)
ACTOR #2: "Where?!?"
ACTOR #1: "On that table!"
(Cut to shot of plastic comb on a table which is obviously located in the director's mom's kitchen. Blurry image of a Domino's pizza flyer is in the background, and family dog can be sleeping to the right)
Alien with lots of teeth that drools and crushes wooden objects. These are the most difficult aliens to produce, as they require both a guy who can find enough rubber to make a suit AND a guy stupid enough to stand around in the suit all day, sweltering under enough heat to make his retinas combust. However, these types of aliens have flexibility that the other two don't. For example, they are really strong and can break boards. The easiest way to show an alien's physically prowess is by placing a couple hundred tables in between it and your main character, who should run two steps forward, turn around to stare in horror at the alien, run two steps forward, and then turn back again. Repeat this until you run out of either film or set. The alien should take this time to break the tables and casually toss them out of his way, thereby showing off his incredible power. If possible, he should also punch through a wall, assuming you can afford the cost of drywall. Which, if you're making a science fiction movie, you probably can't. | <urn:uuid:296c43cb-1963-4f66-bae3-7046cf53673a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.somethingawful.com/d/guides/guide-how-make.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949945 | 1,450 | 2.03125 | 2 |
Power plans: frequently asked questions
A power plan is a collection of hardware and system settings that manage how your computer uses power. You can use power plans to reduce the amount of power your computer uses, maximize performance, or balance the two. For information about making your laptop battery last longer, see Conserving battery power.
Here are answers to some common questions about power plans.
Windows provides the following plans to help you manage your computer's power:
Balanced. Offers full performance when you need it and saves power during periods of inactivity. This is the best power plan for most people.
Power saver. Saves power by reducing system performance and screen brightness. This plan can help laptop users get the most from a single battery charge.
High performance. Maximizes screen brightness and might increase the computer's performance in some circumstances. This plan uses a lot more energy and will reduce the amount of time that a laptop battery lasts between charges.
High performance doesn't appear on the battery meter by default. To turn on High performance, open Power Options by clicking the Start
, and then clicking Control Panel
. In the search box, type power options
, and then click Power Options
. Under Select a power plan
, click Show additional plans
, and then click High performance
If these plans don't suit your needs, you can create your own power plan, using one of these plans as a starting point. For more information, see Change, create, or delete a power plan (scheme). Also, your computer manufacturer might provide additional power plans.
If you're using a laptop, click the battery icon
in the notification area on the taskbar, and then select one of the power plans that appear on the battery meter. By default, the Balanced and Power saver plans appear on the battery meter. Your computer manufacturer might provide additional plans and might customize the battery meter.
If you aren't using a laptop, or if you want to use a power plan that isn't on the battery meter, do the following:
Open Power Options by clicking the Start button , clicking Control Panel, clicking System and Security, and then clicking Power Options.
On the Select a power plan page, select a power plan.
If you don't see the power plan that you want to use, click Show additional plans.
The only power plans that you can delete are the plans that you create and any additional plans that are provided by the computer manufacturer. You can't delete the Balanced, Power saver, or High performance plans, or the plan that you're currently using (the active plan). For information about how to delete a power plan, see Change, create, or delete a power plan (scheme)
Another possibility is that you might not have the required user rights to delete a plan because your system administrator has changed the permissions that are associated with the plan.
Your user rights, restrictions imposed by your system administrator or your computer's hardware configuration, might limit which settings you can change. If your computer is part of a network at an organization—such as a school or business—your organization's system administrator might have disabled or even removed certain settings by using Group Policy. If you think that Group Policy is preventing you from changing a setting that you need to change, contact your system administrator.
To change power settings on a computer that you're connected to by using Remote Desktop Connection, you must be logged on as an administrator on the remote computer.
For more information about how to change power plan settings, see Change, create, or delete a power plan (scheme).
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INTRODUCTION TO BIRD THEFT
Exotic bird theft affects professional aviculturists, hobbyists, pet shop owners, pet bird households, as well as bird sanctuaries and zoos.
Those who steal exotic birds and animals are not simply thieves: they also commit animal cruelty. Birds and other animals are stolen for personal satisfaction, for resale and even for animal sacrifice, with absolutely no regard for their lives or well-being.
Our objectives are to:
- Present "best practices" for bird owners,
- Explain the principles of working with law enforcement to bring the criminals to justice and
- Offer methods for finding birds that are stolen.
The ideas, suggestions, and actual reports presented here have been formulated after gathering information on over 100 known burglaries and two home invasions. This information was gathered with the help of victims, law enforcement and networkers.
