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Abundance and diversity of bacteria in oxygen minimum drinking water reservoir sediments studied by quantitative PCR and pyrosequencing.
Reservoir sediment is one of the most stressful environments for microorganisms due to periodically oxygen minimum conditions. In this study, the abundance and composition of bacteria associated with sediments from three drinking water reservoirs (Zhoucun, ZCR; Shibianyu, SBYR; and Jinpen, JPR) were investigated by quantitative polymerase chain reaction and 16S rRNA-based 454 pyrosequencing. The results of physico-chemical analysis of sediments showed that the organic matter and total nitrogen were significantly higher in ZCR as compared to JPR (P < 0.01). The bacterial abundance was 9.13 × 10(6), 1.14 × 10(7), and 6.35 × 10(6) copies/ng DNA in sediments of SBYR, ZCR, and JPR, respectively (P < 0.01). The pyrosequencing revealed a total of 9,673 operational taxonomic units, which were affiliated with 17 phyla. The dominant phylum was Firmicutes (56.83%) in JPR; whereas, the dominance of Proteobacteria was observed in SBYR with 40.38% and ZCR with 39.56%. The Shannon-Wiener diversity (H') was high in ZCR; whereas, Chao 1 richness was high in SBYR. The dominant genera were Clostridium with 42.15% and Bacillus with 20.44% in JPR. Meanwhile, Dechloromonas with 14.80% and Smithella with 7.20% were dominated in ZCR, and Bacillus with 45.45% and Acinetobacter with 5.15% in SBYR. The heat map profiles and redundancy analysis indicated substantial differences in sediment bacterial community composition among three reservoirs. Moreover, it appears from the results that physico-chemical variables of sediments including pH, organic matter, total nitrogen, and available phosphorous played key roles in shaping the bacterial community diversity. The results obtained from this study will broaden our understanding on the bacterial community structure of sediments in oxygen minimum and stressful freshwater environments.
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Businovo District
Businovo District () was formerly a district in the north of Moscow, Russia.
The village of Busino () was first mentioned in the 16th century ; its name is derived from "Ivan Busa", the name of a local merchant in 1547, whose son was known as "Busin". The record books of 1584–1586 referred to the village as "Kokorevo (), also known as Businovo". In 1685, the village was a part of the lands owned by the Novodevichy Convent.
In 1912, the village comprised 75 households. In 1960, the community it was completely absorbed by Moscow and turned into a typical late Soviet sleeping district.
In 1991, as a result of Moscow's administrative reform, Businovo District was established.
Located close to the MKAD, Businovo was one of the northernmost districts of Moscow. It bordered Khovrino District in the west and Khimki in the north. Its area was approximately . It had only three streets that circled it. There were two schools, two kindergartens, a music school, a municipal library, a polyclinic, and a militsiya station in the district. The closest metro station was Rechnoy Vokzal.
The district existed until August 22, 1997, when its territory was formally merged into Zapadnoye Degunino District.
Cogeneration plant (TETs-21) located on the eastern edge of Businovo is the largest in Europe in terms of generated heat with an estimated power 4,958 Gcal/h.
Category:Districts of Moscow
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White House "ethics czar" Norman Eisen is taking an ambassadorship. He's been the "ethics czar," and now his portfolio is being added to those handled by Bob Bauer, the counsel to the president. Is that an upgrade for ethics and openness in the White House, or the opposite?
MICHELE NORRIS, host:
From NPR News, this is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Michele Norris.
MELISSA BLOCK, host:
And I'm Melissa Block.
In imperial Russia, losing the title of czar was always a demotion. But in Washington, moving from czar to ambassador can be a step-up. The White House ethics czar is about to become the ambassador to the Czech Republic. He's happy about the move.
But as NPR's Ari Shapiro reports, some watchdog groups are not happy with the White House decision to forego hiring a new ethics czar.
ARI SHAPIRO: People who have spent decades pushing for ethics and transparency in government talk about Norm Eisen's tenure as ethics czar as a kind of Camelot moment.
Ms. DANIELLE BRIAN (Executive Director, Project on Government Oversight): It was a dream come true.
Dr. GARY BASS (Founder and Executive Director, OMB Watch): He's performed in almost a superhuman fashion.
Ms. MELANIE SLOAN (Executive Director, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington): He has really pushed these issues in a way nobody else in the White House Counsel's Office has, certainly, in the past 20 years. And I think no other administration has.
SHAPIRO: That was Danielle Brian of the Project on Government Oversight, Gary Bass of OMB Watch, Fred Wertheimer of Democracy 21 and Melanie Sloan of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington - all mourning the departure of the first and possibly the last ethics czar.
Mr. LABOLT: Bob Bauer, as White House counsel, will assume the lead on ethics and government reform.
SHAPIRO: Which is exactly the way earlier presidents handled it.
Six lawyers who used to work for Eisen will keep working on these issues. And a new lawyer named Stephen Crowley(ph) is joining the White House's Domestic Policy Council to focus on ethics and transparency, among other subjects.
Nonetheless, Eileen Miller(ph) of the Sunlight Foundation fears that this is a step backward.
Ms. ELLEN MILLER (Co-founder, Sunlight Foundation): Because we have had for 18 months a designated individual who has been focused solely on these issues. And now, we have an individual who has hundreds of other hugely important issues in his portfolio, and this is just going to be one of them.
SHAPIRO: The White House counsel is the president's top lawyer, overseeing everything from judicial nominations to closing Guantanamo. Ethics is now added to the pile.
But Norm Ornstein of the American Enterprise Institute argues that the way the boxes are arranged is not what's important.
Mr. NORM ORNSTEIN (Congressional Scholar, American Enterprise Institute): All of this rests not on whether you have a Norm Eisen or an ethics czar or somebody else in a particular position. What it really rests on is the degree to which the president of the United States decides that this is something that's important to him.
SHAPIRO: And White House spokesman Ben LaBolt says anyone who wants to know whether the president is committed to these issues should look at Barack Obama's history in public office.
Mr. LABOLT: His record should offer assurances that these issues will remain at the top of his agenda.
Ms. BRIAN: I believe that. I believe, because we worked with then-Senator Obama, and I believe that he does personally really care about these issues.
That's Danielle Brian. She runs the Project on Government Oversight.
Ms. BRIAN: But one of the things that I've learned during his term in office, as president, is sometimes that isn't enough. It isn't enough for him to say I really care about these issues. He needs to have the people who are continuing to push those agencies - particularly, for example, in the intelligence community - that really aren't as embracing of openness and transparency.
SHAPIRO: All of this nail-biting amounts to fear of the unknown, says Fred Wertheimer of Democracy 21.
Mr. WERTHEIMER: I believe we are in a position to have a very satisfactory transition. I think we all know that in the end this will be judged by results, not by the speculation that's taking place now.
SHAPIRO: White House officials say they are happy to be judged on results. They say a stream of new initiatives on transparency, ethics, whistleblower protection and more is on its way - even without an ethics czar to oversee their implementation.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by a contractor for NPR, and accuracy and availability may vary. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Please be aware that the authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio.
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Alfred-Marie Liénard
Alfred-Marie Liénard (2 April 1869 in Amiens – 29 April 1958 in Paris), was a French physicist and engineer. He is most well known for his derivation of the Liénard–Wiechert potentials.
From 1887–1889 Liénard was a student at the École Polytechnique and from 1889–1892 at the École des mines de Paris. From 1892–1895 he was a mining engineer in Valencia, Marseille, and Angers. From 1895–1908 he was professor at the École des Mines de Saint-Étienne and from 1908–1911 he was professor of electrical engineering at the École des Mines de Paris. In World War I he served in the French Army.
Liénard worked in the fields of electricity, magnetism, and mechanics. In 1898 (and two years after him Emil Wiechert), he derived what is now called the Liénard–Wiechert potentials. He also investigated problems related to the elasticity and strength of materials, and wrote papers on thermodynamics and hydrodynamics.
Along with M. H. Chipart, Liénard developed the Liénard–Chipart criterion for determining the stability of a continuous-time system of equations.
Liénard was a commander of the Légion d'honneur. He was also vice-president of the Société Française des Électriciens and he was president of the Société Mathématique de France.
References
External links
Annales.org: Alfred-Marie Liénard
Category:French electrical engineers
Category:École Polytechnique alumni
Category:Mines ParisTech alumni
Category:Corps des mines
Category:1869 births
Category:1958 deaths
Category:French physicists
Category:French engineers
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Under the cover of last week’s budget splash, the Federal Government has quietly changed tax laws which currently allow students and potentially jobseekers to claim a deduction for expenses against government assistance payments.
The move effectively overturns a High Court decision last year which found in favour of Melbourne student Symone Anstis, who argued she should be able to claim deductions for her study costs such as books, fees and depreciation on her computer because they were incurred in gaining her youth-allowance income.
It’s hard not to see this move by the government as an attack on students - as well as the unemployed.
The High Court decision only benefits students who earn enough income (Youth Allowance plus other income) to be over the effective tax free level without completely denying them the right to some Youth Allowance.
This year that base amount, taking into account the tax free threshold and low income tax offset, is $16,000.
Estimates are that the cost to the revenue of such deductions for students in these circumstances over the four income years between 2006 and 2009 was around $300 million in total.
Unemployed the real target?
But students are not the only or perhaps even the real target of the Government in denying deductions against government assistance payments.
The reasoning in the Anstis case could well have meant that people on Newstart who are required to attend job interviews would be able to claim the interview costs as deductions against the payment.
This decision saves at best a few hundred million dollars.
Negative gearing a tax rort
However the government won’t touch negative gearing, a tax rort that allows investors to gear their investment so they never make a profit but use the loss to offset against their other income.
And if that isn’t enough they can then sell the property at a concessional capital gains tax rate if they have held it for more than 12 months.
Denying students and others deductions are interesting priorities when at the same time there has been a fall in company tax collections.
The profit position of Australian companies has been and is remarkably robust, so much so that the Commissioner of Taxation is now talking about an increasing tax gap – the gap between the level of economic activity and the amount of tax paid. While profits are going up, company tax is going down.
The ATO has said that between 2005 and 2008 40% of big business paid no income tax.
After the global financial crisis the figure is likely to be higher today. Of those big businesses which do pay income tax, most pay much less than the headline rate of 30%.
Exemptions
On top of this decline in company tax collections, the Treasury Tax Expenditures Statement 2010 shows we spend $113 billion through, among other mechanisms, exemptions and extra deductions in the tax system.
Tens of billions of this disguised expenditure is spent on business. For example Treasury estimates the various identified specific business concession cost the revenue over $6 billion a year.
The capital gains tax discount for individuals and trusts, of which business is the major beneficiary, totalled over $4 billion in foregone revenue in 2009/10.
The small business capital gains tax discount cost almost $600 million that year.
Treasury’s Tax Expenditure estimates are that we currently spend $27 billion on superannuation tax concessions.
They project this will rise to almost $38 billion in 2013/14. By contrast we spent just over $29 billion on the age pension in 2009/10 and this figure is estimated to rise to $38.5 billion in 2013/14.
Watered-down
Last year the mining industry’s campaign against a modest tax, the Resource Super Profits Tax, destroyed a Prime Minister and saw his successor introduce a much watered down Minerals Resource Rent Tax.
Estimates are that this will produce a loss of projected revenue of on average $10 billion a year.
A simple tidying up of tax laws to get rid some of the more egregious tax planning opportunities, coupled with removing a few of the tax concessions for business, would yield tens of billions every year. That would help wipe the Budget deficit out.
A simple rent tax applying to all minerals and resources would bring in billions to spend on public health, education, transport and renewable energy.
Extending such a tax to all economic rent – think of the banks and two major supermarkets – would raise even more.
Labor has done none of this, other than watering down its original modest rent tax even further.
Warped priorities
Why is it that Labor’s priorities are to attack legitimate deductions for students and the unemployed but to do nothing about company tax avoidance and Government spending through the tax system on business?
If we are all in this together maybe big business should start paying its way.
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Service
tiles kraken vitrified wall tiles
Price : 45 (Per piece)
Price :40 (Per piece)
Specification
min quantity :
1
max quantity :
500
unit :
sq. ft.
size :
800 X 800mm (approx)
type :
glazed vitrified
packet capacity :
6 pieces
finish :
matt
display unit :
Sq.ft
please enter the pin
Description
Glazed Vitrified have a glazed surface. They offer a wide variety of designs, art work and surface textures like wood grain, bamboo, slate or stone. Glazed Vitrified are durable and stylish. Main advantage with Glazed Vitrified is it offers option of making any type of designs, art work that is only possible in this type of Vitrified tiles.
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Bitcoin’s price recorded an impressive 19 percent rally from $4,200 to nearly $5,000 while market capitalization increased by $20 billion within the span of an hour.
In the past month, fueled by the strong performance of crypto assets and alternative cryptocurrencies, the valuation of the crypto market rose by more than $40 billion from $125 billion to $166 billion.
Will Bitcoin Continue to Surge?
The overnight rally of cryptocurrencies is said to have been primarily triggered by the liquidation of short contracts worth more than $500 million: a short squeeze.
The cryptocurrency market needed considerable stimulus to pass the $4,200 resistance level, which in itself required buyers to absorb an $80 million sell wall. The liquidation of short contracts served as a proper catalyst to bitcoin’s near-term movement.
This large movement was necessary because of bitcoin’s extended period of stability from January to March. The last time the price of the dominant cryptocurrency was stagnant for three months a 50 percent plunge in price followed.
The rally in the price of bitcoin following weeks of strong upside movement by alternative cryptocurrencies was somewhat expected. Some technical analysts were anticipating that investors cash out their returns from high-risk trades back into bitcoin.
Initially, only Bitcoin recorded strong gains on early Tuesday morning as capital flowed back into BTC from altcoins. However, by evening, both bitcoin and alternative cryptocurrencies began to surge simultaneously, suggesting that a new inflow of capital is triggering the recovery of the crypto market.
There’s Already $6 Billion in Crypto
Previously, Three Arrows Capital CEO Su Zhu said that the cryptocurrency markets do not need the inflow of external capital to rebound.
Zhu explained that nearly $6 billion are stored in stablecoins, on exchanges, and cryptocurrency funds. These funds are sitting on the sidelines waiting to be allocated into crypto assets in the medium-term. As Zhu stated:
“There’s an estimated $2 billion in cash sitting at crypto funds/holdcos [holding corporations]. There’s another $2 billion+ sitting in stablecoins, and another $2 billion sitting at exchanges/silvergate/signature. This is $6 billion in fiat already onboarded to crypto to buy your bags. Imagine thinking we need new money to hit $10,000.”
If the funds on the sidelines of the cryptocurrency market move, considering that the overwhelming majority of bitcoin volumes are inflated and that the real daily volume of bitcoin is estimated to be below $1 billion, it could help fuel the momentum of both BTC and the rest of the cryptocurrency market.
Volume Exploding
While volume is rising to all-time high levels on exchanges like Binance, there is less sell pressure in the mid-$4,000 region than at $4,200 and below.
$BTC buy volume at an all time high on Binance. pic.twitter.com/inxCpaEM7J — Galaxy (@galaxyBTC) April 2, 2019
Consequently, assets such as Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Litecoin (LTC), and EOS recorded gains in the range of 15 to 33 percent, with BCH leading the market as the best performing cryptocurrency of the day.
Bitcoin $9,634.70 28.51% Bitcoin, currently ranked #1 by market cap, is up 28.51% over the past 24 hours. BTC has a market cap of $173.55B with a 24 hour volume of $41.84B. Bitcoin Price Chart BTCUSD Chart by TradingView The simultaneous increase in the value of bitcoin and alternative cryptocurrencies indicate an overall increase in confidence and improvement in sentiment amongst investors in the cryptocurrency market. Some technical analysts suggested that BTC is vulnerable to a drop to previous support levels if it is unable to break out of the $4,200 to $4,600 range, and with the 200 moving average broken, bitcoin has succesfully regained strong, and likely long-lasting momentum.
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Slideshare uses cookies to improve functionality and performance, and to provide you with relevant advertising. If you continue browsing the site, you agree to the use of cookies on this website. See our User Agreement and Privacy Policy.
Slideshare uses cookies to improve functionality and performance, and to provide you with relevant advertising. If you continue browsing the site, you agree to the use of cookies on this website. See our Privacy Policy and User Agreement for details.
6.
What if rate is <50/min or rhythm is irregular ? Count the number of R waves in a 6 second strip and multiply by 10. For example, if there are 7 R waves in a 6 second strip, the heart rate is 70 (7x10=70).
14.
Infarction <ul><li>Clinically significant ST segment elevation is considered to be present if it is greater than 1 mm (0.1 mV) in at least two contiguous precordial leads or in at least two adjacent limb leads. </li></ul>
29.
Ischemia <ul><li>ST depression is defined by an ST segment which is depressed >1 mm below the baseline </li></ul><ul><li>Typically there are ST segment changes associated with T wave flattening or inversion; isolated T wave changes are not usually seen with ischemia. </li></ul>
32.
Abnormal Q wave <ul><li>According to the new criteria, an abnormal Q wave is any Q wave in leads V1 to V3 or a Q wave 30 msec in leads I, II, aVL, aVF, or V4 to V6; the Q wave must be present in any two contiguous leads and 1 mm in depth. </li></ul><ul><li>(European Society of Cardiology (ESC) and American College of Cardiology (ACC) 2000) </li></ul>
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Q:
Convert JavaScript string object in to array element
I have a variable which value is coming like this:
"
traffic
engagement
conversion
"
I want to convert it to: ["traffic", "engagement", "conversion"] .
Any ideas how to do this?
A:
If we ignore the errors in string (as @Andy said), and we just have a string with words separated by an unknown amount of space, such as this:
var str = " traffic engagement conversion";
This regexp should to the trick:
var arr = str.match(/[^\s]+/g);
It means get all sequences that don't include spaces of any kind.
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The Conjuring 2012 FIRST EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW, Andrea Perron, House of Darkness, House of Light!
Conjuring - JUNE 2012 Andrea Perron FIRST EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW~A HORROR STORY YOU WON'T HEAR ANYWHERE ELSE...HOUSE OF DARKNESS, HOUSE OF LIGHT, BEFORE THE MOVIE ....HARRISVILLE FARMHOUSE, PERRON FAMILY TRUE HAUNTING STORY --Ed and Lorriane Warren Investigated formerly The Warren Files -NOW... The Conjuring....this case was investigated by Ed and Lorraine Warren and made into a movie...Andrea Perron, author, House of Darkness House of Light.. is a collective memoir which chronicles the supernatural events which occurred between 1970-1980, during the decade her family spent dwelling among the spirits in a house alive with death. This portal, cleverly disguised as an ancient New England farmhouse, is the setting for the spiritual excursion we embarked upon.
on DO YOU BELIEVE SHOW, Host, Norene Balovich, co-host, Donna Raymond.........PART 2 OF THIS INTERVIEW:
http://youtu.be/MRBdXwGYjd8
Please SUBSCRIBE and join the Paranormal Zone TV family, LIVE talk shows broadcasted weekly!!! https://www.youtube.com/user/NoreneB/featured
The Conjuring also known as The Warren Files is an upcoming supernatural horror film directed by James Wan.The film stars Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson as Ed and Lorraine Warren, paranormal investigators who come to the assistance of the Perron family (Ron Livingston and Lili Taylor), who are experiencing increasingly disturbing events in their Rhode Island farmhouse.
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GAO investigates rising insurance premiums
In the midst of all the talk about what could happen to pay and benefits because of the budget squeeze, the Government Accountability Office has done some research into why long-term care insurance premiums are going up so much. The GAO says OPM didn't attract interest in underwriting the program from many insurers, and then the company that got the deal, John Hancock, found out their actuarial tables weren't figured out right. Tammy Flanagan is the Senior Benefits Director at National Institute of Transition Planning. She has advice on what, if anything, you can do, and what you should do.
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Q:
Android RXJava cleaner solution
I have a dynamic list of commands which shall be executed.
Some of these command objects should be executed in a background thread and some of them
have to be executed on the UiThread as they change views and trigger animations.
Some commands are not allowed to be executed before another command has been finished. E.g.
C1 triggers a fade in animation which lasts 2 sec. C2 triggers a fade out animation.
=> The delay between the commands is dynamic.
I'm a newbie to RXJava. My solution works but seems not to be very elegant.
=> Before I convert the list of commands into an Observable I add "Wait" commands where needed.
The wait command just calls Thread.sleep(delayInMs). Observation and subscription both run on the same
background thread. The Observable emits the commands. If the command is an instance of UiCommand
the subscriber posts the execution to the uiThread otherwise it executes the command on the
background thread.
What is the best way to solve this problem with RXJava? I would like to get rid of the
UiThread posts and the upfront preparation of the list. But replace this with RXJava features.
A:
Here seems like you can use transformers to convert your observable from synchronous to asynchronous.
Take a look of these examples
https://github.com/politrons/reactive/blob/master/src/test/java/rx/observables/transforming/ObservableCompose.java
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Validity of the Addiction Severity Index (adapted version) in a Costa Rican population group.
Until recently, no adapted and validated instrument was available for assessing the alcohol and drug problems of individuals in Costa Rica. This article reports the results of a study performed by Costa Rica's Institute on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence in order to test an adapted version of one such instrument, the Addiction Severity Index (ASI), in a Costa Rican setting. The instrument was used to interview 100 male subjects 18 to 64 years old (51 with diagnosed alcohol or drug problems and 49 controls). In general, the subjects with previously diagnosed alcohol or drug problems were assigned substantially higher scores. More specifically, statistical analysis indicated highly significant correlations (p less than 0.001) between the type of subject (test subject or control) and the likelihood that noteworthy problems would be found in the areas of alcohol use, family/social relations, work/finances, and psychological status. Overall, the study demonstrated that the instrument was capable of distinguishing between the affected and unaffected populations, and also of gauging the severity of the problems involved and the patients' treatment needs.
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Q:
Why doesn't dynamic keyword work with dynamically loaded assemblies?
I'm working on a CSharp expression evaluator which can be used as you can see below. This component generates code and compiles it in memory and after that, it loads the generated assembly, creates an instance of the generated class and run it. Results are saved in a dictionary.
My problem is that all run ok until the last line of code where it fails with the exception:
Microsoft.CSharp.RuntimeBinder.RuntimeBinderException 'object' does not contain a definition for 'FirstName'.
However, Visual Studio is able to show me the professional variable content:
Professional = { FirstName = Juan Pablo,
LastName = Ibañez,
Certifications = <>f__AnonymousType0`3[System.String,System.String,System.String][],
SayHi = System.Action }
And this is the code:
static void Main(string[] args)
{
const string data = @"results[""professional""] =
new
{
FirstName = ""Juan Pablo"",
LastName = ""Ibañez"",
Certifications = new[]
{
new { Provider=""MSFT"", ExamCode = ""70-536"", Title = ""TS: Microsoft .NET Framework – Application Development Foundation"" },
new { Provider=""MSFT"", ExamCode = ""70-505"", Title = ""TS: Microsoft .NET Framework – Application Development Foundation"" },
new { Provider=""MSFT"", ExamCode = ""70-563"", Title = ""TS: Microsoft .NET Framework – Application Development Foundation"" }
},
SayHi = new System.Action(()=> System.Console.WriteLine(""Hi""))
};";
var eval = CSharpEvaluator.Evaluate(data); // return a disctionary<string, object>
dynamic professional = eval["professional"];
Console.WriteLine("First Name: {0}", professional.FirstName);
Any ideas?
Thank you.
A:
EDIT: I think I've got it. Anonymous types are internal, so the type isn't visible to the dynamic binder. Verifying now...
Yup, that's it. Note the exact error message: 'object' does not contain a definition for 'FirstName'".
It's using object because that's the only type you could actually refer to the object as from within your own assembly. This has nothing to do with the assembly being loaded dynamically - it's simply a matter of it being in a different assembly.
EDIT: You can get round this using the [InternalsVisibleTo] attribute, if you can make your "publishing" assembly apply that. Here's an example:
// In Library.dll
using System.Runtime.CompilerServices;
[assembly:InternalsVisibleTo("Test")]
public class Library
{
public static object Foo()
{
return new { ID = 1 };
}
}
// In Test.exe
using System;
class Test
{
static void Main()
{
dynamic d = Library.Foo();
Console.WriteLine(d.ID);
}
}
If you comment out the attribute, Test.exe breaks as per your question. With the attribute, it works fine. The C# compiler authors think of everything :)
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Man Gets 3 Life Terms – Mom Told Him To Confess Murderpedia: Patrick J. McIntyre A Mother’s Duty Movies/Documentaries 48 Hours: Life and Death Decision Unthinkable (inspired by this crime but not exactly the same) INMATE INFORMATION...
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DW: Bibiana Steinhaus, what is it that you love about football?
Bibiana Steinhaus: I love the passion that drives the people involved. I love the dynamism, the speed, the emotions.
What is your main challenge as a Bundesliga referee?
The main challenge in refereeing is controlling 22 totally different players within a certain number of square meters while being watched by a lot of spectators in the stadium and at home and under the microscope of television and the media.
It's my job to guide them through the 90 minutes and ensure that the laws of the game are adhered to. I have to ensure that challenges are fair, that the result of the game reflects the performance of the players and nothing else.
I think what I like most is managing so many different types of people, on the pitch and around it. Communicating with different characters is probably the biggest challenge but I love doing it. It's a lot of fun!
Refereeing is a physical challenge. Do you think people forget that referees are athletes, too?
As a referee you are obviously a sportsperson. You run up to 12 kilometers (7.5 miles) during a match and you don’t do it at a consistent pace either. You’re constantly stopping and starting and changing direction. Your heartbeat keeps increasing and after 90 minutes, when your body is exhausted, you still have to be mentally prepared to make a decision – a big decision, a huge decision – which could cost a team a lot of money at the end of the day. You have to be 100 percent fit, both mentally and physically.
Steinhaus has also had the added complication this season of helping to trial the video assistant review system
How do you command the respect of all the players?
The recipe for respect is to treat people the way you would like to be treated. You don't need to scream and shout to get a job done. Communication is key. You must be polite, helpful and straight forward. If you can do this, I think you’re on the right path.
I know you don't really like the gender topic but we have to talk about it because that's what people are interested in. Do you think female referees have any advantages over male referees?
As you say, I don't really like the gender topic when it comes to refereeing I understand that it's a topic for people around me. At the end of the day, the performance is what matters. And the person producing the best performance should be the person on the pitch, no matter what gender, what hair color, what religion. That's all that counts.
There are not many female referees in German football. There is only one other, and she is in the second division. Do you think this will change anytime soon?
In Germany we have about 80,000 referees in total and 3,000 of them are female. We have 24 officials refereeing in the Bundesliga and I'm the only female official. But we also have an assistant referee in the second division, Katrin Rafalski, who is doing a great job. Riem Hussein is in the third division. These women are showing that it's not about being female or male; it’s about performance. I really hope this is a good example for young girls to do the same.
Is Germany a pioneering country for female refereeing? What is the situation like worldwide?
The Bundesliga is one of the world's most respected leagues, so having a female official here is a big step in general for female officials. But there are good female officials around the world. At the U17 World Cup in India a few weeks ago, seven females were appointed as fourth officials. That was an international tournament with teams from all over the world.
We have a lot of good leagues in Europe, even in smaller countries, where female referees are officiating. It’s not even a topic because they are doing a great job. And that’s precisely what we want; to be judged by our performances on the pitch.
Steinhaus was given a special welcome before her first Bundesliga game
Is your way of handling the gender issue simply to ignore it?
I don’t want to underline the gender discussion, I want to have a performance discussion. I want to inspire people to do whatever they want, whether that's leading a country, flying to the moon, whatever. Both sexes have great possibilities and that’s a value I stand for. I am happy that Germany is quite far ahead in this respect. Scandinavian countries are even more advanced.
You’ve made quite a few headlines this season. One of my favorites was: "The referee wants you to look at the game, not her." So what did you think about the headiline "Bibi ist die Beste!" (Bibi is the best!) that appeared in the newspaper BILD after your first Bundesliga game?
Generally speaking, I don't like headlines about referees because that means you have been the focus of the game, and that is definitely not a good thing. Headlines are not good for referees!
But of course, with my promotion to the Bundesliga there have been a few headlines around the world about female officials. I like the headlines that discuss the performance, not the fact that I'm a female official. I’m doing the same job as all the others. In fact, my favorite headline was after my second Bundesliga game because there was no headline at all. That's definitely a step forward!
You are a police officer as well. Are there any similarities between being a police officer and a referee?
Being a cop and being a referee is very similar because you always have to deal with two different sides from a neutral point of view. We don't make the laws but it's our job to make sure they are enforced and that people behave accordingly.
Do you think some men can feel humiliated by having their match refereed by a female official? Have you ever experienced people who don’t respect you as a female police officer?
I can understand why people could feel like that but then it's the official's duty to communicate clearly what the situation is and what the next step will be without anybody losing face. Sometimes it takes a little time to earn the respect of the people you work with but, at the end of the day, the police officer or the referee is the one who makes the decisions. Here, at the very latest, people understand who's in charge.
What advice would you give young girls and boys who want to become referees?
I would give the same advice to anybody out there regardless of their age or gender and that is: enjoy being out there. Enjoy making decisions. Enjoy dealing with different personalities. But also learn how to live with misjudgements. This applies not only to refereeing and sports in general but also to real life! Football is a great sport and a great challenge. So get out there, grab a whistle and enjoy what you do!
Bibiana Steinhaus, 38, is a German police officer and football referee. On September 10, 2017, she became the first-ever woman to take charge of a Bundesliga match when she refereed the game between Hertha Berlin and Werder Bremen. She has also refereed the German Women’' Cup Final (2003), the Women’s World Cup Final (2011), the Olympic Women’s Football Final (2012) and the Women’s Champions League Final (2017).
The interview was conducted by Jana Schäfer
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This training program has been designed to create a critical mass of faculty who can train Pediatricians to address the problems of allergic and immunologic diseases in children both in the laboratory and in the clinical setting. The program is based in the Division of Allergy and Immunology in the Department of Pediatrics. The Division is located in the Children's Center of The Johns Hopkins Hospital. All of the laboratories and offices are contiguous and consist of 7 separate, fully equipped laboratories, 6 faculty offices, 2 secretaries' offices, a Fellows' office, and a library/conference room. The division is uniquely suited to offer fellowship training in that it is composed of 5 full-time and one 1/2 time investigators with balanced interests; 3 are primarily interested in allergy and 3 are primarily interested in immunology. In addition, it utilizes the faculty and facilities of other divisions within the University's immunology community, such the Graduate Program in Immunology, the Division of Rheumatology and the Division of Clinical Immunology in the Department of Medicine. The program provides 3 years of balanced training in basic and clinical immunology to Pediatricians who will pursue an academic career. Candidates will have completed a 2-4 year residency in Pediatrics. They will be selected primarily based upon their commitment to an academic career and their interest in research in the allergic and immunologic diseases of children. Each trainee spends the majority of his/her time in laboratory research (80%), supplemented with course work and limited clinical responsibilities. A single faculty member acts as the preceptor for a given fellow, supervising his/her laboratory work, helping to select formal course work, and designing a program of clinical activities. The laboratory work focuses on one of the areas in which the faculty is actively involved and includes immunology and Epidemiology of Childhood Asthma (Drs. Eggleston, Wood, Matsui, Lederman, Bochner and Adkinson), the role of immune system in host defense and inflammation (Drs. Lederman, Bochner, Rosen, Sule and Desiderio) and the Primary Immunodeficiency Diseases, (Drs. Lederman, Winkelstein, Sule, Rosen and Desiderio). Course work includes both a core curriculum designed to give the fellow a strong foundation in basic immunology and elective courses aimed at meeting the special needs of the fellow. Clinical training focuses on Allergy and Immunology but also includes limited experience in Rheumatology, Pulmonology, and ENT, and is in accord with that specified by the Board of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.
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Q:
Main cause of self-charging of unshorted capacitors?
In the lab, we keep all of the high voltage capacitors shorted when not in use, and rightfully so. They tend to spontaneously charge when left for some time and become extremely dangerous. while the self charge rate is not really of any practical use that i know of, I'm not sure what the main mechanism of this charging is. I have a strong background in EM, the cause is just not evident to me. A good qualitative explanation would be just fine.
A:
The phenomenon you are talking about is called dielectric absorption. The way it works is this:
Let's say you've just discharged a capacitor. An ideal capacitor would remain at zero volts after this. However, in real life, the capacitor will develop a small voltage from time-delayed dipole discharging (also known as dielectric relaxation). Dielectric relaxation is a momentary lag in the dielectric constant of a material. The dielectric constant is the same as the relative permittivity of a material, which is the factor by which the electric field between two points in a material is decreased relative to the permittivity of a vacuum.
A simpler explanation is that since no capacitor is perfect, some of the electrons store energy chemically, and don't move all the way through the dialectric in the capacitor.
This voltage that is developed is can be less than 1-2% of the original voltage, but it can be as much as 15% of the original voltage. This is why you have to keep the capacitors shorted when not in use.
I hope this helps! Here are two websites that might also help:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dielectric_absorption
http://slot-tech.com/interesting_stuff/sencore/LC103/TT105%20-%203759.pdf
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---
abstract: 'In a connected group of finite Morley rank in which, generically, elements belong to connected nilpotent subgroups, proper normalizing cosets of definable subgroups are not generous. We explain why this is true and what consequences this has on an abstract theory of Weyl groups in groups of finite Morley rank.'
author:
- Eric Jaligot
bibliography:
- 'biblio.bib'
title: 'Cosets, genericity, and the Weyl group'
---
The only known infinite simple groups of finite Morley rank are the simple algebraic groups over algebraically closed fields and this is a motivation, among many others, for a classification project of these groups. It borrows ideas and techniques from the Classification of the Finite Simple Groups but at the same time it may provide, sometimes, a kind of simplified version of the finite case. This is mostly due to the existence of well-behaved notions of genericity and connectivity in the infinite case, which unfortunately have no direct finite analogs.
The present note deals with a very specific and technical topic concerning such arguments based on genericity in the case of infinite groups of finite Morley rank, which serve here to bypass allegro potential complications of various nature, including finite combinatorics. As a result, we show similarities with algebraic groups in any case as far as a theory of Weyl groups is concerned, and naturally this applies also to non-algebraic configurations which are encountered throughout much of the current work in the area.
In a connected reductive algebraic group, maximal (algebraic) tori are conjugate and cover the group generically, with the Weyl group governing essentially the structure of the entire group. In the abstract context, we use the term “generous" to speak of a subset “whose union of conjugates is generic in the group", the typical property of tori in the classical algebraic case. There are at least two abstract versions of tori in groups of finite Morley rank, which coincide at least in the case of a reductive algebraic group, [*decent tori*]{} on the one hand and [*Carter subgroups*]{} on the other. The main caveat with these two more abstract notions for a seemingly complete analogy with algebraic groups is in both cases an unknown existence, more precisely the existence of a [*nontrivial*]{} decent torus on the one hand and the existence of a [*generous*]{} Carter subgroup on the other. Anyway, here we follow an approach resolutely adapted to the second notion.
With both notions there are conjugacy theorems, the conjugacy of maximal decent tori [@Cherlin05] and of generous Carter subgroups [@Jaligot06]. This gives a natural notion of Weyl group in each case, $N(T)/C{^\circ}(T)$ for some maximal decent torus $T$ or $N(Q)/Q$ for some generous Carter subgroup $Q$. In any case and whatever the Weyl group is, it is finite and, as with classical Weyl groups and algebraic tori in algebraic groups, its determination and its action on the underlying subgroup is fundamental in the abstract context.
As an element of the Weyl group is a coset in the ambient group, it is then useful to get a description of such cosets, even though recovering from such a description the structure and the action of the Weyl group is in general a particularly delicate task. This is mostly due to the fact that, in practice, one can only get a generic, and thus weak, description of the coset. In [@CherlinJaligot2004] such arguments were however developed intensively, and this was highly influenced by one of the most critical aspects of the early work, notably by Nesin, on the so-called “bad" groups of finite Morley rank ([@BorovikNesin(Book)94 Theorem 13.3]). In this paper, a pathological coset, whose representative is typically a Weyl element which should not exist, is usually shown to be both generous [*and*]{} nongenerous, and then the coset does not exist. This is the main protocol, sometimes refered to as “coset arguments", for the limitation of the size of the Weyl group. Generosity is usually obtained by unexpected commutations between the Weyl elements and the underlying subgroup, and in general this may depend on the specific configuration considered. It is certainly the pathological property in any case, and we shall prove here at a reasonable level of generality that the existing cosets should be nongenerous.
In particular, we rearrange as follows the protocol of [@CherlinJaligot2004] in the light of further developments of [@Jaligot06] concerning generosity.
\[TheoGenerixCosets\] Let $G$ be a connected group of finite Morley rank in which, generically, elements belong to connected nilpotent subgroups. Then the coset $wH$ is not generous for any definable subgroup $H$ and any element $w$ normalizing $H$ but not in $H$.
The assumption on the generic elements of $G$ in Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] can take several forms, and we will explain this shortly. The most typical case where Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] applies is however the case in which $H=Q$ is a generous Carter subgroup of $G$. In particular, the present paper is also an appendix of [@Jaligot06] on the structure of groups of finite Morley rank with such a generous Carter subgroup, and more precisely a follow-up to Section 3.3 in that paper.
The general idea of the protocol of [@CherlinJaligot2004] has been used repeatedly in various contexts, most notably to get a fine description of $p$-torsion in terms of connected nilpotent subgroups of bounded exponent and of decent tori [@BurdgesCherlinSemisimpleTorsion]. Applied to the most natural kind of Weyl groups, the protocol shows that centralizers of decent tori are connected in any connected group, implying in particular that the Weyl group $N(T)/C{^\circ}(T)$ attached to a decent torus $T$ acts faithfully on $T$. This corresponds to the most typical and smooth applications of the protocol in [@CherlinJaligot2004], generally a lemma expedited at the early stage of the analysis of each configuration considered there. With [@Cherlin05] and [@Jaligot06], and eventually the finiteness of conjugacy classes of uniformly definable families of decent tori of [@FreconJaligot07 Theorem 6.4], it became clear that, for that specific lemma, the protocol had implementations autonomous from these specific configurations. Proofs may have appeared in [@AltinelBurdgesBullShit; @Freconpseudotores], with a conceptually better and more general implementation in the second case but, regrettably, with no connection at all to [@CherlinJaligot2004] in both cases.
A much more delicate use of the protocol can be found in [@CherlinJaligot2004 Proposition 6.17]. It is proved there, still in a specific configuration, that the centralizer of a certain finite subgroup of a decent torus is connected, with then a much more restrictive faithful action of the Weyl group. As this special application of the protocol contains the main difficulty possibly inherent to the subject, we mostly refer to this example. As we will see below, the key point is that generosity is in general related to a finiteness property, as opposed to a uniqueness property, a delicate aspect treated “by hand" in [@CherlinJaligot2004 Proposition 6.17] and much more conceptually here.
Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] has general consequences on the action of the Weyl group on the underlying subgroup, again whatever these are. Back to the concrete example of a reductive algebraic group, the maximal algebraic torus is a divisible abelian subgroup, and the Weyl group acts faithfully on it. The main corollary of Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] is a general form of this in the abstract context of groups of finite Morley rank.
\[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\] Let $G$ be a connected group of finite Morley rank in which, generically, elements belong to connected nilpotent subgroups. Suppose that $H$ is a definable connected generous subgroup, that $w$ is an element normalizing $H$ but not in $H$, of finite order $n$ modulo $H$, and that $\{h^{n}~|~h\in H\}$ is generic in $H$. Then $C_{H}(w)<H$.