We must also mention the last contributors. The birds themselves, whether they were left behind, returned or found dead, have presented clues on how the crimes were committed. This project is dedicated to them. | <urn:uuid:7fa3618a-03f4-4442-8c40-770bb559f9c0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.birdtheft.org/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95979 | 224 | 2.546875 | 3 |
Masks at the Pitt Rivers Museum
The Pitt Rivers Museum has a range of masks from diverse ethnic communities including those in Africa, North America and Papua New Guinea, as well as theatre masks from Japan, Korea, Borneo and Tibet.
Nowadays people in the Western industrialized countries encounter masks in completely different contexts to those for which the masks on display in the Pitt Rivers Museum were originally designed. Masks fulfil their purposes in diverse situations of life, as means of protection: such as those worn by surgeons, welders or ice-hockey players; in times of war by soldiers; as means of disguise, as worn by burglers, terrorists or participants in a mask-ball; we could even think about make-up as a form of masking. Masks are not always simply hollow figures of human, or animal, heads worn on the face, but can also be worn on the hips or the neck as status symbols, like the so-called pendant masks from the African Kingdom of Benin. They might also be worn on the head with a costume attached to it like some of the dance-masks from New Guinea, where the actual head of the mask, often crowned by an enormous superstructure, is sitting on top of the dancer's head. Other masks were not worn but instead put on display, like some of the Malanggan masks of New Ireland
The act of masking is not simply about disguise but is the creation of a different person altogether. An actor in ancient Greek, Roman or traditional Japanese theatre would strive to bring the mask he was wearing to life and he would act in the way that the character he was representing prescribed him to do. To a certain extent this is also true of some of the African, North American or Melanesian masks in the Museum. But here the context and meaning of masked performance is a different one. Whereas in western tradition masks are meant to be part of an entertainment, in many parts of the world the mask symbolizes an ancestor or other spirit that has come back to life with the help of the masker, who in a way lends his body to the spirit so that it is the spirit performing through the dancer and not the other way round. Quite often the mask is regarded as a very powerful thing that might even have become too powerful through a single performance to ever be worn or touched again without causing harm. In many societies masks are discarded or destroyed after they have been used once. It might even be considered a taboo, something so sacred or powerful, or both, that nobody is allowed to see it and live, or at least remain unpunished.
The occasions for masked performances are closely linked to religious rituals and initiation ceremonies and not merely intended to be entertaining. What is more is that mask-making, understanding their function and also learning how to perform with them is very often part of the socialisation and initiation processes of all the young people (boys only in most societies) of a community as opposed to the theatre or our modern day carnivals where wearing a mask may be part of an actor's character or simply a matter of individual preferences.
How then are we to fully grasp the meaning of such an object if we have to view it not at all in its original context but in one that is completely new and alien altogether to the object in question. Fortunately, the objects in the Pitt Rivers Museum are presented as either part of a specific geographically defined region, or, and this is by far more often the case and indeed one of the principles by which the collection is displayed, they are grouped together with other objects of the same kind. Nevertheless they are still stripped of the paraphernalia vital for an understanding of its former purpose as this, unfortunately but understandable, is the way the objects were first acquired
Irvine, Gregory (1994) "Japanese Masks: Ritual and Drama". In: Mack, John (ed.) (1994) Masks. The Art of Expression. London: British Museum Press. pp.130-150.
King, J.Ch. (1994) "Masks from the Northwest Coast of North America". In: Mack, John (ed.) (1994) Masks. The Art of Expression. London: British Museum Press. pp.106-130
Lommel, Andreas (1970; 1972 transl.) Masks. Their Meaning and Function. London: Paul Elek.
Mack, John (1994) "Introduction: About Face". In: Mack, John (ed.) (1994) Masks. The Art of Expression. London: British Museum Press. pp. 8-32.
Starzecka, Dorotea Czarkowska (1994) "Masks in Oceania". In: Mack, John (ed.)(1994) Masks. The Art of Expression. London: British Museum Press. pp. 56-82.
Waley, Arthur (1921; 1965 4th impr.) The No Plays of Japan. [With letters by Oswald Sickert] London: George Allen and Unwin Ltd. | <urn:uuid:ef1ebcc2-281d-4bbc-a5d6-5cce5df96b0b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://users.ox.ac.uk/~pittinfo/masks.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00039-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957027 | 1,029 | 3.140625 | 3 |
OBSERVER Staff Writer
SILVER CREEK - The village of Silver Creek met with its wastewater treatment plant project engineers from Wendel Companies for an informational session with some good and mixed news.
Part of the good news for the village is its financing through Environmental Funding Corporation, a public benefit corporation, will be subsidized by 50 percent. Brian Sibiga of Wendel said its was his hope the village would receive 100 percent funding, but explained the village board and his firm have taken steps to "make the project viable without 100 percent funding" in place.
OBSERVER Photo by Shirley Pulawski
Brian Sibiga of Wendel Companies explained costs and efficiency savings regarding its wastewater treatment plant upgrade project.