In the case of a connected reductive algebraic group, the subgroup $H$ in Corollary \[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\] is typically the maximal torus $T$ and $w$ a representative of a nontrivial element of order $n$ of the Weyl group. In the finite Morley rank case, $H$ may typically be a generous $n$-divisible Carter subgroup $Q$, and $w$ a representative of a nontrivial element of order $n$ of the Weyl group $N(Q)/Q$. One gets then, for instance if $Q$ is a divisible abelian generous Carter subgroup as in Corollary \[CorCarterAbelienGenerousDiv\] below, consequences qualitatively similar in the finite Morley rank case.
As for Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\], the statement adopted in Corollary \[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\] is far more general than what it says about this typical case. Less typical applications can be found in [@DeloroJaligotI §4.2] in the context of connected [*locally${^\circ}$ solvable${^\circ}$*]{} groups, the smallest class of groups of finite Morley rank containing connected solvable groups and Chevalley groups of type ${\hbox{\rm PSL}\,}_{2}$ and ${\hbox{\rm SL}\,}_{2}$ over algebraically closed fields. Besides, the reader can find there a form of Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\], actually weaker, but which reformats uniformly and in a hopefully informative way the original arguments of [@CherlinJaligot2004] in this context of “small" groups.
Technicalities and environment
==============================
Before passing to the proofs, we review briefly the background needed, or surrounding.
Groups of finite Morley rank are equipped with a rudimentary notion of finite dimension on their definable sets, satisfying as axioms a few basic properties of the natural dimension of varieties in algebraic geometry over algebraically closed fields. By definable we mean definable by a first-order logic formula, possibly with parameters and possibly in quotients by definable equivalence relations. The dimension, or “rank", of a definable set $A$ is denoted by ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(A)$.
The finiteness of the rank implies the descending chain condition on definable subgroups, and this naturally gives abstract versions of classical notions of the theory of algebraic groups:
- The [*definable hull*]{} of an arbitrary subset of the ambient group is the smallest definable subgroup containing that set. It is contained in the Zariski closure in the case of an algebraic group.
- The [*connected component*]{} $G{^\circ}$ of a group $G$ of finite Morley rank is the smallest (normal) definable subgroup of finite index of $G$, and $G$ is [*connected*]{} when $G=G{^\circ}$.
A fundamental property of a connected group of finite Morley rank is that it cannot be partitioned into two definable [*generic*]{} subsets, that is two subsets of maximal rank [@Cherlin79]. Our arguments make full use of the following simpler properties.
\[FactGpConActingOnHModH0\]
- A connected group of finite Morley rank acting definably on a finite set must fix it pointwise.
- A connected group of finite Morley rank acting definably on a group $H$ of finite Morley rank induces a trivial action on $H/H{^\circ}$.
[[**Proof.**]{} ]{}The first item is a well known application of connectedness: as elements of the base set have finite orbits, their (definable) stabilizers are of finite index, and hence cannot be proper. The second item is a special case of the first which does not seem to be specifically mentioned in the literature: as $H{^\circ}$ is definably characteristic in $H$, the acting group induces an action on $H/H{^\circ}$, and we are then in presence of the action of a connected group on a finite set. [ $\square$]{}
Following [@Jaligot06], we say that a definable subset of a group $G$ of finite Morley rank is [*generous*]{} in $G$ when the union of its $G$-conjugates is generic in $G$. In our proof of Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\], we are essentially going to reuse lines of arguments of [@Jaligot06] for dealing with generosity, both for characterizing it and for applying it. When working with generosity in very general contexts, one has to inspect closely each conjugacy class of each individual element of the set considered. The reader can find in [@Jaligot06 §2.2] such an analysis, done there for definable connected subgroups. Another approach for this analysis was mentioned to the author by Cherlin, with a more conceptual geometric proof, duale in some sense, giving also a few more rank equalities. We take here the opportunity to recast these computations in terms of permutation groups, not only because it generalizes naturally, but also as it certainly might be useful in this more general context.
Given a permutation group $(G,\Omega)$ and a subset $H$ of $\Omega$, we denote by $N(H)$ and by $C(H)$ the [*setwise*]{} and the [*pointwise*]{} stabilizer of $H$ respectively, that is $G_{\{H\}}$ and $G_{(H)}$ in a usual permutation group theory notation. We also denote by $H^{G}$ the set $\{h^{g}~|~(h,g)\in{H \times G}\}$, where $h^{g}$ denotes the image of $h$ under the action of $g$, as in the case of an action by conjugation. Subsets of the form $H^{g}$ for some $g$ in $G$ are also called [*$G$-conjugates*]{} of $H$. Notice that the set $H^{G}$ can be seen, alternatively, as the union of $G$-orbits of elements of $H$, or also as the union of $G$-conjugates of $H$. When considering the action of a group on itself by conjugation, as we will do below, all these terminologies and notations are the usual ones, with $N(H)$ and $C(H)$ the [*normalizer*]{} and the [*centralizer*]{} of $H$ respectively.
We note that in this paper we work only with “exact" normalizers $N(H)=\{g\in G~|~H^{g}=H\}$, or “stabilizers", as opposed to “generic stabilizers", where the equality $H^{g}=H$ is understood up to a symmetric difference of lower rank.
\[FaitRankComput\] [**[@Jaligot06 Proposition 2.9]**]{} Let $(G,\Omega)$ be a ranked permutation group, $H$ a definable subset of $\Omega$, and assume that for $r$ between $0$ and ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(G/N(H))$ the definable subset $H_{r}$ of $H$, consisting of those elements of $H$ belonging to a set of $G$-conjugates of $H$ of rank exactly $r$, is nonempty. Then $${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}({H_{r}}^{G})={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(G)+{\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H_{r})-{\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))-r.$$
[[**Proof.**]{} ]{}One may proceed exactly as in the geometric proof of [@Jaligot06 Proposition 2.9]. In the natural geometry associated to this computation, points are the elements of $\Omega$ which are $G$-conjugate to those of $H$ and lines are the $G$-conjugates of $H$. The set of flags is the set of couples (point,line) where the point belongs to the line, and one considers the subflag naturally associated to $H_{r}$. Projecting on the set of points one gets ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}({H_{r}}^{G})+r$ for the rank of this subflag, and similarly ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(G/N(H))+{\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H_{r})$ by projecting on the set of lines. The equality follows.
In this proof we use essentially only two properties of the rank. The first one is a guarantee that the sets $H_{r}$ considered are definable. The second one is a guarantee of the two formulas as above for the rank of a set, as the sum of the rank of its image by a definable function and of the rank of the fibers of that function, when constant. These two properties correspond respectively to the [*definability*]{} and the [*additivity*]{} of the rank in the Borovik-Poizat axioms for ranked structures [@BorovikNesin(Book)94 §4]. [ $\square$]{}
In the context of a permutation group as in Fact \[FaitRankComput\], we may naturally say that the definable subset $H$ of $\Omega$ is [*generous*]{} when the subset $H^{G}$ of $\Omega$ is generic in $\Omega$. Of course, this matches with the usual definition in the case of the action of a group on itself by conjugation. Continuing in the general context of permutation groups, Fact \[FaitRankComput\] has the following corollary characterizing generosity.
\[CorHGenr=0\] Assume furthermore ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(G)={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(\Omega)$ and ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H)\leq {\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))$ in Fact \[FaitRankComput\]. Then $H^{G}$ is generic in $\Omega$ if and only if ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H_{0})={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))$. In this case ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H_{0})={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H)={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))$, a generic element of $\Omega$ lies in only finitely many conjugates of $H$, and the same applies to a generic element of $H$.
[[**Proof.**]{} ]{}If $H^{G}$ is generic in $\Omega$, then one has for some $r$ as in Fact \[FaitRankComput\] that ${H_{r}}^{G}$ is generic in $\Omega$, and then $$0\leq r ={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H_{r})-{\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))\leq {\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H)-{\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))\leq 0,$$ showing that all these quantities are equal to $0$. In particular $r=0$, and ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H_{0})={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))$. Conversely, if ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H_{0})={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))$, then ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}({H_{0}}^{G})={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(G)={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(\Omega)$ by Fact \[FaitRankComput\].
For our last statement, we also see with the above inequalities that ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H)={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))$, and as $H_{0}$ and $N(H)$ have the same rank it follows that ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H_{0})={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H)={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))$. In particular the definable subset $H_{0}$ of $H$ is generic in $H$, and together with the genericity of ${H_{0}}^{G}$ in $\Omega$ this is exactly the meaning of our two last claims. [ $\square$]{}
We stress the fact that, under the circumptances of Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\], the generosity of $H$ is equivalent to the genericity of the [*definable*]{} sets $H_{0}$ and ${H_{0}}^{G}$ in $H$ and $\Omega$ respectively, so that working with these definable sets avoids troublesome saturation issues. At this point, it is also worth mentioning that there are uniform bounds on finite sets throughout. This is one of the Borovik-Poizat axioms, usually called [*elimination of infinite quantifiers*]{}, which gives uniform bounds on the cardinals of finite sets in uniformly definable families of sets. This is used on rather rare occasions, and could also be used here to see the definability of sets like $H_{0}$ in Fact \[FaitRankComput\] and Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\]: $H_0$ is exactly the set of elements of $H$ contained in at most $m$ distinct conjugates of $H$, for some [*fixed*]{} finite $m$. We will not use it as the definability of the rank amply suffices here, but this aspect can of course be kept in mind.
A typical case in which Fact \[FaitRankComput\] and Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\] apply is the case in which the permutation group $(G,\Omega)$ is interpretable in a group $G$ of finite Morley rank. In the rest of this paper we are only going to consider the action of a group of finite Morley rank on itself by conjugation, so Fact \[FaitRankComput\] and Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\] will be applied freely.
As $G$ and $\Omega$ are the same is this case, the extra assumption ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(G)={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(\Omega)$ is then automatically satisfied in the characteristion of generosity of Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\]. The second assumption ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H)\leq {\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))$ is not satisfied in general, but an interesting case in which it holds is the case in which $H$ has the form $x\Gamma$, where $\Gamma$ is a definable subgroup of $G$ and $x$ is an element of $G$ normalizing $\Gamma$: in this case $\Gamma \leq N(x\Gamma)$, and thus ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(x\Gamma)={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(\Gamma)\leq {\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(x\Gamma))$. In fact, one sees in this case that $N(x\Gamma)$ is exactly the preimage in $N(\Gamma)$ of $C_{N(\Gamma)/\Gamma}(x\mbox{~mod~}\Gamma)$. All cosets considered in this paper are of this type, and we will make full use of Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\] when considering the generosity of such cosets in the rest of the paper.
We insist again on the fact that the characterisation of Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\] is in this case essentially the genericity of $H_{0}$ in $H$ (in addition to ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(H)={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(H))$), and thus the fact that only finitely many conjugates of $H$ pass through a generic element of $H$. In general, and we would like to say with probability almost one, there is not uniqueness. It may be seen by considering the generic element $g$ of a connected reductive algebraic group. It lies in a maximal torus $T$, which lies in a generous Borel subgroup $B$; $T$ is the unique of its conjugates containing $g$ ([@Jaligot06 Corollary 3.8]), but there are several conjugates of $B$ containing $g$ (and permuted by the Weyl group $N(T)/T$).
That’s all about the background we will use. We do not use decent tori and Carter subgroups in the present work, Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] and Corollary \[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\], but, as they correspond so closely to its most typical applications, it may be useful to recall their definitions and to place more precisely our results in context. A decent torus $T$ of a group of finite Morley rank is a definable (connected) divisible abelian subgroup which coincides with the definable hull of its (divisible abelian) torsion subgroup, and a Carter subgroup $Q$ is a definable connected nilpotent subgroup of finite index in its normalizer (and in particular it satisfies $Q=N{^\circ}(Q)$). Both types of subgroups exist in any group of finite Morley rank, which is trivial in the first case and follows in the second case from a graduated notion of unipotence on certain connected nilpotent subgroups, for which decent tori are precisely the first stones [@FreconJaligot07 §3.1]. By [@Cherlin05], maximal decent tori are conjugate in any group of finite Morley rank, which indeed follows from the fact that $C{^\circ}(T)$ is generous for any such decent torus $T$. By [@Jaligot06], generous Carter subgroups are conjugate in any group of finite Morley rank.
We take this opportunity to mention the following corelation between decent tori and generous Carter subgroups.
\[FactToreDescGenCarter\] If $Q$ is a generous Carter subgroup of a group of finite Morley rank, then $T\leq Q\leq C{^\circ}(T)$ for some maximal decent torus $T$, and $N(T)=C{^\circ}(T)\cdot N(Q)$.
Actually, we will prove something slightly more general than Fact \[FactToreDescGenCarter\], expanding a bit the existing theory of generous subgroups in passing.
Recall first that the existence of a generous Carter subgroup is, maybe, the main open question at the moment concerning groups of finite Morley rank. It is equivalent to the question to know whether any connected group of finite Morley rank containing no proper definable connected generous subgroup is nilpotent (see [@Jaligot06 Genericity Conjecture 4.1 b–$\beta$]). As in [@Jaligot06 §4.2], a minimal counterexample to the question of existence of a generous Carter subgroup in connected groups has tendency to be [*semisimple*]{}, i.e., with all its normal solvable subgroups trivial, and has no proper definable connected generous subgroups.
\[FaitMinimaliteCarters\] Let $G$ be a group of finite Morley rank.
- If $Q$ is a definable nilpotent subgroup of $G$, then any definable subgroup of $Q$ generous in $G$ is of finite index in $Q$.
- If $Q$ and $H$ are definable subgroups of $G{^\circ}$ generous in $G$, with $Q$ nilpotent, then $Q{^\circ}\leq H{^\circ}$ up to conjugacy.
- If $Q$ is a generous Carter subgroup of $G$, then $Q$ is, up to conjugacy, the unique minimal definable subgroup of $G{^\circ}$ generous in $G$.
[[**Proof.**]{} ]{}$(1)$. Assume $H$ is a definable subgroup of $Q$, generous in $G$. Then $H$ must be of finite index in its normalizer, by [@Jaligot06 Lemma 2.2] or more generally Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\]. Now by normalizer condition in infinite nilpotent groups of finite Morley rank, $H$ is of finite index in $Q$.
$(2)$. By Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\] and connectedness of $G{^\circ}$, a generic element of $G{^\circ}$, say $g$, is in conjugates of $Q$ and $H$, say $Q$ and $H$, and in only finitely many such conjugates. Now by [@Jaligot06 Fundamental Lemma 3.3], $N{^\circ}(Q\cap H)\leq {N{^\circ}(Q)\cap N{^\circ}(H)}$, and as $N{^\circ}(Q)=Q{^\circ}$ and $N{^\circ}(H)=H{^\circ}$ by generosity of $Q$ and $H$ (using again [@Jaligot06 Lemma 2.2] or Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\]), we get $N{^\circ}(Q\cap H)\leq (Q\cap H){^\circ}$. In particular $Q\cap H$ has finite index in its normalizer in $Q$, and is thus of finite index in $Q$ by normalizer condition in infinite nilpotent groups of finite Morley rank. In particular, $Q{^\circ}\leq H{^\circ}$.
$(3)$. By $(1)$ and connectedness of $Q$, $Q$ is minimal for the generosity of definable subgroups of $G{^\circ}$. By $(2)$, any definable generous subgroup $H$ of $G{^\circ}$ contains a conjugate of $Q$, i.e., $Q\leq H{^\circ}$ up to conjugacy. Hence item $(3)$ follows from the conjugacy of generous Carter subgroups of [@Jaligot06]. [ $\square$]{}
The core of the proof of Fact \[FaitMinimaliteCarters\] $(2)$ may seem to be somehow hidden in the use of [@Jaligot06 Fundamental Lemma 3.3], which essentially relies on Fact \[FactGpConActingOnHModH0\] $(1)$. Fortunately, our proof of Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] below will reproduce the content of that lemma, with cosets instead of subgroups.
Fact \[FaitMinimaliteCarters\] $(3)$ provides a way to see generous Carter subgroups in the ostensibly wider class of [*minimal*]{} definable generous subgroups, where the problem of existence somehow shifts to the problem of conjugacy.
We now add decent tori into the picture.
\[FactArgFrattGen\] Let $G$ be a group of finite Morley rank.
- If $H$ is a definable generous subgroup of $G{^\circ}$, then $H{^\circ}$ contains a maximal decent torus $T$ of $G$.
- If $H$ is a definable connected generous subgroup of $G$, minimal with respect to this property, and $T$ is a maximal decent torus of $G$ in $H$, then $T\leq Z(H)$.
- If $T$ is a maximal decent torus and $C{^\circ}(T)$ contains a unique minimal definable generous subgroup up to conjugacy, say $H$, then $N(T)=C{^\circ}(T)\cdot N(H)$.
[[**Proof.**]{} ]{}$(1)$. By [@Cherlin05], $C{^\circ}(T)$ is generous for any decent torus $T$ of $G$. Arguing as in the proof of Fact \[FaitMinimaliteCarters\] $(2)$, one finds a generic element in $C{^\circ}(T)\cap H$ and one deduces similarly that $N{^\circ}(C{^\circ}(T)\cap H)\leq {N{^\circ}(C{^\circ}(T))\cap N{^\circ}(H)}=
{C{^\circ}(T)\cap H{^\circ}}$. As $T$ is central in $C{^\circ}(T)$, this implies in particular that $T\leq H{^\circ}$.
$(2)$. By [@Cherlin05], $C{^\circ}_{H}(T)$ is generous in $H$. By transitivity of the generosity of definable subgroups [@Jaligot06 Lemma 3.9 a], one deduces that $C{^\circ}_{H}(T)$ is generous in $G$, and the minimality of $H$ forces $C{^\circ}_{H}(T)=H$, i.e., $T\leq Z(H)$.
$(3)$. We have $T\leq N{^\circ}_{C{^\circ}(T)}(H)=H{^\circ}$ by generosity of $H$ in $C{^\circ}(T)$, and thus $T\leq Z(H)$. In particular, $N(H)\leq N(T)$. Now a Frattini Argument gives the desired decomposition: if $w\in N(T)$, then $H$ and $H^{w}$ are two minimal definable generous subgroups of $C{^\circ}(T)$, $H^{w}=H^{\alpha}$ for some $\alpha$ in $C{^\circ}(T)$, and $w=w\alpha^{-1}\alpha \in N(H)\cdot C{^\circ}(T)$. Notice that $C{^\circ}(T)$ is normal in $N(T)$. [ $\square$]{}
Fact \[FactToreDescGenCarter\] follows from Facts \[FaitMinimaliteCarters\] and \[FactArgFrattGen\], together with the remark that the generous Carter subgroup $Q$ of $G$, containing the maximal decent torus $T$, must also be generous in $C{^\circ}(T)$ (by [@Jaligot06 Lemma 2.3] or Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\]).
In presence of a [*nontrivial*]{} maximal decent torus $T$, the [*Weyl group*]{} of an arbitrary group of finite Morley rank is naturally defined as in [@CherlinJaligot2004 Theorem 1.8] as $N(T)/C{^\circ}(T)$, and in presence of a [*generous*]{} Carter subgroup $Q$, it is defined as in [@Jaligot06 §3.3] as $N(Q)/Q$. In the first case the original definition relied on a particular decent subtorus related to the prime $p=2$, but since the full proof of conjugacy of maximal decent tori of [@Cherlin05] it naturally takes this form. We also mention that the term “Weyl group" made his first appearance, beyond the classical algebraic case, in [@Nesin89-a] in the context of “bad" groups of Morley rank $3$, with all possible definitions equivalent in this case.
In Fact \[FactToreDescGenCarter\], we see that both notions of Weyl group essentially match, with however $$N(T)/C{^\circ}(T)\simeq (N(Q)/Q)/(N_{C{^\circ}(T)}(Q)/Q)$$ isomorphic to a possibly proper quotient of $N(Q)/Q$, and thus a sharper notion with the second definition. Hence when both definitions are possible we prefer the second one, though the question of equality in general is an interesting issue.
We note that everything said here with a decent torus $T$ can be stated similarly with a pseudo-torus $T$, a slightly more general notion of torus with practically the same properties [@Freconpseudotores].