Sibiga told the board at a special meeting on Monday night the recent decision to begin an energy audit of the plant will help offset costs associated with the upgrades necessary for the consent order the village signed with the Department of Environmental Conserva-tion. The upgrades will put the village in compliance with DEC regulations, but not without significant costs.
Several estimates were given for the project. Sibiga said a 2009 study estimated costs at $7.5 million, but more recent estimates were lower.
"That was a preliminary study. We went through everything and came up with a scenario which would cost about $3.75 million," on the low end or $4.5 million as a "worst case scenario."
He explained the lower figures represented work which would include the use of existing equipment, such as the tank, which are still in good condition.
"We will also do some (aspects of the project) by gravity to eliminate pumping," he said.
"We're leveraging what you already have. The tank will save a couple million," Sibiga said. The $4.5 million figure, he explained, would be a scenario where many lines would require pumps to move liquids if they cannot flow with the help of gravity alone. | <urn:uuid:514696cd-a69d-4dd7-a1ec-a0703e2972ae> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.observertoday.com/page/content.detail/id/579155/Wastewater-project-estimates-released-in-Silver-Creek.html?nav=5047 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00033-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979136 | 405 | 1.6875 | 2 |
Rainforest Action Network’s executive director Becky Tarbotton died last week after collapsing on a Mexican beach: Porter
Becky Tarbotton was an environmentalist who was comfortable in a boardroom, a protest and a Ladakhi farm field. That’s why she was so powerful.
The ground bucked beneath my feet over the holidays.
First, I tripped while jogging and dive rolled onto the street. The pain was sharp and howling. The emergency room doctor informed me I’d torn my shoulder tendons.
Then, two days later, my dear friend Becky Tarbotton died in a drowning accident I still don’t understand. The news cleaved one of my internal tectonic plates and I’ve felt rickety since then. There, the pain is deep and haunting.
Becky was an environmental activist from Vancouver. She ran the Rainforest Action Network — an edgy, smart California-based advocacy group that fights for Mama Earth through direct action and boardroom negotiations. That meant Becky worked at activist boot camps in Appalachia protesting mountaintop removal mines and then sat across from bank executives in Washington, lobbying for them to divest from dirty coal. She had one black suit she’d wear for those meetings, she told me laughing a few years ago.
Her biggest coup came last October, when after 18 months of pressure from RAN, the Walt Disney Company announced it would no longer buy paper from endangered forests or conflict zones.
In 2010, RAN commissioned a lab to test the paper in children’s books and discovered 60 per cent contained fibre from Indonesia’s tropical rainforest, home to the endangered Sumatran tiger and Orangutan. Fast and furious logging there has made Indonesia a leading greenhouse gas emitter.
Eight major publishers quickly agreed to change their paper procurement habits. But Disney, the world’s largest children’s book and magazine publisher, was a holdout.
“We are not the Rainforest Negotiation Network,” Becky said at RAN’s annual gala. “We are the Rainforest Action Network.”
They handcuffed a chainsaw-wielding Mickey and Minnie Mouse to the gates of Disney’s corporate headquarters under a banner that read “Disney: Destroying Indonesia’s Rainforests.”
Within one week, six Disney executives were at RAN’s office. They vowed to use “responsibly harvested fibre” not only in their children’s books, but at all 1,700 company subsidiaries.
Becky called it “the most far-reaching responsible paper policy ever adopted by a major public company.”
For her, it was a David-and-Goliath story, about how a few people — in this case, four RAN negotiators — can effect colossal change.
The same could be said for her.
Bill McKibben, a prominent American climate change campaigner, called her a “hero among heroes.”
Becky would have spewed her tea laughing at that, I imagine. She was goofy and fun, beautiful and insecure in the way most kids who went to small, alternative high schools are. She liked the limelight, but mostly for her silly dance moves. She took her work seriously, but not herself.
I met Becky my first week at McGill University. She was hard to miss — almost 6 feet tall, long brown hair, a loud giggle and a penchant for Body Shop dewberry perfume. If you didn’t hear her, you could smell when she was in the room. She studied geography with my husband, Graeme, and they became fast friends.
Later, we lived around the corner from her in Vancouver, where she was studying at graduate school.
But it wasn’t until we travelled to Ladakh in northern India that I really got to know Becky. She lured Graeme and I there to work on village farms and learn about alternative developmentfor the summer. We liked it so much, we returned the next summer to help her run the program.
Ladakh is the world’s bird nest — 3,000 metres in the sky, perched between the desert Karakoram and Himalayan mountains, which glow like overripe plums at dawn. For centuries, Buddhist farmers had worked fields of barley in relatively the same way — using yaks to thresh, the wind to winnow and the winter to recuperate with friends at festivals. I remember nuns handing out armloads of apples and apricots on the bus. But, that was all changing fast, since a road had been built from the south, bringing army jeeps, diesel generators and skin lightening cream.
Becky spent eight summers there, helping form a strong Ladakhi women’s advocacy group which offered alternative development ideas — little greenhouses and small hydro dams. Dressed in a Tibetan chuba (dress), she met us at the airport and told the taxi driver in Ladakh where to take us.
Then, she sat down on the kitchen floor with our hosts and refused a cup of salted butter tea two times before accepting, as if she’d lived there her whole life. (The Ladakhi custom calls for coyness. Accept tea right away, and they’ll deem you rude.)
At 26, Becky was comfortable in her own skin. She’d found her place.
Those summers were a pivotal time in my life. I was Becky’s opposite — acutely unsure of myself. I was going through an existential crisis. And, placed in a farm house in a small village where no one spoke English, I was further deconstructing.
After two weeks of squatting in the fields harvesting barley by hand, I woke up one morning no longer able to flex my right foot. I was sure I was crippled for life.
Then, one brilliant day, Becky appeared making her way up the footpath toward the house. She laughed at my walk, massaged my foot, regaled me with her latest funny mishap and assured me all would be fine.
That’s what struck me most about Becky: She was brave, but caring. She had convictions, but she wasn’t strident. She was fuelled by love and humour, more than anger and fear. That’s why so many people were drawn to her.
The parties she threw those summers, when all the volunteers came together, were like spiritual buffets. We didn’t listen to music, we sang songs ourselves, with Becky pulling out her fiddle to play some Gaelic reel as we danced. I remember walking home with her up the winding footpaths to our house, gasping at the cascade of silver in the sky above.
Becky never moved home to Vancouver again, although she had close family and friends there. From Ladakh, she went to England, Vermont and finally, California. All those moves, the shedding of comfortable skin for the tender aloneness of a new place, kept her kind and open, I think. Her colleague at RAN, Nell Greenberg, told me Wednesday that Becky’s strength wasn’t accidental. She worked to overcome those typical female insecurities — that she was an imposter who wouldn’t be taken seriously.
“Her vision and her voice were even more powerful than her beauty,” Greenberg said. “She was in full possession of her power this past year.”
Who knows what Becky would have gone on to do? She was only 39 last week, when she collapsed on a Mexican beach with water in her lungs. She drowned on land.
My shoulder will recover with time. My heart, I’m told, will too.
Catherine Porter’s column usually appears on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. She can be reached at [email protected]
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- GTA new home prices hit record $644,427 | <urn:uuid:ad3ea65c-3ec3-4ef0-bf61-7bcdeb26f890> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2013/01/03/rainforest_action_networks_executive_director_becky_tarbotton_died_last_week_after_collapsing_on_a_mexican_beach_porter.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00065-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969744 | 1,766 | 1.984375 | 2 |
Scientists have demonstrated that the growth of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) in mice can be suppressed by inhibiting chemokines that act to mediate interaction between the cancer cells and fibroblasts in the stroma. Their research found that invasive PDAC cells secrete much higher levels of a number of chemokines than preinvasive pancreatic intraepithelial neoplasia (PanIN) cells, and that these chemokines stimulate stromal fibroblasts to induce connective tissue growth factor (Ctgf), a profibrotic and tumor-promoting factor, which accelerates tumor growth in vivo.
In vivo studies by the team at Vanderbilt University and the University of Tokyo showed that treating a mouse model of human PDAC using an inhibitor of the interleukin 8 receptor, CXCR2, reduced Ctgf expression and angiogenesis, slowed tumor progression, and led to increased survival. Vanderbilt’s Harold L. Moses, M.D., and the University of Tokyo’s Hideaki Ijichi, M.D., and colleagues claim the findings suggest that inhibiting tumor-stromal interaction might be a promising therapeutic strategy for PDAC. They report their findings in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, in a paper titled “Inhibiting Cxcr2 disrupts tumor-stromal interactions and improves survival in a mouse model of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma.”
Previous studies have suggested that development of PDAC from preinvasive PanIN occurs through a multistep progression involving the accumulation of specific genetic alterations, the team notes. Indeed, at the invasive stage, mutations and deletions in KRAS, P16INK4A, P53, and SMAD4 are found in approximately 90%, 90%, 75%, and 55% of PDAC, respectively, suggesting that alteration in these signaling pathways plays a causal, or at least permissive, role that allows progression from PanIN to PDAC in vivo.
This notion has been supported by work in various mouse models, which demonstrated that inactivating a number of these genes dramatically accelerates PDAC progression through activation of Kras. The researchers led by Drs. Moses and Ijichi had previously generated a particular mouse model of human PDAC, designated Kras+Tgfbr2KO, which develops aggressive PDAC that histologically mirrors manifestations of the disease in humans. In particular, these mice demonstrate abundant stromal components in the tumor tissue that recapitulates desmoplasia, a hallmark of PDAC histology in humans that occurs as a proliferation of fibrotic and connective tissue around the invasive tumor.