Besides, we note that [@FreconConjCarter07] provides an analysis of non-generous Carter subgroups in very specific inductive contexts for groups of finite Morley rank. This yields the conjugacy of such non-generous Carter subgroups, and eventually gives in these specific cases the full conjugacy of Carter subgroups, in the non-generous case as well as in the generous case. In particular, this gives a notion of Weyl group in the most pathological situation in which all Carter subgroups would be non-generous, the line antipodal to the one pursed in [@Jaligot06] and, seemingly, here.
In Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] we assume that, [*generically*]{}, elements of the ambient group have a prescribed property: to be in a connected nilpotent subgroup. As this property has no first-order character, this can be interpreted in two possible ways. It means either that the group is saturated and that realizations of the generic type have that property, or, more strongly but with no saturation assumption, that the ambient group has a definable generic subset, all of whose elements have the property. This “generic property" is known to be true, in this second form, in the specific case of connected [*locally${^\circ}$ solvable*]{} of finite Morley rank, the smallest class containing connected solvable groups of finite Morley rank and Chevalley groups of type ${\hbox{\rm PSL}\,}_{2}$ over algebraically closed fields (see [@BorovikBurdgesCherlin07 Proposition 8.1], and [@DeloroJaligotI §5.3] for an account on this and related topics). In any case, the assumption in Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] is much weaker than that of the existence of a generous Carter subgroup, and as the former is known in contexts where the latter is not known, it seems relevant at present to state Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\], and its consequences, under this weak assumption.
Cosets and generosity
=====================
In the present section we pass to the proof of the technical Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] on generous cosets, and in the next we will see its main corollary on Weyl groups.
In most applications of the general protocol for computing Weyl groups in groups of finite Morley rank, there is a uniqueness property, and then rank computations for generosity, or non-generosity, follow more or less immediately from the presence of [*disjoint*]{} unions. We refer for example to [@CherlinJaligot2004 3.3-3.4], which was essentially extracted from the original works on bad groups [@BorovikNesin(Book)94 Theorem 13.3, Claim (d)]. In general, one can use only finiteness instead of uniqueness for generosity, as explained and illustrated abundantly after Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\]. The reader can find in [@CherlinJaligot2004 Proposition 6.17] a concrete application of the protocol for Weyl groups which uses finiteness only (see actually the preparatory sequence 6.13-6.16, and more specifically 3.16, in that paper), and we give here a much more conceptual treatment of this aspect via Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\].
Recall that $G$ is a connected group of finite Morley rank in which, generically, elements belong to connected nilpotent subgroups, that $H$ is a definable subgroup of $G$ and $w$ is an element in $N(H)\setminus H$, and we want to show that $wH$ is not generous in $G$.
[**Proof of Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\].**]{} Assume towards a contradiction $wH$ generous in $G$.
We may freely apply Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\] to the coset $wH$, as remarked after that corollary. It follows that ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(wH)={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(wH))$ on the one hand, and, on the other hand, that $wH$ has a definable generic subset, generous in $G$, all of whose elements can lie in only finitely many conjugates of $wH$. In this sense, a generic element $g$ of $G$ is, up to conjugacy, a generic element of $wH$, and contained in only finitely many conjugates of $wH$. Of course, $N(wH)\leq N(H)$, and in fact $N(wH)$ is the preimage in $N(H)$ of $C_{N(H)/H}(w\mbox{~mod~}H)$. As $H$, $wH$, and $N(wH)$ have the same rank, $$N{^\circ}(wH)=H{^\circ}.$$ In particular one sees also that $w$ has finite order modulo $H$.
By assumption, a generic element $g$ of $G$ also belongs to a connected nilpotent subgroup $Q$ and, as taking definable hulls does not affect connectedness and nilpotence of subgroups in group of finite Morley rank, we may assume $Q$ definable. (We note here that the generic property in $G$ holds either for the realizations of the generic type in case of saturation of $G$, or on all elements of a definable generic subset of $G$, if such a subset exists.)
Using the connectedness of $G$, one concludes from the two preceding paragraphs that a generic element $g$ of $G$ is, on the one hand, in $wH$ (up to conjugacy) and in only finitely many of its conjugates, and, on the other hand, in a definable connected nilpotent subgroup $Q$. We will get a contradiction from this position of tightrope walker of $g$.
As $g\in wH\cap Q$, we may also assume $w$ in $Q$, replacing the original representative $w$ of the coset $wH$ by a representative in $Q$ in necessary. This is possible as we may take $g$. Then $$wH\cap Q=w(H\cap Q).$$ Notice that $w$ still has finite order modulo $H\cap Q$, as the original $w$ had that property modulo $H$. The group ${\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q)$ is in particular definable, and $(H\cap Q){^\circ}$ is exactly its connected component. From now on we concentrate on the definable subgroup ${\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q)$ of $Q$, and to its normalizer in $Q$.
$N{^\circ}_{Q}({\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q))$ acts by conjugation on the definable subgroup ${\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q)$. By Fact \[FactGpConActingOnHModH0\] $(2)$, it induces a trivial action on this group modulo its connected component, that is $(H\cap Q){^\circ}$. This means that it normalizes each coset of $(H\cap Q){^\circ}$ in ${\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q)$. In particular, $N{^\circ}_{Q}({\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q))$ normalizes the (possibly larger) coset $w(H\cap Q)$.
At this point we use an argument similar to the one used in [@Jaligot06 Fundamental Lemma 3.3]. We denote by $X$ the set of elements of $w(H\cap Q)$ contained in only finitely many conjugates of $wH$. We note that the set $X$ is not empty, as it contains the generic element $g$. We also note that the subset $X$ of $wH$ can be contained in only finitely many conjugates of $wH$, as it contains the element $g$ which has this property. As $N{^\circ}_{Q}({\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q))$ normalizes $w(H\cap Q)$, it also normalizes $X$, and thus it permutes by conjugation the conjugates of $wH$ containing $X$. We are now in presence of the definable action of a connected group on a finite set, and it follows from Fact \[FactGpConActingOnHModH0\] $(1)$ that it has a trivial action, or in other words that $N{^\circ}_{Q}({\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q))$ normalizes each of these finitely many conjugates of $wH$ containing $X$. In particular, it normalizes $wH$.
Hence $$N{^\circ}_{Q}({\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q)) \leq N{^\circ}(wH)=H{^\circ},$$ as noticed earlier, and the definable connected subgroup $N{^\circ}_{Q}({\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q))$ of $Q$ then satisfies $$N{^\circ}_{Q}({\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q)) \leq (H{^\circ}\cap Q){^\circ}\leq (H\cap Q){^\circ}.$$ But as $(H\cap Q){^\circ}$ is exactly the connected component of ${\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q)$, this inclusion shows that ${\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q)$ has finite index in its normalizer in $Q$. Now definable subgroups of infinite index of nilpotent groups of finite Morley rank are of infinite index in their normalizers, by the classical finite Morley rank version of the normalizer condition in finite nilpotent groups. On finds thus that ${\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q)$ has finite index in $Q$, and by connectedness of the latter one gets $$Q={\langle}w{\rangle}(H\cap Q).$$ As $(H\cap Q)$ now has finite index in $Q$, one gets similarly $$Q=(H\cap Q).$$
At this point one gets a contradiction, either by noticing that $w$ has been pushed inside $H$, or that $g$ has been pushed outside $Q$. [ $\square$]{}
Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] has the following slightly more general form, where the connectedness of the ambient group is dropped and the possibly insinuated saturation assumption is slightly weakened. We note that in this corollary we do not require the elementary extension to be saturated itself, but simply that it is satisfies the same assumption as in Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\].
\[CorGnonConnonSat\] Let $G$ be a group of finite Morley rank having an elementary extension $G^{*}$ in which, generically, elements belong to connected nilpotent subgroups. Then the coset $wH$ is not generous in $G$ for any definable subgroup $H$ of $G{^\circ}$ and any element $w$ in $N_{G{^\circ}}(H)\setminus H$.
[[**Proof.**]{} ]{}Assume towards a contradiction $wH$ generous in $G$. As $G$ is a finite union of translates of $G{^\circ}$, $wH$ is generous in $G{^\circ}$. As the rank can only go up when passing to an elementary extension, one then sees that the canonical extension $[wH]^{*}$ of $wH$, in $[G^{*}]{^\circ}=[G{^\circ}]^{*}$, is generous in $[G^{*}]{^\circ}$. Now one can apply Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] in $[G^{*}]{^\circ}$. [ $\square$]{}
Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] also has the following desirable application.
\[CorTheoGenHGenHoGen\] Let $G$ be a group of finite Morley rank as in Corollary \[CorGnonConnonSat\] and let $H$ be a definable subgroup of $G{^\circ}$. Then $H\setminus H{^\circ}$ is not generous in $G$ and, if $H$ is generous in $G$, then $H{^\circ}$ is generous in $G$, and in fact in any definable subgroup containing it.
[[**Proof.**]{} ]{}As $H\setminus H{^\circ}$ is a finite union of cosets of $H{^\circ}$ normalizing $H{^\circ}$, the first claim follows from Corollary \[CorGnonConnonSat\]. Now $H{^\circ}$ must be generous in $G$ whenever $H$ is, and our last claim is [@Jaligot06 Lemma 3.9] or Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\]. [ $\square$]{}
In particular, when Corollary \[CorTheoGenHGenHoGen\] applies in a connected group of finite Morley rank, then the notion of minimal definable generous subgroup, as in Facts \[FaitMinimaliteCarters\] or \[FactArgFrattGen\], is the same as the notion of minimal definable [*connected*]{} generous subgroup.
Cosets and action
=================
As stressed in the introduction, recovering the action of a Weyl group on its underlying subgroup from weak information on the elements of the corresponding cosets is a particularly delicate task. Corollary \[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\] is however a general result of faithfulness following merely from the nongenerosity provided by Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\]. The rest of this paper is devoted to the proof of Corollary \[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\], or rather of what we see as the most interesting intermediary steps.
The most general situation is that of a definable connected generous subgroup $H$, and we want to examine the action of $N(H)/H$ on $H$, and much more generally the action on $H$ of elements $w$ in $N(H)$. Typically, $H$ may be a generous Carter subgroup, with then $N(H)/H$ the natural Weyl group, and $w$ a representative of any coset of $H$ in $N(H)$.
We note that a definable generous subgroup $H$ always satisfies $$N{^\circ}(H)=H{^\circ}$$ by Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\], and is in particular of finite index in its normalizer. We note also that there is a basic result of lifting of torsion in groups of finite Morley rank, implying in particular that any element of finite order of $N(H)/H$ lifts to an element of $N(H)$ of finite order (and where the primes involved in both primary decompositions are the same). In particular, choosing an element $w$ of finite order, for example as in Corollary \[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\], is always a low cost possibility.
The following lemma is the natural continuation of [@CherlinJaligot2004 Lemma 3.4] with the present much better understanding of generosity as a finiteness property as opposed to a uniqueness property. It is the finest corelation one can get between generic elements of the coset $wH$ and generic elements of $H$ in the typical situation where the conclusion of Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] holds. It shows, we think, the real power of the method.
\[LemmaRelDefHull\] Let $G$ be a group of finite Morley rank, $H$ a definable generous subgroup of $G$, and $w$ an element in $N(H)\setminus H$ such that ${\langle}w{\rangle}H\setminus H$ is not generous. Then
- The coset $wH$ has a definable subset $[wH]_{\rm{gen}}$, whose complement is nongeneric in $wH$, and all of whose elements are in infinitely many conjugates of $wH$.
- The subgroup $H$ has a definable generic subset $H_{\rm{gen}}$ such that, for any $x$ in $[wH]_{\rm{gen}}$, the subgroup of ${\langle}w{\rangle}H$ containing $x$ and defined as $$\bigcap_{g\in G,~x\in[wH]^{g}}[{\langle}w{\rangle}H]^{g}$$ has an empty intersection with $(H_{\rm{gen}})^G$.
[[**Proof.**]{} ]{}As $N{^\circ}(H)=H{^\circ}$ by generosity of $H$ and Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\], ${\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(wH)={\hbox{\rm rk}\,}(N(wH))$, and the first claim follows from the nongenerosity of $wH$ by Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\]. Again we remark that the sets provided by Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\] are definable.
Now one can apply Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\] to ${\langle}w{\rangle}H$ also. The generosity of ${\langle}w{\rangle}H$ (following that of $H$) then gives a definable subset $[{\langle}w{\rangle}H]_{0}$, generic in ${\langle}w{\rangle}H$, and all of whose elements can lie in only finitely many conjugates of ${\langle}w{\rangle}H$. If that set had a nongeneric intersection with $H$, then it would have a generic intersection with one of the proper cosets of $H$ in ${\langle}w{\rangle}H$, say $w'H$. As all elements lying in this intersection would be contained in only finitely many conjugates of $w'H$, as contained in only finitely many conjugates of ${\langle}w{\rangle}H$ and all normalizers are finite modulo $H{^\circ}$, Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\] would give the generosity of $w'H$, a contradiction to the assumption that ${\langle}w{\rangle}H\setminus H$ is not generous. One may thus consider a generic element of $H$ as an element of $H_{\rm{gen}}:=H\cap [{\langle}w{\rangle}H]_{0}$, and thus with the property that it is in only finitely many conjugates of ${\langle}w{\rangle}H$.
Consider now $x$ generic in $wH$ in the sense of the first claim, i.e., such that $x$ is in infinitely many conjugates of $wH$. The intersection of subgroups considered in our second claim is a subgroup of ${\langle}w{\rangle}H$. It is contained in infinitely many conjugates ${\langle}w{\rangle}H$, again as all normalizers are finite modulo $H{^\circ}$. Hence it contains no conjugates of an element in $H_{\rm{gen}}$, as such an element is contained in only finitely many conjugates of ${\langle}w{\rangle}H$. [ $\square$]{}
We mention, parenthetically, that the subgroup as in Lemma \[LemmaRelDefHull\] $(2)$ containing the element $x$ of $wH$ is normalized by $C(x)$. It is definable by descending chain condition on definable subgroups, and in particular it contains the definable hull of $x$ as a (possibly smaller) subgroup.
In general, an element $x$ of a coset $wH$ has the form $x=wh$ for some $h$ in $H$ and taking powers one gets $$(wh)^{n}=w^{n}h^{w^{n-1}}h^{w^{n-2}}\cdots h$$ for any natural number $n$ (some useful formulas when considering torsion [@CherlinJaligot2004 §3.3]). Assuming additionally that the element $w$ of $N(H)$ has finite order $n$ modulo $H$, which can be done in a general way as explained above, one has $$(wh)^{n}=w^{n}h^{n}$$ in the easiest case in which $w$ and $h$ commute, with $w^{n}$ in $H$. This corelation between the element $wh$ of the coset $wH$ and the $n$-th power of the element $h$ of $H$ will be combined to the full force of the pure genericity argument of Lemma \[LemmaRelDefHull\] in our proof of Corollary \[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\].
To this end, our next main step is as follows.
\[LemmeGHw<H\] Let $G$ be a group of finite Morley rank, $H$ a definable connected generous subgroup, and $w$ an element in $N(H)$ such that ${\langle}w{\rangle}H\setminus H$ is not generous in $G$. Then $$\{h^{w^{n-1}}h^{w^{n-2}}\cdots h~|~h\in H\}$$ is not generic in $H$ for any multiple $n$ of the (necessarily finite) order of $w$ modulo $H$.
[[**Proof.**]{} ]{}Assume towards a contradiction $\{h^{w^{n-1}}h^{w^{n-2}}\cdots h~|~h\in H\}$ generic in $H$. Let $\phi~:~wh\mapsto (wh)^{n}$ denotes the definable map, from $wH$ to $H$, consisting of taking $n$-powers. As $$\phi(wH)=w^{n}\cdot \{h^{w^{n-1}}h^{w^{n-2}}\cdots h~|~h\in H\},$$ our contradictory assumption forces that $\phi(wH)$ must be generic in $H$.
Let $H_{\rm{gen}}$ denote the definable generic subset of $H$ provided by Lemma \[LemmaRelDefHull\] $(2)$. By connectedness of $H$, one gets that $H_{\rm{gen}}\cap \phi(wH)$ must be generic in $H$ as well. In particular, $\phi^{-1}(H_{\rm{gen}}\cap \phi(wH))$ must be generic in the coset $wH$, and one finds an element $x$ in this preimage and in the subset $[wH]_{\rm{gen}}$ provided by Lemma \[LemmaRelDefHull\] $(1)$.
Now $\phi(x)\in H_{\rm{gen}}$, but as $\phi(x)=x^{n}$, one gets $$x^{n}\in H_{\rm{gen}}\cap {\langle}x{\rangle},$$ a contradiction to Lemma \[LemmaRelDefHull\] $(2)$, as ${\langle}x{\rangle}$ is obviously a subgroup of the subgroup considered in Lemma \[LemmaRelDefHull\] $(2)$. [ $\square$]{}
Combined with Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\], one gets the following.
\[Cor13\] Let $G$ be a group of finite Morley rank as in Corollary \[CorGnonConnonSat\], $H$ a definable connected generous subgroup of $G$, and $w$ an element of $G{^\circ}$ in $N(H)\setminus H$. Then $$\{h^{w^{n-1}}h^{w^{n-2}}\cdots h~|~h\in H\}$$ is not generic in $H$ for any multiple $n$ of the (necessarily finite) order of $w$ modulo $H$.
[[**Proof.**]{} ]{}As usual, $H$ is of finite index in its normalizer by Corollary \[CorHGenr=0\]. By Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\], or rather its slightly more general form, Corollary \[CorGnonConnonSat\], Lemma \[LemmeGHw<H\] applies. [ $\square$]{}
If $w$ turned out to centralize $H$ in Lemma \[LemmeGHw<H\], then one would get $$\{h^{w^{n-1}}h^{w^{n-2}}\cdots h~|~h\in H\}=\{h^{n}~|~h\in H\}$$ and thus Corollary \[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\] follows similarly from Theorem \[TheoGenerixCosets\] and Lemma \[LemmeGHw<H\]. Again, Corollary \[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\] could be stated identically in the slightly more general context of groups as in Corollary \[CorGnonConnonSat\], taking just care to pick up the element $w$ in $G{^\circ}$ as in Corollary \[Cor13\]. [ $\square$]{}
Not to come to an abrupt end, we mention the following special case of Corollary \[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\], much typical of a connected reductive algebraic group, where the maximal torus corresponds to our abelian generous Carter subgroup. In this mere application, we do not conclude much more than the faithfulness of the action of the Weyl group, but state it in a form emphasizing various subgroups reminiscent of the $BN$-pair structure of a reductive algebraic group.
\[CorCarterAbelienGenerousDiv\] Let $G$ be a connected group of finite Morley rank with an abelian generous Carter subgroup $Q$, and assume $Q$ $p$-divisible for any prime $p$ dividing the order of $N(Q)/Q$. Then $Q$ has (finitely many) proper definable subgroups, corresponding to all subgroups of the form $C_{Q}(w)$ for $w$ varying in $N(Q)\setminus Q$, and with a canonical definition as the centers of proper cyclic extensions of $Q$ in $N(Q)$. In particular, $N(Q)/Q$ acts faithfully on $Q$.
[[**Proof.**]{} ]{}Let $w$ in $N(Q)\setminus Q$, of finite order $n$ modulo $Q$. As $Q$ is $p$-divisible for all primes $p$ dividing the order of $N(Q)/Q$, its is $n$-divisible, and in particular $Q^{n}=Q$. Now $C_{Q}(w)<Q$ by Corollary \[CorGenWeylGpFaithfull\]. We have shown that $C_{Q}(w)<Q$ for any element $w$ in $N(Q)\setminus Q$.