Although prior studies have indicated that desmoplasia is associated with faster tumor progression and chemoresistance, little is known about tumor-stromal interactions during tumor progression. The team hypothesized that PDAC cells may produce and release certain factors into the microenvironment to which the stromal cells could in turn respond, by establishing favorable conditions for tumor growth.
They screened for secreted factors produced by the PDAC cells from Ptf1acre/+;LSL-KrasG12D/+;Tgfbr2flox/flox PDAC tissue, and from mPanIN cells from the Ptf1acre/+;LSL-KrasG12D/+pancreas tissue. The results showed that several chemokines, cytokines, and cell surface proteins were secreted from PDAC cells at much higher levels than from mPanIN cells. These included the Cxc chemokines Cxcl1, Cxcl2, Cxcl5, and Cxcl16. Further analysis showed that expression of the chemokines was upregulated in PDAC cells at the transcriptional level.
The increased expression and secretion of cytokines prompted the investigators to look at whether the interactions between chemokines and their receptors (Cxcl1, Cxcl2, and Cxcl5 bind to Cxcr2, while Cxcl16 binds to Cxcr6) might play a role in regulating PDAC progression. They found that although the receptor Cxcr2 was detected in both normal and mPanIN pancreas epithelia, its expression was relatively prominent at the invasive front of PDAC tissue, in both the stroma and epithelium. Inhibiting expression of Cxcr2 in PDAC cells using the Cxcr2 inhibitor SB225002 had no effect on PDAC cell proliferation, which led to the notion that the increased secretion of Cxc chemokines by PDAC cells might instead be acting on the stromal cells.
Previous work has suggested that the profibrotic Ctgf may have tumor-promoting activities, and the researchers' own prior studies had also found strong expression of Ctfg at the tumor-stromal border of Ptf1acre/+;LSL-KrasG12D/+;Tgfbr2flox/flox PDAC tissues. “This suggested that an active Ctgf-dependent tumor-stromal interaction was present in the PDAC tissue that could be a therapeutic target, since the interaction increased in intensity during tumor progression,” they note.
The researchers therefore looked to see whether secretion of Cxc chemokines by PDAC cells was inducing Ctgf expression in stromal fibroblasts. QRT-PCR confirmed that the fibroblasts demonstrated much higher basal expression of Ctgf mRNA compared with the PDAC cells, and that Ctgf expression was significantly upregulated when the cells were stimulated with Cxcl1, Cxcl2, and Cxcl5. When fibroblasts were incubated with culture media taken from either PDAC cells or mPanIN cells (a control media without cells was used as a comparison), PDAC cell culture medium induced significantly higher expression level of Ctgf mRNA than mPanIN medium. Furthermore, administering either of the Cxcr2 inhibitors repertaxin or SB225002 inhibited PDAC culture medium-induced Ctgf upregulation by fibroblasts in a dose-dependent manner.
TGF-β signaling is also well known to induce Ctgf expression, and the researchers provided confirmation of this separately, by demonstrating that the Tgfbr1 inhibitor SB431542 dramatically suppressed Ctgf induction. “Taken together, the data suggest that Cxc chemokines produced by PDAC cells can stimulate pancreatic fibroblasts to express Ctgf in a Cxcr2 signal-and TGF-β signal-dependent manner,” the authors write.
To corroborate their in vitro findings in vivo, the researchers compared tumor development in nude mice injected with either PDAC cells taken from a KRAS-activated mouse tissue, or with a mixture of PDAC cells and pancreatic fibroblasts. Although animals receiving both cell types were effectively given just half the number of PDAC cells than animals receiving PDAC cells alone (all animals received the same total number of cells), the mixed-cell injection resulted in faster subcutaneous tumor growth, indicating a tumor-promoting effect of the tumor-stromal interaction. When the resulting mixed-cell tumors were treated with the Cxcr2 inhibitor repertaxin, a significant growth-inhibitory effect was observed within weeks, suggesting that the tumor-promoting effect of the observed tumor-stromal interaction was Cxcr2 dependent.
Cxcr2 was then knocked out in PDAC cells and fibroblasts, and the experiments repeated. This time animals received either Cxcr2 wild-type PDAC cells and Cxcr2-knockdown fibroblasts, or Cxcr2-knockdown PDAC cells and Cxcr2 wild-type fibroblasts. In this case it was the combination of Cxcr2 wild-type PDAC cells and Cxcr2-knockdown fibroblasts that led to slower tumor growth.
To more closely mimic a clinical situation, the researchers evaluated the antitumor effect of Cxcl-Cxcr2 axis inhibition by treating the Ptf1acre/+;LSL-KrasG12D/+;Tgfbr2flox/flox mice with repertaxin or SB225002. Another cohort of the same mouse model was treated using gemcitabine, with or without repertaxin.
While dissected tumors were generally large enough to take up most of the pancreas in control, repertaxin-treated, and SB225002-treated mice, these animals did often demonstrate areas of morphologically normal pancreatic tissue, which suggested that the inhibitor delayed the tumor development, they remark. Among gemcitabine-treated mice, tumor formation was obviously inhibited, as there was well-retained normal pancreas structure as well as focal tumor areas. Importantly, however, “morphologically normal pancreatic tissue was more frequently observed in the combination treatment with repertaxin and gemcitabine,” the authors stress.
Tumor volume measurements also showed that repertaxin or SB225002 treatment alone significantly decreased the tumor volume, and adding gemcitabine resulted in further suppression. Interestingly, the microvessel density (MVD) in the Cxcr2 inhibitor-treated tumors was significantly lower than that of the control group, while the gemcitabine-treated group did not show obvious inhibition of angiogenesis. Encouragingly, mice treated using SB225002 demonstrated statistically significant increases in overall survival.
Immunohistochemistry confirmed that Ctgf expression had been inhibited in the treatment groups, with both Cxcr2 inhibitors decreasing Ctgf expression in the remaining stroma of PDAC tissue. Gemcitabine-treated tissues, meanwhile, showed a decrease in Ctgf expression that appeared to correlate with the observed decrease of stromal volume.
“The antitumor mechanisms of gemcitabine and the Cxcr2 inhibitor were obviously different,” the authors state. “Pancreas of the mice treated with gemcitabine still retained normal structure with multiple tumor foci, while they did not show a decrease in MVD. In contrast, mice treated with Cxcr2 inhibitor showed diffuse tumor formation in the pancreas with minimal normal area remaining and significantly decreased MVD.
These apparent different mechanisms of action hinted that combining the two forms of antitumor might be a promising therapeutic strategy for PDAC. To test this, the researchers carried out a survival study in which mice were treated using either a combination of gemcitabine plus SB225002, or gemcitabine alone. The combination and gemcitabine-alone treatments showed significant survival extension compared with the control group, although unfortunately, “the combination treatment did not show an advantage in the survival data compared with the single treatment," the authors admit. Observations in some of the treated mice indicated that this may have related at least in part to dose-related drug toxicities.
Nevertheless, they conclude, “These results indicate that blockade of the Cxcl-Cxcr2 axis may be an effective adjuvant therapeutic strategy for PDAC…The combination of gemcitabine, which inhibits DNA synthesis, mainly targeting tumor cells, and Cxcr2 inhibitor, which mainly modulates tumor microenvironment and inhibits angiogenesis, might be a synergistic therapeutic strategy and may prevent excessive toxicities by allowing dose reduction of each drug.” | <urn:uuid:1bf36db4-a0f2-4e08-9953-3e01435f4ae1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.genengnews.com/gen-news-highlights/scientists-say-blocking-chemokine-receptor-in-pancreatic-cancer-stromal-cells-helps-slow-cancer-/81245701/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00030-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946128 | 2,413 | 1.828125 | 2 |
(Redirected from Subsidy)
- Note: Also see the page on the Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit, which addresses a specific biofuels subsidy program in the United States.
- Global Subsidies Initiative - The Global Subsidies Initiative (GSI) of the International Institute for Sustainable Development "is a project designed to put the spotlight on subsidies and the corrosive effects they can have on environmental quality, economic development and governance."
- Ethanol industry lurches in wake of lost subsidy, oversupply, 28 February 2012 by Minnesota Public Radio: "After predicting they would survive the end of a major federal subsidy without problems, it looks like officials at the nation's ethanol producers may have been too optimistic."
- "Since the subsidy ended Dec. 31, ethanol profit margins have declined sharply, even slipping into negative territory. Experts see no quick turnaround in sight...."
- "The loss of the 45-cent-per-gallon federal tax break marks a major change in the economics of ethanol. It also created a double whammy beginning with the closing months of last year, when ethanol producers saw a rush of buyers for the last of a subsidized product."
- Senate keeps ethanol subsidies, 14 June 2011 by Politico: (United States) "The Senate on Tuesday rejected, 40-59, a symbolic attempt to strike ethanol tax subsidies as Democrats are working on a deal to hold at least one vote on ethanol next week."
- "The amendment from Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) fell well short of the necessary 60 votes to invoke cloture and limit debate. Five Democrats supported the amendment and 12 Republican ethanol backers, largely from the Midwest, opposed it."
- "Coburn’s amendment would have repealed a 45-cent-per-gallon tax credit to blend ethanol in gasoline that is set to expire at the end of the year. It is estimated that the tax credit would be worth upwards of $6 billion if it continues the whole year. The amendment also would have repealed a 54-cent-per-gallon tariff on ethanol imports."