The fact that there are finitely many possibilities for such subgroups $C_{Q}(w)$ follows from their alternative definitions as $$C_{Q}(w)=Z({\langle}w{\rangle}Q)$$ and from the fact that $N(Q)/Q$ is finite. For a canonical definition of such subgroups, one may then take $Z({\langle}w{\rangle}Q)$, with $w$ varying in $N(Q)\setminus Q$. [ $\square$]{}
[**Acknowledgments.**]{} El autor aprovecha la oportunidad para agradecer a Nadia M. y su familia por una Navidad maravillosa en Galicia durante la cual fue concebido este artìculo.
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EsPoir is a short platformer in which you will be chased in the darkness by a strange, hellish creature.
Will you ever find a way out ?
How to Play :
- Use the arrow keys to move
- Use the up arrow/ctrl/space to jump
- You will die if you ever get hit by the creature or fall on spikes, and it means you have to restart the current level.
- The game was made in a short time for a contest, and thus, it is very short. There are only 3 levels which can be beaten in less than a minute each, but it will most likely take a casual gamer 10 minutes to complete.
- There are two possible endings ; to get the hidden one, try playing the last level differently...
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Built for and by the Serbian community originally. It is a virtual landmark on the south side of Milwaukee. It is a beautiful interior and exterior for worship with a very serious type of culture which enjoys their facility and the continuation of the Serbian...More
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I was so surprised to see such masterful mosaics in this church. A lot of care and adoration was put into every tile and it shows. It's really a gorgeous place to visit and a nice quiet spot to reflect.
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SECOND DIVISION
NOVEMBER 26, 2002
Nos. 1-98-0444, 1-98-0445, 1-98-1928,
1-98-2095, 1-01-0497, 1-01-0779 (cons.)
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, ) Appeal from the
) Circuit Court of
Plaintiff-Appellee, ) Cook County.
)
v. ) 94 CR 16717
)
WAYNE EDWARDS, AYODELE FAYAODE, )
AFOLOBI ANIMASHAWN, ANDRE NELSON ) The Honorable
) Marcus R. Salone,
Defendant-Appellant. ) Judge Presiding.
JUSTICE CERDA delivered the opinion of the court:
Following a jury trial, defendants, Wayne Edwards, Ayodele Fayaode, Afolobi Animashawn, and Andre Nelson, were found guilty of criminal drug conspiracy. Edwards, Fayaode and Nelson were sentenced to 30 years in prison, while Animashawn received a prison sentence of 25 years. On appeal, defendants contend that their indictment was duplicitous and that the nonconsensual eavesdropping orders granted by the trial court were unconstitutional. Edwards, Fayaode and Animashawn further contend that the State did not prove all of the elements of conspiracy listed in the indictment, that their sentences were excessive, and that the trial court erred in not issuing proper jury instructions and in permitting the introduction of nonexpert testimony. Nelson alone argues that the trial court erroneously allowed the introduction of a prejudicial videotape, and that his mittimus is incorrect. Edwards appeals the dismissal of his postconviction petition. Several of these issues are discussed in the nonpublishable portion of this opinion.
BACKGROUND
Defendants and 15 other codefendants were charged with multiple counts of criminal drug conspiracy under indictment number 94 CR 16717. The indictment arose from an investigation into drug sales by the Black Souls street gang on the west side of Chicago. The investigation was conducted by the Drug Enforcement Agency, the Internal Revenue Service and the Chicago Police Department. It included visual surveillance in the area of Walnut Street and Homan Avenue, and visual and telephone surveillance of a residence located at 1346 N. Kildare Avenue.
In March 1993, the police were granted two court orders allowing the use of pen registers and caller identification trap and trace devices. The devices were to display numbers dialed to and from a telephone located at the Kildare residence, which was registered to Crystal Bennett, and a cellular telephone registered to German Forero. Each order was for a period of 60 days and was subsequently extended for additional 60-day periods.
In July 1993, the State’s Attorney’s office authorized three applications consensual eavesdropping devices. The authoriza-tions were signed by the Deputy State’s Attorney, an assistant State’s Attorney, and the chief of the narcotics bureau.
In September and October 1993, the police obtained two more court orders for the use of pen registers and trap and trace devices on a telephone located at Edwards’ apartment on Sheridan Road and a second telephone number registered to Crystal Bennett at the Kildare house. These orders were also for 60-day periods.
On November 12, 1993, the trial court entered two nonconsensual electronic surveillance orders, allowing the interception of telephone calls made to and from the Kildare residence and to and from the cellular telephone listed to German Forero. The orders were each for a period of 30 days, and the State’s Attorney’s office was required to submit progress reports to the court every 10 days while conducting the eavesdropping.
In December of the same year, the trial court entered a court order allowing the use of a pen register for 60 days on a second cellular telephone registered to German Forero. The court subsequently entered a nonconsensual electronic surveillance order for that cellular telephone. Pursuant to these orders, the Chicago police recorded over 1,000 telephone calls.
On June 6, 1994, a grand jury returned a multicount indictment against defendants. Count I, for criminal drug conspiracy, alleged that defendants conspired to commit the offenses of: (1) possession with the intent to deliver and delivery of 400 grams or more but less than 900 grams of a substance containing heroin; (2) possession with the intent to deliver and delivery of 15 grams or more but less than 100 grams of a substance containing heroin; (3) delivery of 10 grams or more but less than 15 grams of a substance containing heroin; and (4) delivery of less than 10 grams of a substance containing heroin. The only other count of the indictment relevant to this appeal is count VIII, which alleged that defendants Fayaode and Animashawn committed the offense of possession with intent to deliver 400 grams or more but less than 900 grams of a substance containing heroin.
The indictment specifically alleged that Edwards organized and supervised the wholesale and street-level retail distribution of heroin for the Black Souls street gang. Edwards allegedly employed workers who arranged meetings with customers seeking to purchase heroin, and he oversaw the procurement, cutting, packaging and distribution of the heroin. One of the workers who reported to Edwards was Nelson. Nelson allegedly conducted the activities of the narcotic organization out of the Kildare residence. Edwards and Nelson procured the heroin from suppliers, two of whom were Fayaode and Animashawn. Count I alleged numerous acts the various defendants committed in furtherance of the conspiracy.
A trial was held with two juries, one jury for defendant Nelson and a second for the other defendants appealing in this consolidated case. At trial, Chicago police officer Sal Colello testified that, as part of the investigation, he regularly drove through the area of Walnut Street and Homan Avenue to observe patterns of activity. He testified that numerous people gathered in the street in the area. He observed people acting as “lookouts” by announcing the arrival of police, and others acting as “security,” ensuring that drug sales ran smoothly. Colello also saw people standing in line to purchase tinfoil packets of heroin and witnessed hand-to-hand sales of the tinfoil packets. On October 14, 1993, Colello videotaped the narcotic sales activity in the Walnut-Homan area. The videotapes were published to the jury and were described by Officer Colello.
Miguel Mendez, a cellular telephone salesman, testified that he programmed two cellular telephones for Fayaode. Fayaode paid Mendez to put the contracts in the name of Mendez’s nephew, German Forero. The telephone bills would be delivered to Forero’s address, but Fayaode would pay the bills in cash. The telephones were activated in December 1992 and June 1993. Mendez also sold a cellular telephone to Animashawn in Animashawn’s own name.
Chicago police officer Lee Bielecki testified that he had been a police officer for 12 years. For the past five years he had been assigned to the narcotics section of the Chicago Police Department. For the seven years before that, he had been assigned to the 11th district, which included the Walnut-Homan area. Officer Bielecki stated that he was a patrol officer, and later, a tactical officer in the 11th district. He had been involved in several major and mid-level narcotic investigations, and over 1,000 street-level investigations during his career. Over 100 of the street-level investigations specifically involved cocaine and heroin.
Following additional testimony about his experience in the Walnut-Homan area, the court qualified Officer Bielecki as an expert in the field of narcotics law enforcement, particularly with regard to drug trafficking in the Walnut-Homan area.
Officer Bielecki testified that he monitored the pen registers used in this case. In July and August of 1993, undercover officers making heroin purchases used cellular telephones to call codefendant Darryl Edwards’ cellular telephone. The pen register showed corresponding calls between the officers and Darryl Edwards and between Darryl and the telephone at the Kildare residence. Hundreds of telephone calls were made to and from the Kildare residence on a daily basis. From the spring of 1993 to October 1993, police registered more than a few thousand calls.
The State published 124 audiotapes. Each contained an intercepted telephone call by one or more of the codefendants. The jury reviewed transcripts of the conversations while the audiotapes were played. Officer Bielecki testified that he determined the identities of the speakers on the audiotapes from the context of the conversations, the identification of the speaker by himself or another speaker, and his own familiarity with the voices. Prior to listening to the wiretaps, Bielecki had spoken with Nelson 50 to 75 times and with Edwards over 100 times. He heard Fayaode’s voice for the first time during the wiretapping, but testified Fayaode’s voice was distinctive due to his accent. The officer had never spoken to Animashawn, but had overheard his voice at the police station.
Officer Bielecki interpreted the terminology used in some of the recorded conversations. The officer testified that the conversations included: (1) Edwards speaking about the sale of 200 grams of heroin and stating that he would not pay the supplier until the drugs were sold; (2) Nelson speaking about “licks” (600 packets of heroin) and stating that they should have gotten 9 or 10 licks out of 200 grams; (3) Nelson discussing the mixing of heroin with other substances; (4) Nelson and Fayaode discussing $50,000 owed to Fayaode, and Nelson’s request for 200 grams of heroin; (5) Edwards discussing a meeting concerning the sale of 100 grams of heroin; (6) Nelson being asked why certain heroin was not mixed with other substances prior to sale; (7) Fayaode telling Nelson he wanted to bring 400 grams, not just 300 grams; (8) someone telling Nelson that he sold half his lick; (9) someone telling Nelson that he had already collected $2,400 from the lick he was selling; (10) Nelson telling someone he did not need to purchase any drugs at that time; (11) Nelson discussing drug deliveries made by Fayaode and stating that they would give all the Walnut-Homan salesmen fresh licks to sell; (12) someone telling Nelson he was going to mix heroin with another substance; (13) Nelson and Fayaode discussing the delivery of 500 grams of heroin; (14) Animashawn stating that if he got the heroin cheaper from his supplier, he would sell it for a lower price; (15) Nelson discussing the fact that the police had the Kildare residence under surveillance; and (16) Nelson telling someone to clean up evidence of drug paraphernalia in the house.
Chicago police officer Maurice Barnes testified that on October 14, 1993, he made an undercover narcotic purchase in the Walnut-Homan area. He purchased two tinfoil packets for $20 from Black Soul member David Robinson. Robinson was arrested, and the packets were found to contain .14 gram of heroin.
On November 16, 1993, the police intercepted a telephone conversation between codefendants Tommiwa Kolly and Darryl Edwards, during which they discussed the delivery of 500 grams of heroin. Chicago police officer Jude Evans testified that, on that same date, he was assigned to stop a car seen leaving the Kildare residence and identify the driver. Evans stopped the car for a traffic violation and the driver, Tommiwa Kolly, provided him with an Illinois identification card. Evans saw large sums of money on the floor of the car. Kolly told Evans the money “must be” John’s, the owner of the car, but he did not know John’s last name or address. The money was impounded, and Evans told Kolly he would have to follow him to the police station to obtain a receipt. On the way to the station, Evans saw Kolly using his cellular telephone. Once at the station, Kolly drove through the parking lot and left. He did not return for the receipt or the money.
On November 17, 1993, the police recorded a telephone conversation between Fayaode and Nelson, who was using the telephone at the Kildare residence. Nelson told Fayaode to come pick up some money. Fayaode said he would tell “Tony” to do it. Surveillance established that Animashawn arrived at the Kildare residence shortly after the conversation. Animashawn entered the residence and soon departed carrying a paper bag. Surveillance officers saw Animashawn and Fayaode drive to Fayaode’s 211 East Ohio Street residence. Fayaode took the paper bag inside.
Officer Barnes testified that on November 23, 1993, he detained a car driven by codefendants Terrell Freeman and Vincent Reed. Barnes found a large plastic bag of tinfoil packets hidden in a side panel of the car. Freeman and Reed were not arrested, but the bag was confiscated. The substance in the bag weighed 41.6 grams and contained heroin. Barnes testified that the police stopped the car to generate conversation on the wiretaps.
Officer Bielecki testified that the police intercepted a number of telephone conversations connecting Freeman to the conspiracy, including: (1) codefendant Bryant Boyd telling Freeman to come to Kildare to get a lick; (2) Freeman telling Boyd the police took the lick; (3) Nelson and Boyd talking about the lick taken from Freeman; and (4) Freeman talking to Edwards about being stopped by the police.
Chicago police officer James Spratte testified that on November 24, 1993, he stopped a car occupied by Fayaode and Animashawn. Spratte searched the car and seized a shoe box containing 497.96 grams of heroin. A telephone conversation was later intercepted in which Nelson and codefendant Darryl Edwards discussed Fayaode’s arrest while in possession of 500 grams of heroin. Another conversation was intercepted in which Nelson discussed Fayaode’s bail. Someone subsequently provided $40,000 in cash for Fayaode and Animashawn’s bond. A narcotics-sniffing dog alerted on the drawers containing the cash.
Officer Spratte further testified that on December 1, 1993, he arrested codefendant Remmy Baker on an outstanding warrant. He followed Baker from the Kildare residence and seized $3,000 and 73.87 grams of heroin from his car. A telephone conversation had been intercepted that same day during which Baker told Darryl Edwards he was bringing some heroin to the Kildare house.
On December 9, 1993, Chicago police officers Betty Coleman and Sharon Wise made an undercover purchase of a tinfoil packet in Walnut-Homan area. The seller was arrested and identified as Moise Stamps. There was no testimony that Stamps was a Black Souls member. The packet weighed .07 gram and contained heroin.
In December 1993, Nelson and Edwards were arrested by the Chicago police. The Internal Revenue Service searched their residences. Items seized from Edwards’ home included a Mercedes Benz automobile, $6,890 in a paper bag, $680 in a closet, $13,848 in a shoe box, numerous items of jewelry, a cellular telephone, a piece of paper displaying Fayaode’s pager number, a traffic ticket belonging to Nelson, photo albums, and a telephone tap detection device. Among the items seized from Nelson’s home were jewelry, cellular telephones, and a photo of Nelson, Fayaode, and Animashawn. The appraised value of the jewelry seized from both residences totaled over $50,000.
The jury found Edwards guilty of criminal drug conspiracy to deliver less than 10 grams of heroin. He was also found guilty of conspiring to possess 15 grams or more but less than 100 grams of heroin with the intent to deliver. He was acquitted of conspiracy to possess 400 to 900 grams of heroin with the intent to deliver. Edwards was sentenced to 30 years in prison.
The jury found Nelson guilty of criminal drug conspiracy to deliver less than 10 grams of heroin, to possess 15 grams or more but less than 100 grams of heroin with the intent to deliver, and to possess 400 grams or more but less than 900 grams of heroin with the intent to deliver. Nelson was sentenced to 30 years in prison and was fined $150,000.
The jury found Animashawn guilty of criminal drug conspiracy to possess with the intent to deliver heroin weighing 400 grams or more but less than 900 grams. He was acquitted of possession with the intent to deliver 400 grams or more but less than 900 grams of heroin. Animashawn was sentenced to 25 years in prison and was fined $150,000.
The jury found Fayaode guilty of criminal drug conspiracy to commit the offense of possession with intent to deliver 400 or more but less than 900 grams of heroin. He was found not guilty of possession with intent to deliver 400 grams or more but less than 900 grams of heroin. Fayaode was sentenced to 30 years in prison and was fined $250,000.
Following his conviction, defendant Edwards filed a
pro se
petition for postconviction relief, alleging, among other things, that the trial judge penalized him for refusing a plea bargain. The petition was summarily dismissed.
Defendants appeal.
ANALYSIS
I. Duplicity of the Indictment and
the Alleged Resulting Errors
Defendants first contend that count I of the indictment for criminal drug conspiracy was duplicitous because it alleged the commission of multiple offenses, which should have been alleged in separate counts. Defendants did not challenge the indictment until after trial. In the alternative, defendants Edwards, Animashawn and Fayaode argue that, if count I properly alleged a single conspiracy, the State did not prove them guilty of all of its elements as listed in the indictment. Defendants further contend that the jury should have been instructed of the possibility that there were multiple conspiracies. They argue that there was a fatal variance between the evidence at trial, which showed multiple conspiracies, and the single conspiracy alleged in the indictment. Defendants conclude that these errors caused the jury to return legally inconsistent verdicts.
A. Duplicity of the Indictment
Duplicity occurs when two or more distinct offenses are joined in the same count of an indictment.
People v. Oaks
, 169 Ill. 2d 409, 444, 662 N.E.2d 1328 (1996),
reversed on other grounds
by
In re G.O.
, 191 Ill. 2d 37, 727 N.E.2d 1003 (2000). An indictment is not duplicitous if it charges a single offense in more than one way or if it merely pleads different acts contributing to the ultimate charged offense.
Oaks
, 169 Ill. 2d at 444;
People v. Johnson
, 231 Ill. App. 3d 412, 424, 595 N.E.2d 1381 (1992). A duplicitous indictment does not set forth the nature and elements of the charge with certainty, thereby rendering the complaint void.
People v. Heard
, 47 Ill. 2d 501, 505, 266 N.E.2d 340 (1970). Review of the sufficiency of a complaint is
de
novo
.
People v. Moulton
, 282 Ill. App. 3d 102, 104, 668 N.E.2d 1078 (1996).
The United States Supreme Court has specifically found that a count alleging a multi-object agreement is not duplicitous:
“The allegation in a single count of a conspiracy to commit several crimes is not duplicitous, for `The conspiracy is the crime, and that is one, however diverse its objects.’ [citation omitted]. *** The single agreement is the prohibited conspiracy, and however diverse its objects it violates but a single statute ***.”
Braverman v. United States
, 317 U.S. 49, 54, 87 L. Ed. 23, 28, 63 S. Ct. 99, 102 (1942).
Numerous federal cases have also held that, even though an indictment may not charge multiple conspiracies in a single count, one count alleging a single conspiracy with multiple objects is not duplicitous. See
United States v. Campbell
, 279 F.3d 392, 397-98 (6th
Cir. 2002) (indictment charging defendant with conspiracy to distribute marijuana, cocaine, and crack cocaine is not duplicitous);
United States v. Patterson
, 162 F. Supp. 2d 1017, 1019 (N.D. Ill. 2001) (indictment charging defendants with conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute
and
to distribute a controlled substance is not duplicitous);
United States v. Bruun
, 809 F.2d 397, 406 (7th
Cir. 1987).
A person commits criminal drug conspiracy when:
“[W]ith the intent that an offense set forth in Section 401, Section 402, or Section 407 of this Act be committed, he agrees with another to the commission of that offense. No person may be convicted of conspiracy to commit such an offense unless an act in furtherance of such agreement is alleged and proved to have been committed by him or by a co-conspirator.” 720 ILCS 570/405.1 (West 2000).
As in the cases cited above, count I in the instant case alleged that defendants committed the single offense of criminal drug conspiracy, thereby violating the single statute defined in section 405.1 of the Illinois Controlled Substances Act (720 ILCS 570/405.1 (West 2000)). The count simply enumerated four objects of that conspiracy: (1) delivery of and possession with intent to deliver 400 grams or more but less than 900 grams of a substance containing heroin; (2) delivery of and possession with intent to deliver 15 grams or more but less than 100 grams of a substance containing heroin; (3) delivery of 10 grams or more but less than 15 grams of a substance containing heroin; and (4) delivery of less than 10 grams of a substance containing heroin. This does not render the indictment duplicitous.
In addition, count I included great detail about the objects of the conspiracy. It sufficiently apprised defendants of the charges against them and allowed them to prepare their defense.
Defendants cite to
People v. Eagle Books, Inc.
, 151 Ill. 2d 235, 602 N.E.2d 798 (1992),
People v. Capitol News, Inc.
, 137 Ill. 2d 162, 560 N.E.2d 303 (1990), and
People v. Heard
, 47 Ill. 2d 501, 266 N.E.2d 340 (1970), for the proposition that disparate acts may not be alleged in the same count of an indictment. In
Eagle Books
and
Capitol News
, the Illinois Supreme Court found that offering for sale, selling, and delivering obscene materials were disparate acts, which could not be charged in the same count of an indictment.