- "About a dozen senators, led by Thune and Klobuchar, are proposing to immediately — starting July 1 — end the existing blender tax credit and replace it with a variable blender tax credit linked to the price of crude oil through 2014."
- The energy emperor's ethanol wardrobe looks mighty bare , 6 March 2011 by Washington Examiner: "Anyone looking at the ethanol subsidy program should be reminded of the childhood story of the emperor's new clothes."
- "While those who support the program put forth various reasons for their support -- that ethanol will reduce greenhouse gases or curb our reliance on foreign oil -- in reality, it is merely a wealth transfer program from the general taxpayer to corn producers."
- "If we admitted that, and just gave corn producers a check, we would be better off. We would avoid the misallocation of resources and the unintended consequences of the current program, such as higher food prices, that are a result of making the subsidy indirect rather than direct."
- "The environmental reasons for using ethanol are at best controversial. Former Vice President Al Gore has recently said about the ethanol subsidy, 'It is not good to have these massive subsidies.' Producing ethanol from corn and distributing it emits more greenhouse gases than producing gasoline from crude oil and distributing it."
- "If the use of corn ethanol were economically efficient, the ethanol industry would not need subsidies, taxes on the use of competitive fuels, and a government requirement that its product be used."
- Malaysia's once-vaunted biofuel industry grinds to halt, 6 September 2010 by AFP: "Malaysia's once-vaunted biofuel industry has seen production grind to a halt since a March announcement that the government's mandatory switch to the green energy will be delayed to June 2011."
- New CBO Report Examines Biofuels Tax Incentives, 16 July 2010 by Mackinnon Lawrence: "CBO releases report this week assessing biofuel incentives. Study finds that biofuel subsidies, costs associated with reducing petroleum use and GHG emissions vary by fuel."
- "First, after making adjustments for the different energy contents of the various biofuels and the petroleum fuel used to produce them, the report finds that producers of ethanol made from corn receive 73 cents to provide an amount of biofuel with the energy equivalent to that in one gallon of gasoline. On a similar basis, producers of cellulosic ethanol receive $1.62, and producers of biodiesel receive $1.08."
- "Second, the report finds reducing petroleum use costs taxpayers anywhere from $1.78 – 3.00 per one gallon of gasoline, again, depending on the type of fuel."
- "Third, the costs to taxpayers of reducing greenhouse gas emissions varies from $275 per metric ton of CO2e for cellulosic, $300 per metric ton for CO2e for biodiesel, and about $750 per metric ton of CO2e for ethanol . NOTE: the CBO estimates do not reflect any emissions associated with land use change (direct or indirect)."
- "Domestic Fuel reports this week that the Renewable Fuels Association (RFA) asserts the report provides no comparison to other technologies or types of biofuels against the destruction that goes hand in hand with fossil fuel production."
- Read the full report here: Using Biofuel Tax Credits to Achieve Energy and Environmental Policy Goals (PDF)
- EDITORIAL: Stop 'Big Corn', 5 April 2010 by the Washington Times: "The Environmental Protection Agency wants to dump more corn into your fuel tank this summer, and it's going to cost more than you think."
- "The agency is expected to approve a request from 52 ethanol producers known collectively as "Growth Energy" to boost existing requirements that gasoline contain 10 percent ethanol to 15 percent. The change means billions more in government subsidies for companies in the business of growing corn and converting it into ethanol. For the rest of us, it means significantly higher gasoline and food prices."
- "It's time that this shameless corporate welfare gets plowed under....Big Corn's advocates claim that forcing Americans to use this renewable fuel would reduce dependency on Mideast oil and lead to cleaner air. It's just as likely, however, that they want to get their hands on the $16 billion a year from the 45-cent-per-gallon "blender's tax credit" - in addition to the various state and federal mandates giving us no choice but to pump their pricey product into our fuel tanks."
- "According to the University of Missouri's Food and Agricultural Policy Research Institute, the ethanol tax credit increases corn prices by 18 cents a bushel, wheat by 15 cents and soybeans by 28 cents. That means higher prices for most food items at the grocery store and restaurants."
- The Case Against Biofuels: Probing Ethanol’s Hidden Costs, 11 March 2010 opinion piece by C. Ford Runge in Yale environment360: "Despite strong evidence that growing food crops to produce ethanol is harmful to the environment and the world’s poor, the Obama administration is backing subsidies and programs that will ensure that half of the U.S.’s corn crop will soon go to biofuel production. It’s time to recognize that biofuels are anything but green."
- President Obama "and his administration have wholeheartedly embraced corn ethanol and the tangle of government subsidies, price supports, and tariffs that underpin the entire dubious enterprise of using corn to power our cars. In early February, the president threw his weight behind new and existing initiatives to boost ethanol production from both food and nonfood sources, including supporting Congressional mandates that would triple biofuel production to 36 billion gallons by 2022."
- "Yet a close look at their impact on food security and the environment — with profound effects on water, the eutrophication of our coastal zones from fertilizers, land use, and greenhouse gas emissions — suggests that the biofuel bandwagon is anything but green."
- (U.K.'s largest power station) Drax suspends plan to replace coal with greener fuel, 19 February 2010 by Times Online: "Britain’s biggest power station has suspended its plan to replace coal with greener fuel, leaving the Government little chance of meeting its target for renewable energy."
- "The power station, which is the country’s largest single source of CO2, has invested £80 million in a processing unit for wood, straw and other plant-based fuels, known as biomass."
- "Drax is also one of dozens of companies delaying investments in new biomass power stations because of uncertainty over the Government’s policy on long-term subsidies. Hundreds of farmers growing biomass crops may now struggle to sell their produce."
- "The Renewable Energy Association said that plans for more than 50 biomass projects, totalling £13 billion of investment, had been suspended because of uncertainty over policy."
- Biofuels for the poor, 23 March 2009 opinion piece in The Jakarta Post: "After being criticized for being slow to develop the local biofuel industry, the Indonesian government has finally issued two important policies; first, a decree issued last year obliging industries and the transportation sector to use biofuels; and second, its recent decision to provide subsidies for sales of the fuel."
- UK 'should end biofuel subsidies', 26 August 2008 by BBC News: The UK "government should stop funding biofuels and use the money to halt the destruction of rainforests and peatland instead, a think tank has said."
- The RTFO [Renewable Transportation Fuel Obligation] is designed to cut up to three million tonnes of CO2 emissions each year, but Policy Exchange said investing in the protection of peatland or rainforests could result in a '50 times greater amount of avoided emission'".
- Download the Policy Exchange report, The Root of the Matter: Carbon Sequestration in Forests and Peatlands (PDF file)
- Facing criticism, biofuels industry forms new lobby group to influence lawmakers, 25 July 2008 by mongabay.com: "Under attack by politicians, aid groups, and environmentalists for driving up food prices and fueling destruction of ecologically sensitive habitats, some of the world's largest agroindustrial firms have formed a lobby group to influence consumers and lawmakers to support continued subsidies for biofuel production in the United States".
- "The group, known as the Alliance for Abundant Food and Energy, was created by Archer Daniels Midland Co, DuPont Co, Deere & Co, Monsanto Co and the Renewable Fuels Association".
- "The group will promote genetically modified crops to improve crops yields as a solution to meeting global food needs. It does not aim to curtail biofuel production and will lobby Congress to keep subsidies for ethanol and biodiesel production in place".
- US and EU urged to cut biofuels, 7 July 2008, BBC World News: "World Bank President Robert Zoellick has called for reform of biofuel policies in rich countries, urging them to grow more food to feed the hungry."
- U.N. Chief to Prod Nations On Food Crisis, 2 June 2008 by the Washington Post: "U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon will issue an urgent plea to world leaders at a food summit in Rome on Tuesday to immediately suspend trade restrictions, agricultural taxes and other price controls that have helped fuel the highest food prices in 30 years, according to U.N. officials....The United Nations will also urge the United States and other nations to consider phasing out subsidies for food-based biofuels -- such as ethanol".
- Europe, Cutting Biofuel Subsidies, Redirects Aid to Stress Greenest Options, 22 January 2008, The New York Times: "Governments in Europe and elsewhere have begun rolling back generous, across-the-board subsidies for biofuels, acknowledging that the environmental benefits of these fuels have often been overstated....But as they aim to be more selective, these governments are discovering how difficult it can be to figure out whether a particular fuel — much less a particular batch of corn ethanol or rapeseed biodiesel — has been produced in an environmentally friendly manner."
- Biofuels — At What Cost? Government support for ethanol and biodiesel in selected OECD countries (PDF file) - September 2007, by the Global Subsidies Initiative. From the description:
- "Government support for biofuels has soared in recent years as policy makers have sought ways to reduce reliance on fossil fuels, especially petroleum. However, up to now the full extent of this support has not been documented. Yet informed public debate over the cost-effectiveness and impacts of biofuel policies is impossible without such information."
- This report "is a synthesis of individual country reports which are being released over the course of 2006 and 2007."
- 14 September 2010, Washington, D.C., USA: Classifying Biofuel Subsidies: Farm Bill and WTO Considerations. (Themes: subsidies, trade, WTO)
|Investment in biofuels | Subsidies | Trade|
| Agriculture (Land use) | Climate change | Economics (Green economy/Green jobs)|
Environment | Social (Poverty) | Trade
What is bioenergy? | Benefits/Risks | Who is doing what? | <urn:uuid:40be863b-45d0-4a08-9b61-8bac0eadf28a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bioenergywiki.net/Subsidy | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00075-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940312 | 2,766 | 2.34375 | 2 |
Subsets and Splits