Eagle Books
, 151 Ill. 2d at 245-46;
Capitol News
, 137 Ill. 2d at 175. The
Heard
court similarly found an indictment to be duplicitous where it alleged the defendant set up, promoted or sold tickets for a “policy game” in violation of the Illinois gambling statute.
Heard
, 47 Ill. 2d at 504. Because these cases did not involve allegations of conspiracy, they are inapposite to the instant case. The federal cases cited above, which specifically held that it is not duplicitous to charge a defendant with criminal drug conspiracy in various ways, are more directly on point. As a result, we will adhere to the law as interpreted by those cases.
Although defendants were granted leave to cite the supplemental authorities of
People v. Nolan
, 332 Ill. App. 3d 215, 773 N.E.2d 105 (2002), and
People v. Gonzales
, 314 Ill. App. 3d 993, 743 N.E.2d 77 (2000), we find these cases do not support defendants’ contention that the indictment was duplicitous.
For all of these reasons, we find that count I was not duplicitous.
Defendants Edwards, Animashawn, and Fayaode argue in the alternative that, if count I alleged one conspiracy, then the State did not prove all of the offense’s elements. They contend that each of the four alleged objects of the conspiracy must be viewed as an essential element of the single crime.
It is well settled that a verdict of guilty for conspiracy to commit only one of a number of alleged offenses is sufficient to sustain a conviction. See
United States v. Pascarella
, 84 F.3d 61, 71 (2d
Cir. 1996) (a court may affirm a conviction for conspiracy where the evidence showed that defendant committed only two out of the three aims of the alleged conspiracy); see also
United States v. Ross
, 131 F.3d 970, 984 (11th
Cir. 1997), citing
Griffin v. United States
, 502 U.S. 46, 56-60, 116 L. Ed. 2d 371, 380-83, 112 S. Ct. 466, 472-75 (1991) (courts will uphold a general verdict for a multi-object conspiracy if the evidence was sufficient to support any of the alleged objects).
While count I in this case alleged one conspiracy to commit four acts, the jury was given separate verdict forms to determine defendants’ guilt of conspiracy to commit each act. They were instructed that defendants were “charged in different ways with the offense of Criminal Drug Conspiracy” and that they would receive two verdict forms (guilty and not guilty) for each way the offense was charged. These instructions properly enabled the jury to find defendants guilty of criminal drug conspiracy without having to find they conspired to commit all four objects of the conspiracy. The State was not required to prove defendants conspired to commit all four objects of the conspiracy in order to sustain their convictions.
Griffin
, 502 U.S. at 56-57, 116 L. Ed. 2d at 381, 112 S. Ct. at 472-73.
B. Proof of a Single Conspiracy v. Multiple Conspiracies
Defendants Edwards, Fayaode, and Animashawn next contend that there was a fatal variance between the indictment, which alleged a single conspiracy, and the evidence at trial, which established multiple conspiracies. They argue the jury should have received a proposed instruction on multiple conspiracies.
A defendant’s allegation that there is a fatal variance between the indictment and the evidence at trial must be treated as a challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence.
United States v. Bullis
, 77 F.3d 1553, 1560 (7th Cir. 1996). Therefore, we will uphold the jury’s determination that a single conspiracy existed if, in viewing the evidence in a light most favorable to the government, any rational trier of fact could have found the existence of the conspiracy beyond a reasonable doubt.
Bullis
, 77 F.3d at 1560.
Where coconspirators agree to work in furtherance of a common goal or purpose, there is but one conspiracy.
Kotteakos v. United States
, 328 U.S. 750, 773, 90 L. Ed. 1557, 1571, 66 S. Ct. 1239, 1252 (1946);
Bullis
, 77 F.3d at 1560;
United States v. Varelli
, 407 F.2d 735, 741 (7th
Cir. 1969). Although the parties to the agreement may change over time and there may be many transactions, this does not establish that there were separate conspiracies.
Varelli
, 407 F.2d at 742. In a single conspiracy, each defendant may perform a different function to further the illegal objective of the conspiracy.
United States v. Paiz
, 905 F.2d 1014, 1020 (7th
Cir. 1990);
Varelli
, 407 F.2d at 742. Only where the conspirators have different interests and distinct goals will the court find the existence of multiple conspiracies.
Bullis
, 77 F.3d at 1560.
Federal courts have specifically found that an ongoing drug distribution conspiracy involving core members who buy and sell drugs to various suppliers, dealers and customers establishes a single common goal to distribute those drugs in violation of the law.
Paiz
, 905 F.2d at 1020. Although each drug transaction could be viewed as an agreement in and of itself, those separate agreements are geared toward the common goal of the drug distribution network.
Paiz
, 905 F.2d at 1020 n.4. In such cases, “‘separate agreements often form the basis for finding the existence of a single ongoing conspiracy.’”
Paiz
, 905 F.2d at 1020 n.4, quoting
United States v. Briscoe
, 896 F.2d 1476, 1507 (7th
Cir. 1990). The integration of the separate agreements into a larger common plan with a common goal incorporates them into a single conspiracy.
Paiz
, 905 F.2d at 1020 n.4.
In this case, defendants shared the single, common goal of distributing drugs in the Walnut-Homan area. The continuation of that purpose throughout the conspiracy established that there was only one conspiracy. See
Bullis
, 77 F.3d at 1560. Each of the defendants performed different functions to further the objective of distributing drugs in the area. Fayaode and Animashawn supplied the drugs, Edwards oversaw the distribution operation, and Nelson distributed the drugs to street salesman, while also conducting other activities out of the Kildare residence. There was no evidence that any of the defendants had a distinct interest or goal separate from the goal of his coconspirators.
In
Kotteakos v. United States
, the Supreme Court overturned the defendants’ convictions, finding that, instead of proving a single conspiracy, the government proved eight or more different conspiracies.
Kotteakos
, 328 U.S. at 752, 90 L. Ed. at 1559, 66 S. Ct. at 1242. The defendants in that case were convicted of a single conspiracy to fraudulently obtain loans under the National Housing Act. However, the government failed to establish a connection between the various defendants, except that each had obtained a separate illegal loan through defendant Simon Brown.
Kotteakos
, 328 U.S. at 773, 90 L. Ed. at 1561, 66 S. Ct. at 1243. Each defendant had the individual purpose of obtaining his own loan and no common goal was proven.
Kotteakos
, 328 U.S. at 773, 90 L. Ed. at 1571, 66 S. Ct. at 1252.
In contrast, in
United States v. Paiz
, the defendants were convicted of conspiracy to distribute and possess with the intent to distribute marijuana. The defendants argued there was a variance between the indictment, which charged one conspiracy encompassing 117 overt acts, and the evidence at trial, which they alleged proved multiple conspiracies.
Paiz
, 905 F.2d at 1018. The court held that because the defendants had “knowingly embraced a common criminal objective,” there was sufficient evidence to support the jury’s determination that there was a single conspiracy.
Paiz
, 905 F.2d at 1020.
Like in
Paiz
, defendants here pursued an overall objective to distribute drugs in the Walnut-Homan area and committed numerous overt acts in pursuit of that objective. The drugs and money involved passed through many hands and each conspirator worked to keep the distribution network functioning. There was no evidence that any of the defendants had a separate goal. Each of them was involved in the network for an extended period of time and continued to perform his function in the network through numerous transactions. We find there was sufficient evidence to support the jury’s finding of a single conspiracy, and there was no evidence that defendants were involved in multiple conspiracies. Therefore, there was no variance between the indictment and the evidence presented at trial.
Defendants further argue that the jury should have been instructed on multiple conspiracies. If the jury then found that multiple conspiracies existed, rather than the one conspiracy alleged by the State, they would have been obligated to acquit defendants of criminal drug conspiracy.
The decision to give or refuse a non-Illinois Pattern Jury Instruction (IPI) is within the sound discretion of the trial court.
People v. Thomas
, 175 Ill. App. 3d 521, 528, 529 N.E.2d 1071 (1988). The court should instruct the jury on multiple conspiracies when there is a possibility of a variance between the indictment and the proof.
Varelli
, 407 F.2d at 746.
Because we have already found that there was no possibility of a variance in this case, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to give the non-IPI jury instruction.
C. Legally Inconsistent Verdicts
Defendants Animashawn and Fayaode conclude that the duplicitous indictment and the court’s refusal to instruct the jury on multiple conspiracies resulted in legally inconsistent verdicts. Although we have already rejected both of these arguments, we will address defendants’ contention that the jury verdicts were legally inconsistent because they acquitted defendants of possession with intent to deliver 400 to 900 grams of heroin, but found them guilty of conspiracy based on the same offense.
A logically inconsistent verdict may stand, but a legally inconsistent verdict may not.
People v. Klingenberg
, 172 Ill. 2d 270, 274 (1996). Generally, a verdict which acquits and convicts a defendant of "crimes composed of different elements, but arising out of the same set of facts," is not legally inconsistent.
Klingenberg
, 172 Ill. 2d at 274. However, a fact finder may not conclude that the same essential element exists and does not exist.
People v. Hill
, 315 Ill. App. 3d 1005, 1011 (2000).
Verdicts that acquit a defendant of a predicate offense, but convict him of a compound offense are legally inconsistent.
Klingenberg
, 172 Ill. 2d at 275. A predicate offense is one that is an essential element of another (compound) offense.
Klingenberg
, 172 Ill. 2d at 274. In determining whether a verdict is legally inconsistent, a reviewing court must look not only at the statutory definitions of the crimes charged, but also at the proof offered by the State at trial.
People v. Rhoden
, 299 Ill. App. 3d 951, 957 (1998).
In this case, defendants Fayaode and Animashawn were found guilty of the crime of criminal drug conspiracy, but not guilty of the completed crime that was the object of the conspiracy. Defendants incorrectly argue that the possession crime alleged in count VIII was a predicate offense of criminal drug conspiracy. The criminal drug conspiracy statute does not require the completion of a predicate offense. One conspires to possess narcotics by agreeing to possess them and taking steps toward possessing them, not by completing possession. See 720 ILCS 570/405.1 (West 2000).
The Supreme Court has specifically found that “[a] conspiracy is not the commission of the crime which it contemplates, and neither violates nor 'arises under' the statute whose violation is its object.”
Braverman
, 317 U.S. at 54, 87 L. Ed. at 28, 63 S. Ct. at 102. It is not necessary to sustain a conspiracy conviction to charge and prove as substantive offenses the overt acts listed in the conspiracy count.
Pinkerton v. United States
, 328 U.S. 640, 644, 90 L. Ed. 1489, 1495, 66 S. Ct. 1180, 1182 (1946). We find the verdicts here were not legally inconsistent.
Defendants further argue that the verdicts were legally inconsistent because Animashawn and Fayaode were convicted of conspiracy to possess and deliver between 400 and 900 grams of heroin, while Edwards, the alleged hub of the conspiracy, was not. We reject this argument for a number of reasons.
First, legal inconsistency occurs when the jury finds that the same essential element exists and does not exist, not when different defendants are convicted of agreeing to commit different acts in furtherance of an overall conspiracy. Second, this argument ignores the Illinois conspiracy statute, which specifically states that it is not a defense to conspiracy if a coconspirator was acquitted for the same offense. 720 ILCS 570/405.1(b) (West 2000).
Defendants cite
United States v. Varelli
,
United States v. Kotteakos
, and
Blumenthal v. United States
, 332 U.S. 539, 92 L. Ed. 154, 68 S. Ct. 248 (1947), for the propositions that the hub of a single conspiracy cannot be accountable for sales of fewer grams of narcotics than the spokes and that coconspirators are equally culpable for the acts of their leader. We find that none of the cases stand for these propositions. In fact, they state the opposite. The
Kotteakos
and
Varelli
courts specifically held that it was improper for the trial court to instruct the jury that the acts or statements of one conspirator may be considered as evidence against any other defendant found to be a coconspirator.
Kotteakos
, 328 U.S. at 770, 90 L. Ed. at 1569, 66 S. Ct. at 1250;
Varelli
, 407 F.2d at 747. Similarly, the
Blumenthal
court stated that the danger in conspiracy cases is the possibility that the jury will improperly attribute evidence against one defendant to the other defendants since they are tried jointly.
Blumenthal
, 332 U.S. at 559-60, 92 L. Ed. at 169, 68 S. Ct. at 257. Clearly these cases do not support defendants’ argument.
Finally, we note that the jury did not have to believe the State’s argument that Edwards was the hub of the operation in order to convict defendants of criminal drug conspiracy. The evidence was sufficient to support Edwards’ conviction even if he could not be personally linked to every cache of drugs recovered by the police. Because Animashwn and Fayaode were the alleged drug suppliers, it was logically consistent for the jury to believe that they handled larger amounts of drugs than their co-conspirators. For these reasons, Edwards’ acquittal for conspiracy to deliver between 400 and 900 grams was not legally inconsistent with Animashawn’s and Fayaode’s convictions.
II. Pen-Register and Eavesdropping Orders
Constitutionality of the Nonconsensual
Electronic Surveillance Orders
Defendants contend that the three electronic surveillance orders entered pursuant to section 108B-3 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of 1963 (725 ILCS 5/108B-3 (West 2000)) violated the Illinois Constitution. According to defendants, article I, section 6, of the Illinois Constitution permits law enforcement officers to conduct electronic surveillance only when one party to the conversation consents or “in the rarest and most extreme cases of necessity.”
Article I, section 6 states:
“The people shall have the right to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and other possessions against unreasonable searches, seizures, invasions of privacy or interceptions of communications by eavesdropping devices or other means. No warrant shall issue without probable cause, supported by affidavit particularly describing the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized.” Ill. Const. 1970, art. I, §6.
The plain language of this section prohibits only
unreasonable
eavesdropping, not all nonconsensual eavesdropping.
Coryn v. City of Moline
, 71 Ill. 2d 194, 200, 374 N.E.2d 211 (1978) (the best indication of the intent of the framers of the Illinois Constitution is the actual language they adopted).
The Illinois Supreme Court has held that the protection against unreasonable searches and seizures afforded by article I, section 6 is the same as that provided by the fourth amendment of the United States Constitution.
People v. Tisler
, 103 Ill. 2d 226, 242, 469 N.E.2d 147 (1984). Therefore, the Illinois Constitution’s protection against unreasonable searches is measured by the same standards as those used for the fourth amendment to the United States Constitution.
Tisler
, 103 Ill. 2d at 243.
The United States Supreme Court has expressly held that “under sufficiently 'precise and discriminate circumstances,' a federal court may empower government agents to employ a concealed electronic device 'for the narrow and particularized purpose of ascertaining the truth of the ... allegations' of a 'detailed factual affidavit alleging the commission of a specific criminal offense.”
Katz v. United States
, 389 U.S. 347, 355, 19 L. Ed. 2d 576, 584, 88 S. Ct. 507, 513 (1967), quoting
Osborn v. United States
, 385 U.S. 323, 329-30, 17 L. Ed. 2d 394, 399-400, 87 S. Ct. 429, 432-33 (1966); see also
Commonwealth v. Doty
, 345 Pa. Super. 374, 388, 498 A.2d 870, 877 (1985) (Pennsylvania constitution guarantee against unreasonable searches and seizures serves only to prohibit a nonconsensual electronic interception without warrant or court order issued upon probable cause)
.
In Illinois, nonconsensual eavesdropping orders may be obtained pursuant to section 108B-3 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. Section 108B-3 provides:
“The State’s Attorney, or a person designated in writing or by law to act for him and to perform his duties during his absence or disability, may authorize, in writing, an ex parte application to the chief judge of a court of competent jurisdiction for an order authorizing the interception of a private oral communication when no party has consented to the interception and the interception may provide evidence of, or may assist in the apprehension of a person who has committed, is committing or is about to commit, a violation of *** Section 401, 401.1 (controlled substance trafficking), 405, *** or 407 of the Illinois Controlled Substances Act ***.” 725 ILCS 5/108B-3 (West 2000).
Applications for nonconsensual eavesdropping orders must be made in writing, upon oath or affirmation, and must include the following: (1) the facts relied upon by the applicant; (2) a showing that there is probable cause to believe that the communication will occur at the particular place of interception; (3) the objective of the investigation; (4) a statement of the period of time for which the interception is required to be maintained; (5) a particular statement of facts showing that other normal investigative procedures have been tried and have failed, or reasonably appear unlikely to succeed if tried, or are too dangerous to employ; and (6) a statement of facts concerning all previous applications known to the applicant involving any person whose communication is to be intercepted. 725 ILCS 5/108B-4 (West 2000).
To enter an order for nonconsensual eavesdropping, the chief judge must determine from the application that: (1) there is probable cause to believe the person whose communication is to be intercepted is committing, has committed, or is about to commit an offense enumerated in section 108B-3; (2) there is probable cause to believe that a particular communication concerning such offense may be obtained through the interception; (3) normal investigative procedures with respect to the offense have been tried and have failed or reasonably appear to be unlikely to succeed if tried or are too dangerous to employ; and (4) the officers authorized to conduct the electronic surveillance are certified. 725 ILCS 5/108B-5 (West 2000).
We find the requirements in Article 108B provide for adequate judicial supervision and sufficiently protect a suspect’s constitutional right to be free from unreasonable nonconsensual eavesdropping. Because the applications and orders in this case complied with the particular requirements of section 108B-3, defendants’ assertion that the nonconsensual eavesdropping orders were unconstitutional is without merit.
Defendants further contend that section 108B-7 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (725 ILCS 5/108B-7 (West 2000)) violates the warrant clauses of article I, section 6, of the Illinois Constitution and the fourth amendment of the United States Constitution. Defendants argue the warrant clauses require particularity with respect to the things to be seized, but section 108B-7 gives officers unfettered discretion regarding the scope and length of time communications may be seized.
First, we agree with the trial court that the warrant clause contained in article I, section 6 of the Illinois Constitution does not apply to the interception of communications. The Illinois Constitution’s warrant clause requires a finding of probable cause for warrants that seek to search a place and seize a person or thing. Ill. Const. 1970, art. I, §6. The framers of the Constitution specifically rejected an amendment that would have made the warrant clause applicable to the interception of communications, stating that communications could not be described with the same particularity as specific items of evidence. See 6 Record of Proceedings, Sixth Illinois Constitutional Convention 1536-39.
In addition, section 108B-7 meets the particularity requirements of the fourth amendment. Section 108B-7(b) provides that interceptions may continue for the period of time necessary to achieve the objective of the authorization, as long as that period does not exceed 30 days. It further states that eavesdropping orders entered under the section must require the interception to begin and terminate as soon as practicable and be conducted in such a manner as to minimize the interception of communications not otherwise subject to interception. 725 ILCS 5/108B-7(b) (West 2000). The federal wiretapping statute uses practically identical language (see 18 U.S.C. §2518 (5) (2000)), and has been found constitutional by various federal courts (see
United States v. Ramsey
, 503 F.2d 524, 526 (7th Cir. 1974);
United States v. Tortorello
, 480 F.2d 764, 775 (2d Cir. 1973) (Title III is not unconstitutional on its face);
United States v. Cox
, 462 F.2d 1293, 1303 (8th Cir. 1972);
United States v. Cox
, 449 F.2d 679, 684 (10th Cir. 1971)). As a result, Article 108B does not violate the warrant clauses of the Illinois and United States Constitutions.
[Nonpublishable material removed here]
Accordingly, the judgment of the circuit court is affirmed. As discussed in the nonpublishable portion of this opinion, we order the mittimus corrected to reflect defendant Nelson’s conviction for criminal drug conspiracy.
Affirmed; mittimus corrected.
McBRIDE P.J., and BURKE J., concur.
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Additional Information
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Keep your baby's clothes, toys, trinkets and other items organized with the Organizing Essentials Medium Fliptop Box-Fairy Tale. Featuring a design of diamonds and stars, this pink and white storage box will perfectly complement your little girl's nursery or bedroom. It is embellished with a pink satin bow for a cute look.
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Someone told me about what a lot of people use to kill coons by mixing some fly bait with 12 ounce can of coke in a saucer and then setting out near feeder. Just seems a bit drastic. I think Ill just trap them. Have any of ya'll heard of that technique? thanks!
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Slagle Slate Ottoman
Plush comfort and sleek, contemporary flair make for a pretty pair in this ottoman. Sophisticated neutral fabric is rich with texture and tonal interest. Firmly fitted cushion is just the place to rest a serving tray or kick up your heels in style.
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Farm-to-table restaurant growing in a Growing Dome
Fresh Local Vegetables, Fruit and Herbs from a Farm-to-Table Restaurant in the Snowy Colorado Mountains All Winter Long?
How One Colorado Ski Resort Restaurant Serves Fresh From the Garden Ingredients Year Round Despite Extremely Short Colorado Growing Season
Mirabelle Restaurant, stands out in the Vail Valley restaurant scene by showcasing fresh food grown on-site all year long.
Belgian born Master Chef Daniel Joly of Mirabelle Restaurant in Beaver Creek, Colorado has been a devoted Farm-to-Table restaurateur his entire career. But the short growing season and harsh winters in the region make sourcing fresh ingredients for his gourmet creations a significant challenge.
Luckily the addition of a Growing Spaces® Growing Dome® now allows him unlimited creativity to set his menu apart from competing restaurants serving typical fare.
However, Mirabelle Restaurant, in addition to sourcing food from local farmers… is going even further by growing their own food as well.
In a Growing Spaces Growing Dome.
From Epcot to Beaver Creek
Master Chef, Daniel Joly, first became inspired to grow food for his restaurant as a guest chef at Epcot Center. When he experienced their geodesic dome greenhouse he quickly saw the unlimited potential of growing fresh produce indoors. He wanted to recreate their success on a scale that would be suitable for a small farm-to-table restaurant. Sustaining his menu during the busy ski season could mean either trying to fight the elements during the winter or paying the high cost to ship in ingredients from warmer climates that would no longer be fresh upon arrival. Instead he wanted the independence and flexibility of growing his own food year round.
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Browsing Posts published in September, 2008
I have to note that the home base of some of our favorite bloggers-in-arms (and commenters), Too Conservative, is still offline.
As revealed in the comments at Hoodathunk, TC went over their bandwidth usage limit and got unceremoniously shut down. Also read there our good friend BlackOut exercising his magical powers of healing and brotherly love.
Back when NVTH was in its infancy, TC was our evil aunt, our death-dealing midwife. But long story short, we all became best friends.
Here’s to hoping LI and company get themselves a new host soon. I know from experience that is a royal pain in the you know what, so my sympathies. If any of you TC contributors are itching to blog send me a note and I will give you a temporary login here. (LI I have lost your e-mail address).
Loudoun County, and I know the LCRC, are waiting with bated breath for your return to action.
Look, clearly I cannot dispute what any of you are saying about the bad interviews, because they WERE bad; otherwise I would not be proffering advice to change course completely.
But let me insert some objective reality into the discussion before the waltz on Palin’s political grave gets too far along.
Sarah Palin is obviously not the nitwit many of you are making her out to be because she has performed very well in debates and interviews in the past. Her political accomplishments have been, by any measure, impressive.
The question is: Does this new appointment place her out of her league? Has she now been promoted to the level of her incompetence?
Performing poorly in a broadcast interview is like falling off a bike, let me tell you. I’ve been interviewed on things I knew a lot about and came off looking like a complete idiot. (Many of you will object, “but Joe, you ARE a complete idiot.” To which I must say: Agreed, but I came off as a much MORE COMPLETE idiot than I could possibly be). The reason for my poor performance was always related to psychic stress: nerves, fear, forgetfulness.
We see this all the time in our elected officials who are, at least nominally, all human. Remember Bush’s “hard work” debate in 2004? Remember Obama’s “57 states”?
When Palin can’t even say which newspapers she reads, there is definite evidence of such stress. I submit that the stress is directly related to commands that she not stray from the party line about anything, and she had not yet been briefed on the official McCain position on appropriate newspapers.
That exchange is a great symbol (thanks to Zimzo for sending it) of how thoroughly the McCain campaign geniuses have dissolved the savor from the salt of their best asset.
What remains to be seen is which Sarah Palin shows up Thursday night. She is the one who has kept McCain competitive in the race. (By way of example, I would be writing about the presidential campaign 95% less frequently if she was not on the ticket). Barring a major misstep by Barack Obama, Sarah Palin is probably the only factor that will determine whether McCain’s effort gets one final big bump in the polls.
And ironically, her performance will depend on whether she can loosen up.
UPDATE: Good discussion in the comments. I think we can say with assurance it all will depend on which Sarah Palin shows up Thursday night: the one who has been less than impressive in the mainstream media interviews, or this one. I will admit, not being able to name which newspapers you read is the very definition of stifled.
——–
It was made evident in the first debate that John McCain revealed Barack Obama’s understanding of international relations to be puerile at best, yet Obama seems to have been judged winner according to the early polls (polls towards the end of this week will be more instructive). What this tells us is the general public is not looking for facts but rather presentation.
Barack Obama can say he visited 57 states and would sit down face to face with the leaders of Iran and North Korea, and the public gives him a pass because he says it mellifluously. The bar is not set too high.
So with regard to Sarah Palin’s apparent current task to memorize a host of McCain talking points, I suggest two adjustments which will give her more room to operate and free her of the burden to be a Chatty-Kathy doll for the McCain campaign.
1) Be able to say what she thinks, and if it diverges from the talking points, respond “John and I are almost on the same page but I will try to bring him over to my point of view.” She has done this well on the topic of ANWR.
2) If asked something she doesn’t know about, say “I never took statistics but I learned to have excellent statisticians on staff for the information I need to make a decision” or some such.
Barack Obama clearly will need to be blanketed with knowledgeable experts in order to make decisions above the pay grade of a community organizer.
Sarah Palin, who presumably will have the opportunity afforded every vice president for some on the job observation (men apparently assumed by the mainstream media to be more adept at this than women), would not be immediately stripped of her Cabinet if John McCain became disabled. So she and Obama would be on equal footing.
Oh, and there is also
3) Hey McCain campaign: Ease up on the force-fed talking points. You are falling in the polls, (after Sept 30 that link will be meaningless so don’t click) so might as well allow your VP nominee to say whatever the hell she wants. Let her go off the reservation. Let her contradict you completely. She connects with the voters in a way that you don’t.
We’ve seen how the “schooling Sarah” strategy has worked. It diminished a key asset of your campaign. Screw the McCain platform. Let the woman talk and even be a renegade VP.
Like it or not, this is “American Idol” America: Thus we have Barack Obama.
The McCain campaign needs some style points and I respectfully submit that John McCain ain’t gonna deliver the goods. Sarah could deliver the goods in an avalanche if you take the blinders and shackles off her. Let her go off the reservation. It’s the only way she can do what you brought her on board for.
Plenty of Americans who won’t vote for John McCain will vote for Sarah Palin.
For the first time in my lifetime, serious people are talking about the possibility of a depression. The credit problem is world-wide. If there is a competing school of thought, a view that the credit crisis isn’t so bad or will take care of itself without great damage being done, I haven’t seen it articulated.
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90 Okla. Cr. 347 (1950)
214 P.2d 263
HARRIGILL
v.
STATE.
No. A-10998.
Criminal Court of Appeals of Oklahoma.
January 25, 1950.
*348 Walter C. Henneberry and John A. Cochran, Tulsa, for plaintiff in error.
Mac Q. Williamson, Atty. Gen., and Lewis A. Wallace, Asst. Atty. Gen., for defendant in error.
BRETT, J.
Plaintiff in error, Harry H. Harrigill, defendant below, was charged by information in the district court of Tulsa county, Okla., with the crime of unlawful possession of intoxicating liquor, Title 37, § 31, O.S.A. 1941, and by reason of being a third offender was alleged to be an habitual violator of the prohibitory laws of the State of Oklahoma. The defendant was tried and convicted by a jury and his punishment fixed at a year and a day in the penitentiary under the provisions *349 of section 14, Title 37, O.S.A. 1941, section 18, chapter 70, Session Laws of 1911, page 165, and judgment and sentence entered accordingly. The charging part of the information alleges:
"* * * that on the 21st day of April, A.D. 1947, in Tulsa County, State of Oklahoma, and within the jurisdiction of this court did unlawfully, wrongfully, wilfully and feloniously, have in his possession certain intoxicating liquor, to-wit: seventy pints and 5 4/5 quarts of assorted tax paid whiskys, with the unlawful intent then and there upon the part of said defendant to barter, sell, give away and otherwise furnish same in violation of the prohibitory liquor laws of the State of Oklahoma; that defendant is an habitual violator of the prohibition laws of this State, in that heretofore, to-wit: On the 19th day of November, 1945, said defendant plead guilty to the crime of unlawful possession of intoxicating liquor in the Court of Common Pleas in and for Tulsa County, Oklahoma, and was given a fine of $75.00 and costs and sentenced to serve a term of 30 days in the County jail of Tulsa County, Oklahoma, by Judge Carter Smith, being Case No. 48417; That heretofore, to-wit: On the 10th day of August, 1946, said defendant plead guilty to the crime of unlawful possession of intoxicating liquor in the Court of Common Pleas in and for Tulsa County, Oklahoma, and was given a fine of $200.00 and costs and sentenced to serve a term of 60 days in the county jail of Tulsa County, Oklahoma, by Judge Carter Smith, being case No. 49714, contrary to the form of the statutes in such cases made and provided and against the peace and dignity of the State."
As to the foregoing charge and conviction the defendant urges six assignments in his brief, none of which are of substantial merit or decisive of the issues herein, except the last one. To discuss any of the other assignments under the conditions herewith presented would constitute nothing more than judicial dicta, would serve no *350 useful purpose, and would unduly lengthen this opinion.
The last assignment urged by the defendant is that Sec. 14, Title 37, O.S.A. 1941, S.L. 1911, page 165, Chapter 70, § 18, was repealed by § 2, Chapter 26, S.L. 1913, page 46, O.S.A. 1941, Title 37, § 12.
The foregoing contention is predicated upon the following statutory enactments. Section 12, O.S.A. 1941, Title 37, was first enacted in substance in the 1911 Session Laws, chapter 70, § 16, and before amendment read as follows, to wit:
"For the second conviction for the violation of any of the provisions of this act, the penalty shall be a fine of not less than five hundred dollars nor more than one thousand dollars, and by imprisonment for not less than six months nor more than twelve months, and it shall be mandatory upon the trial judge, in cases where anyone has been convicted under any of the provisions of this act, to pronounce sentence within 10 days from the date of conviction."
Section 18 of the Session Laws of 1911, chapter 70, page 165, as the same appears in section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, reads as follows, to wit:
"Any person violating any provision of the laws of this state enacted for the suppression of the liquor traffic, commonly called the prohibition laws, who has theretofore been twice convicted for the violation of any of the provisions of such laws, shall be guilty of being `an habitual violator of the prohibition laws of this state,' and shall be so charged in the presentment, or indictment, or information, along with the violation of the law, and be tried in the court having jurisdiction of felonies, and upon conviction thereof shall be punished by imprisonment in the penitentiary of this state for not less than one year nor more than five years."
*351 Thereafter, in Session Laws 1913, chapter 26, § 2, page 46, the foregoing § 16, chapter 70, Session Laws 1911, page 165, supra, was amended to read as the same now appears in section 12, 37 O.S.A. 1941, as follows, to wit:
"For the second and all subsequent convictions for the violation of any of the provisions of this act, the penalty shall be a fine of not less than fifty ($50.00) dollars, nor more than two thousand ($2,000.00) dollars, and by imprisonment of not less than thirty (30) days in the county jail, nor more than five (5) years in the State Penitentiary, * * *."
So far as the prohibitory laws of the state were concerned relative to habitual violators, these statutes constitute the whole of the subject matter in relation to habitual violators and the penalties provided therefor. An analysis of the subject matter of the foregoing acts makes it apparent that section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, S.L. 1911, chapter 70, § 18, page 165, is a special act designed to define a new offense, that of "an habitual violator of the prohibition laws of this state". To the contrary, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941 § 12, S.L. 1913, chapter 26, § 2, page 46, is a general act designed to apply to the whole subject matter of habitual violators of the liquor prohibition act. It is not single in its classification, but may be applied in cases predicated on convictions involving manufacture, sale, transportation, possession, etc., of intoxicating liquor. Section 12, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, does not create or define a new offense but has been held merely to enhance the punishment against those charged and convicted of any second or subsequent offenses of the prohibitory laws. Hildebrandt v. State, 19 Okla. Cr. 30, 197 P. 852.
It is interesting to note the reason which gave rise to the amendment to sec. 16, S.L. 1911, page 165, as amended, as the same now appears in Title 37, O.S.A. *352 1941 § 12. Section 16, S.L. 1911, chapter 165, was enacted and approved on March 11, 1911. As it appeared therein it provided the minimum penalty for violations thereof should not be for less than a $500 fine, and by imprisonment for not less than 6 months. The minimum penalty therefore was in excess of that provided in the Constitution, art. 1, § 7, providing a minimum penalty of a fine of not less than $50 and by imprisonment for not less than 30 days in all offenses involving the (1) manufacture, (2) sale, barter, give away, (3) or otherwise furnishing any intoxicating liquor of any kind, or the (4) advertising for sale of, soliciting the purchase of any liquors, or (5) who shall ship or convey such liquors. It should be remembered also that the foregoing provisions as they appear in the Constitution are almost identical with the provisions of the prohibition ordinance, O.S.A. 1941, page 115. It therefore appears that the provisions of sec. 12, 37 O.S.A. 1941, before being amended, being applicable by way of enhancing the punishment for all the offenses enumerated in the constitutional provision providing a greater minimum penalty than provided in the Constitution was in conflict therewith and void. The situation in regard to the necessity that such acts, as the one under consideration, should contain the minimum penalty provision of the Constitution, was first called to the attention of the Legislature by the case of Nowakowski v. State, 6 Okla. Cr. 123, 116 P. 351. This was a case involving the statute approved March 9, page 164, S.L. 1909, prohibiting the sale of intoxicating liquor to any minor, or person of unsound mind, etc., and fixing the punishment for violation thereof at imprisonment in the penitentiary at not less than one year and no more than five years. Therein this court said:
*353 "The prohibitory provision of the Oklahoma Constitution is self-executing, and declares that the unlawful sale of intoxicating liquor shall be punished by a fine of not less than $50 and imprisonment for not less than 30 days. An act of the Legislature approved March 9, 1909, Session Laws 1909, p. 164, provides that the punishment for selling intoxicating liquor to a minor shall be imprisonment in the penitentiary for a term of not less than one nor more than five years. Held, that the constitutional provision is all-embracing in its terms and includes a sale to a minor; that the Legislature cannot remit the constitutional requirement that the offense shall be punished by a fine of not less than $50; that, while the Legislature may fix the maximum punishment for the offense, it cannot change the minimum punishment which the Constitution has fixed; and that the act is therefore unconstitutional and void."
And in the body of the opinion:
"The constitutional provision is all-embracing in its terms, * * *.
"The Constitution has fixed the minimum punishment for this offense, and the Legislature, while it may fix the maximum punishment, is nevertheless powerless to change that which the Constitution has fixed."
The holding that the constitutional provision is all embracing has been followed many times by this court. Ex parte Smith, 24 Okla. Cr. 415, 218 P. 708; Santino v. State, 29 Okla. Cr. 149, 232 P. 859; Trimble v. State, 32 Okla. Cr. 175, 240 P. 329.
Thereafter in Session Laws 1913, Chapter 26, § 3, page 46, 37 O.S. 1941 § 5, the Legislature amended the hereinbefore referred to act of March 9, S.L. 1909, page 164, and fixed the penalty for the sale or furnishing of liquor to minors, lunatics or drunkards at the minimum provided in the Constitution of a fine of not less than $50 and by imprisonment at not less than 30 days. This *354 was in keeping with the constitutional provision as to minimum punishment. As applied to the case at bar this matter was called to the attention of the Legislature that all acts looking toward the enforcement of the constitutional prohibition act should contain the minimum penalties as provided in the Constitution. Hence, the act of March 8, S.L. 1913, page 46, chapter 26, sec. 2, amending sec. 16, chapter 70, S.L. 1911, page 64, providing the minimum penalty to conform with the constitutional provision. The Legislature reasoned that since sec. 2, chapter 26, page 46, Session Laws 1913, section 12, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, is applicable to and designed to enhance the punishment of second violations of the provisions of the prohibition act, it must of necessity have contained the minimum penalty of a fine of not less than $50 and by imprisonment for not less than 30 days as provided in the Constitution. But the Legislature did not stop there. They further amended the provisions of sec. 16, chapter 70, S.L. 1911, page 165, section 12, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, by making the section applicable not only to second convictions but inclusive of "all subsequent convictions". Moreover, it extended the limits of the penalty to include the minimum of a fine of not less than $50 and imprisonment at not less than 30 days in jail as provided in the Constitution and extended the maximum to the limit of five years included in the third offender statute as the same appears in Session Laws 1911, chapter 70, § 18, page 165, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941 § 14. Section 12 as amended in 1913 in its scope contained all that section 14, supra, contained, and in addition thereto provided the minimum penalty required under the Constitution. It contained all, except the dry bone of definition "an habitual violator of the prohibition laws of this state". The language of section 12, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, in effect, is to encompass all that was contained in section *355 14. It conclusively appears that section 12, Title 37, O.S.A. 1941, is all embracing as to second and all subsequent violations of the liquor prohibition act. Hence the defendant's contention that section 14, of Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, as enacted in Session Laws of 1911, chapter 70, page 165, § 18, was repealed by implication by the terms of Title 37 O.S.A. 1941 § 12, S.L. 1913, chapter 26, § 2, page 46, is meritorious. We think it conclusively appears the Legislature sought by section 2, chapter 26, Session Laws 1913, page 46, Section 12, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, to amend the provisions of section 16, chapter 70, S.L. of 1911, page 165, section 12, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, and repeal section 18 in relation to persistent, continuous and habitual offenders, so as to bring second and "all subsequent offenders" within its provisions and to make the penalties for enhanced punishment therein contained, not only conform to the constitutional minimum, but extend to the five year maximum provided in section 18, chapter 70, Session Laws 1911, page 165, section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941. The legislative intent is clear that a repeal of Session Laws 1911, chapter 70, § 18, page 165, section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, was intended. There remains but one further consideration. Will the law sustain such repeal? The amendment to section 16, chapter 70, S.L. 1913, § 2, page 46, contains no clause expressly repealing section 18, Session Laws 1911, page 165, supra, or all laws in conflict with said section 2, Session Laws 1913, page 46, chapter 70, § 2. Hence, if the said section 18, Session Laws 1911, page 165, section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, was repealed by the amendment to section 16, Session Laws 1913, page 46, chapter 26, § 2, such repeal was by implication. We are not unmindful that repeals by implication are not favored in the law. Lovejoy v. State, 18 Okla Cr. 335, 194 P. 1087; Hudson v. State, 37 Okla. Cr. 290, 258 P. 352, 354; *356 Waters v. State, 75 Okla. Cr. 185, 129 P.2d 863; Ex parte Sweeden, 84 Okla. Cr. 127, at page 132, 179 P.2d 695, at page 697, wherein this court said:
"We are familiar with the oft announced rule that repeals of statutes by implication are not favored but it is also well settled that the Legislature may, within constitutional limitations, express its will in any form which it sees fit and a repeal is effected where the intent to repeal is clearly evidenced; and where two statutes cover the same subject and the first statute last adopted is repugnant to and irreconcilable with the provisions covering the same subject in the first statute, the latest expression of the Legislature will govern. City of Pawhuska v. Pawhuska Oil & Gas Company, 64 Okla. 214, 166 P. 1058; James v. Board of Commissioners of McCurtain County, 103 Okla. 141, 229 P. 554; Hines et al. v. Harmon, 178 Okla. 1, 61 P.2d 641."
In Rich v. State, 61 Okla. Cr. 148, 66 P.2d 950, 953, this court said:
"In re James, 4 Okla. Cr. 94, 111 P. 947, 949, this court says:
"`The rule that a later statute, general in its terms and broad enough to include matters provided for by a former special act, will ordinarily not affect the special provisions of such former act, is not a provision of substantive law, but is merely one rule for determining the legislative intent; and when it is apparent that the Legislature intended to make the later act exclusive, designed it to cover the whole subject-matter to which it relates, and to embrace the entire law on the subject, it will repeal the repugnant provisions of all former acts, general or special. "When an earlier statute is special only in the sense that it applies to a single case, of which there are many in the state, and the later statute is general in its operation and applies to all such cases, then the earlier one is repealed by the later." 26 Am. & Eng. Enc. L. 743.
*357 "`See, also, Southport v. Ogden, 23 Conn. 128; Coe v. Meriden, 45 Conn. 155; Nusser v. Com., 25 Pa. 126. Thus it is said in 1 Lewis' Sutherland on Statutory Construction, § 276:
"`The question is one of intent. There is no rule of law which prohibits the repeal of a special act by a general one, nor is there any principle forbidding such repeal without the use of words declarative of that intent. The question is always one of the intention, and the purpose to abrogate the particular enactment by a later general statute is sufficiently manifested when the provisions of both cannot stand together. * * *'".
The foregoing rule is clearly applicable to the situation confronting the court in relation to the repeal of section 18, chapter 70, Session Laws 1911, page 165, section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941. The aforesaid section 12, the later act as amended, was passed and approved March 8, 1913, while section 14 was passed and approved on March 11, 1911. We believe that the later act was intended by the Legislature to be exclusive, and designed it to cover the whole subject matter in relation to the habitual violators of the liquor prohibition act. Had this not been true the Legislature would not have employed the language "for the second and all subsequent convictions for the violation of any of the provisions of this act". That language is general in its application to all violations of the act whether it be a second conviction, a third conviction or convictions in any number beyond the second conviction. No one can rightly contend that the Legislature intended to single out third offenders for special treatment as distinguished from fourth or fifth offenders. Such an analysis shows the untenable nature of the contention advanced by the state that because section 18, chapter 70, Session Laws 1911, page 165, section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, defines a new offense it should *358 be permitted to stand. To so hold would be to ignore the plain intent of the all embracing character of section 12, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, relative to habitual violations of the prohibition act. Moreover, the minimum penalty provided in section 18, chapter 70, Session Laws 1911, page 165, section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, is in irreconcilable conflict with the minimum provided in both the Constitution, art. 1, § 7, and in section 2, chapter 26, Session Laws 1913, page 46, sec. 12, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941. There can be no doubt that it was clearly the intention of the Legislature to repeal section 18, chapter 70, Session Laws 1911, page 165, section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, by amending section 16, supra, in section 2, chapter 26, Session Laws 1913, page 46, section 12, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941. The only remaining question, then, is one of authority so to do. In Phinney v. State, 90 Okla. Cr. 21, 210 P.2d 205, 206, it was said:
"In construing two statutes relating to same subject, later statute purporting to revise entire subject matter and containing additional provisions for carrying into effect same objects, will be construed to repeal by implication the former statute although no reference is made thereto."
See, also, Ex parte Olden, 88 Okla. Cr. 56, 199 P.2d 228.
As was said in Re James, supra, the question is one of intent, and since there is no rule of law which prohibits the repeal of a special act by a general one, nor any principle forbidding such repeal without the use of words declarative of that intent, and that intent having been manifested in such way as to indicate the purpose of the Legislature was to make the later act a substitute for the former act, there is nothing for the court to do but to sustain the repeal of the former act by implication *359 as contained in the later act. We therefore hold that section 12, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, S.L. 1913, page 46, chapter 26, § 2, was intended to and did repeal section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, S.L. 1911, page 165, chapter 70, § 18, even though no express reference was made thereto in the Act of 1913. It was within the power of the Legislature so to do. The trial court instructed the jury under the provisions of section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, to the effect that the minimum penalty that could be imposed was not less than one year. Therefore, under the conditions hereinbefore set forth, it was error so to do, said section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, so providing having been repealed as hereinbefore set forth.
The prosecuting officer indicated, at the time of oral argument, that the reason this case was alleged under the third offender statute, section 14, Title 37, O.S.A. 1941, was because of the validating act of 1943, page 252, 75 O.S. Supp. § 114, validating all acts contained in the 1941 statutes. Section 14, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, was therein contained; he operated under the belief that the statute became a valid act. Such is not the case, however, as was said in Ex parte Olden, supra, in the body of the opinion, 199 P.2d at page 237, as follows:
"In the case of Thomas v. State, supra [83 Okla. Cr. 25, 172 P.2d 651], this court laid down the following rules of law as shown by the syllabus:
"`3. Sec. 2, chap. 4, Tit. 75, p. 457, Oklahoma Session Laws of 1941, 75 O.S. 1941 § 102, instructs the codifiers of the 1941 statutes to not include in their compilation "laws held unconstitutional by the highest courts," and to "eliminate" all repealed laws.
"`5. Where one was authorized to codify existing laws but the authority was expressly withheld to include any statute which had been "repealed" or "held unconstitutional by the highest courts," and such a statute was in *360 advertently included, adoption of the statutes did not have effect of validating the statute inadvertently included.'"
This however, will not end this prosecution. The evidence of the defendant's guilt herein is clear and conclusive, and the information is entirely sufficient to allege second and subsequent offenses. A new trial is hereby ordered to be granted the defendant, and the issues submitted to the jury under the provisions of section 12, Title 37 O.S.A. 1941, covering second and all subsequent violations of any of the provisions of the prohibition act. The case is accordingly reversed, with directions to retry the defendant under the same information, and to instruct the jury under the provision of said section 12.
JONES, P.J., and POWELL, J., concur.
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Contact PD/PI: Panettieri, Reynold Alexander Project Summary/Abstract Overview Coordinated by Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences (RBHS), the New Jersey Alliance for Clinical and Translational Science (NJ ACTS) comprises a consortium with Rutgers and Princeton Universities (PU), NJ Institute for Technology (NJIT), medical, nursing, dental and public health schools, hospitals, community health centers, outpatient practices, industry, policymakers and health information exchanges. All Alliance universities and affiliates have provided substantial resources and contributed to the planning, development and leadership of the consortium. With access to ~7 million people, NJ ACTS serves as a ?natural laboratory? for translational and clinical research. With a state population of ~9 million, New Jersey ranks 11th in the US, 1st in population density and higher than average in racial and ethnic diversity. Surprisingly, NJ has no CTSA Hub to coordinate translational and clinical research. Our CTSA Hub focuses on two overarching themes: the heterogeneity of disease pathogenesis and response to treatment, and the value of linking large clinical databases with interventional clinical investigations to identify cause-and-effect and predict therapeutic responses. NJ ACTS will provide: innovative approaches to link information from large databases and electronic health records to inform clinical trial design, execution and analysis; and novel platforms for biomarker discovery using fluorescence in situ hybridization and machine learning to identify unique neural signatures of chronic illness. NJ ACTS will access a large health system with significant member diversity; a rich legacy of community engagement and community-based research platforms; and proven approaches to enhance workforce development in clinical research. With a substantial investment in streamlining research administration and IRB practices at Rutgers and with the inception of NJ ACTS, there exists an unparalleled opportunity for logarithmic growth in clinical research in New Jersey. To build our capacity for participant and clinical interactions as a CTSA Hub, the newly established Trial Accelerator and Recruitment Office will coordinate feasibility assessment, implementation, recruitment, and evaluation of clinical studies. Additionally, our organization of five clinical research units into a cohesive network provides extraordinary expertise in strategic locations to enhance participant recruitment from diverse communities with a particular focus on: children; the elderly; those with serious mental illness or substance abuse issues; low-income individuals served by Medicaid; those with HIV/AIDS; and people of all ages who are minorities, underserved, and victims of health and environmental disparities. With a history of collaboration, partners and affiliates share unique skills, expertise, training and mentoring capabilities that will be greatly amplified within the infrastructure of a CTSA Hub. Princeton and NJIT, without medical schools or hospital affiliates, seeks collaboration with Rutgers to provide clinical research platforms; Rutgers seeks the PU and NJIT expertise in novel informatics platforms, expertise in natural language and ontology, machine learning and cognitive neurosciences. Together NJ ACTS will provide an alliance that will catalyze clinical research and training across New Jersey to improve population health and contribute to the CTSA Consortium. In this revised application, the overall themes remain unchanged but Cores leadership and direction has been markedly refined. Page 337 Project Summary/Abstract Contact PD/PI: Panettieri, Reynold Alexander New Jersey Alliance for Clinical and Translational Science (NJ ACTS)
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Embolic infarcts of carotid origin differ in size and site with contralateral carotid patency.
Carotid emboli cause small infarcts in the ipsilateral hemisphere in rats when the contralateral carotid artery is fully patent. With contralateral carotid occlusion, embolic infarcts, both large and small, occur with equal proportions in both hemispheres. To determine if emboli also cross to the territory of a stenotic carotid artery, we combined high grade (78-96%) stenosis of the left common carotid artery with photochemically-induced (laser irradiation 632 nm, 200 mW/cm2, 15 min; intravenous Photofrin II, 12.5 mg/kg) embolism from the right common carotid artery in 12 rats. Ninety-eight cerebral infarcts occurred in 9 experimental animals, with eight infarcts being large (> 2.5 mm). The mean proportions of infarcts and emboli on the left were 25% and 19%, respectively. These results suggest that contralateral carotid artery stenosis, like occlusion, will influence the site and size of embolic infarcts and that the "symptomatic" carotid artery cannot always be determined by the side of the cerebral infarct.
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Ossification in the hand and foot of the macaque (Macaca nemistrina). I. General features.
The appearance of the secondary centers of ossification was investigated in hand and foot radiographs of 112 fetal and neonatal Macaca nemestrina and a maturational index calculated using a scoring system that differentiated between the initial and later stages of ossification. Cumulative incremental curves of skeletal maturation, constructed by plotting the maturational indices against gestational age, demonstrated three distinct periods of ossification: the First Acceleration when primary centers appear, the Plateau, and the Second Acceleration when the secondary centers ossify. Similar curves are constructed for human prenatal and postnatal ossification. The results are also compared with those reported for M. mulatta, and the bases of the observed differences are discussed. Compared with other primates, the fetal and neonatal macaque shows a developmental precocity which may be an ontogenetic adaptation to the socioecological setting of terrestrial life.
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Q:
accessing value of dictionary using while loop
May I know best solution for accessing values of dictionary using while loop not with for each because i have already a while so that i can reduce no of lines in my program what i did so far is
while (da.Read())
{
Dictionary<string, decimal> d = b.findclosingbalanceofledger(da["LeId"].ToString());
foreach (var pair in d)
{
MessageBox.Show(pair.Key);
MessageBox.Show(pair.Value.ToString());
}
}
what i am trying to do is
while (da.Read())
{
Dictionary<string, decimal> d = b.findclosingbalanceofledger(da["LeId"].ToString());
MessageBox.Show(pair.Key);
MessageBox.Show(pair.Value.ToString());
}
b.findclosingbalanceofledger(id)
has following code
public Dictionary<string,decimal> findclosingbalanceofledger(string id)
{
decimal totalcredit = 0;
decimal totaldebit = 0;
decimal closingbalance =0;
string closingbalancetype;
Dictionary<string, decimal> closingbalanceofledger = new Dictionary<string, decimal>();
con.Open();
string sql = @"select sum(Amount) as total,vocherType from Voucher where LedId=@LedId and vocherType=@Payment group by vocherType";
using (SqlCommand cmd = new SqlCommand(sql, con))
{
cmd.Parameters.AddWithValue("@LedId",id);
cmd.Parameters.AddWithValue("@Payment", "Payment");
cmd.Parameters.AddWithValue("@Reciept", "Reciept");
SqlDataReader dr = cmd.ExecuteReader();
if(dr.HasRows)
{
while (dr.Read())
{
totalcredit = System.Convert.ToDecimal(dr["sum"].ToString());
}
}
}
con.Close();
con.Open();
string sql1 = @"select sum(Amount) as sum,vocherType from Voucher where LedId=@LedId and vocherType=@Reciept group by vocherType";
using (SqlCommand cmd = new SqlCommand(sql1, con))
{
cmd.Parameters.AddWithValue("@LedId", id);
cmd.Parameters.AddWithValue("@Payment", "Payment");
cmd.Parameters.AddWithValue("@Reciept", "Reciept");
SqlDataReader dr = cmd.ExecuteReader();
if (dr.HasRows)
{
while (dr.Read())
{
totaldebit = System.Convert.ToDecimal(dr["sum"].ToString());
}
}
}
con.Close();
if (totalcredit > totaldebit)
{
closingbalance = totalcredit - totaldebit;
closingbalancetype = "credit";
}
else
{
closingbalance = totaldebit - totalcredit;
closingbalancetype = "debit";
}
closingbalanceofledger.Add(closingbalancetype,closingbalance);
return closingbalanceofledger;
}
A:
The accepted answer is wrong in the sense that it relies on unspecified behavior; I quote Dictionary documentation:
The order of the values in the Dictionary<TKey, TValue>.ValueCollection is unspecified, but it is the same order as the associated keys in the Dictionary<TKey, TValue>.KeyCollection returned by the Keys property.
This means that whatever FirstOrDefault returns is unspecified and can change depending on the current .NET framework, hardware, day of the week, number of observable sunspots in the sun, etc.
The only cases where the behavior of Values.FirstOrDefault will always be consistent is if the collection is empty or it has one single member; but if you are sure there is only one member then why are you using a dictionary in the first place? Nonetheless if it were the case, the correct option would be Single() which enforces that there must be only one member in the collection.
Now, if the case were that you wanted the first element of a collection which can have zero, one or more members, then this means that you must have some ordering criteria. Well then, specify it:
Is it by key?
var first = myDictionary.OrderBy(kv => kv.Key).FirstOrDefault();
Is it some property of the value?
var first = myDictionary.OrderBy(kv => kv.Value.Foo).FirstOrDefault();
If the order you are interested in is the order in which the elements have been added to your collection then do not use a dictionary, use a List or, if you want to semantically make it clear, a Queue.
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Tuesday, September 22, 2015
Tinnitus Miracle: More About That
Being informed that the noises in your ears might be long-term which there is no ensured remedy for tinnitus is, for most of us, a pretty tension causing piece of news. And do you know what? That anxiety feeling really makes your tinnitus even worse.
Numerous individuals with tinnitus believe that, since there is not presently a known remedy, that there is nothing they can do about it. WRONG! Although there is not a cure (yet), there is a tinnitus treatment that will assist the sound get dulled down by as much as 80 %. When trying to discover your own personal tinnitus treatment is that a tinnitus treatment that works for one individual might or might not work for you, the most essential thing to remember. First off, in order to get on the ideal track of finding your treatment, you need to figure out exactly what activates your tinnitus to flare.
MSG is hidden in hydrolyzed vegetable vegetable, protein or plant protein, natural flavoring, spices and more. And it doesn’t have actually to be contributed to the label as an active ingredient. This is another need to avoid processed and pre-packaged food as much as possible for your general health and for tinnitus relief.
Often the sufferer just needs to find out how to leave with the condition because there is no known treatment for tinnitus. For some people it is more difficult than for others. However, there are some approaches that can help to reduce the symptoms.
The worst part of ringing in the ears is you cannot turn the sound volume down. Folks point out http://ift.tt/1JwOOU6 is not related to tinnitus miracle yet that’s not completely real. You might have tried lots of different methods, from medications, natural herbs, and even specialist treat from your local ear physician, you continue to browse for a tinnitus miracle.
When you follow this sort of intense treatment minimizing the noise is no longer a choice however instead eliminating the sound is the fantastic and only choice!
Pertaining to terms with ringing in the ears includes learning and getting the recognized facts into perspective. No more turning and twisting and going down one way roads. You have to stay concentrated on what you desire to achieve.
In our day and age, tinnitus treatment is much more innovative than 100 years ago. Also there is a great deal of knowledge about ringing in the ears causes readily available that wasn’t available even One Decade back. Much of this understanding is readily available on the internet and in books written by individuals who have overcome their own hearing and ear sound issues. So keep reading and researching. Keep seeking and you will certainly probably find a cure for your ringing in the ears.
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Q:
JPA (Hibernate) pack multiple enum values into a single byte array using stored function
I am currently trying to map a legacy database schema (which I cannot easily alter) into JPA 1.0 (provider is Hibernate 3.3). The schema was designed in the days when disk space was at a premium, so there are several cases where multiple distinct values are packed into binary byte arrays. For example, given the following three enums:
enum ItemA { A, B, C }
enum ItemB { E, F }
enum ItemC { G, H, I, J }
These will be compressed into a single bit-string column where:
the first 2 bits encode ItemA (A = 0b01, B = 0b10, C = 0b11),
the next bit is ItemB (0 = E, 1 = F); and
the next 2 bits are ItemC (G = 0b00, H = 0b01, I = 0b10, and J = 0b11).
So, in order to map this I would need to mask off the range of bits for each enum and then map that to the corresponding values.
To make matters worse, the actual bit positions and masks used for each enum and each value in that enum vary depending on some other config tables stored in the database. The only supported way of packing and unpacking these values is via a set of stored functions (PL/SQL):
function pack_data(item_a in char(1), item_b in char(1), item_c in char(1)) returns raw...
function unpack_data_item_a(bit_string in raw) returns char(1) ..
function unpack_data_item_b(bit_string in raw) returns char(1) ..
etc
My current JPA mapping for this looks like the following:
@Entity
@Table(name = "some_table")
public class MyEntity {
@Id
@Column(name = "entity_id")
private Long id;
@Column(name = "bit_string")
private byte[] bitstring;
@Transient
private ItemA itemA;
@Transient
private ItemB itemB;
@Transient
private ItemC itemC;
...
}
The question is: How can I go about automatically populating (unpacking) these enum fields on load, and then automatically packing them into the bitstring again on insert/update? If they were read-only then I'd just hide them in a view and map them as read-only.
Possible solutions discussion:
I thought about using @PrePersist/@PreUpdate lifecycle callbacks, but the Hibernate docs say not to touch the EntityManager in these callbacks, which makes it somewhat difficult to access the database. I could add a new persistence unit and use a REQUIRES_NEW transaction to access the stored procedures in the lifecycle callbacks, perhaps? That seems a little hacky.
Could Hibernate specific @SqlUpdate/@SqlInsert annotations to override the SQL be the solution? It seems possible, but I'm scared off by the need to rely on the (somewhat arbitrary looking) order that Hibernate expects the bind variables to appear - is this stable over time?
Edit: Another possibility is to use the view for read and use an INSTEAD OF trigger to populate the bit-string. I'd like to avoid that if possible as it is hidden from JPA and might confuse other devs.
Any help appreciated!
A:
After investigating the custom Hibernate type option suggested by IsNull, I decided that for this particular case it was rather too much code - and raw JDBC code too (inside the custom type). Instead I opted to make the MyEntity class effectively immutable, and to add a MyEntityBuilder (builder pattern) to create it. The builder collects the various enum fields and then calculates the packed bit string in the final build() step:
public class MyEntityBuilder {
private final EntityManager em;
private ItemA a;
...
public MyEntityBuilder(final EntityManager em) {
this.em = em;
}
public MyEntityBuilder setA(ItemA a) {
this.a = a;
return this;
}
// other setters...
public MyEntity build() {
final byte[] packedData = (byte[])
em.createNamedQuery(MyEntity.PACK_DATA)
.setParameter("item_a", a)
.setParameter("item_b", b)
.setParameter("item_c", c)
.getSingleResult();
return new MyEntity(packedData, a, b, c);
}
}
Where MyEntity.PACK_DATA is a named native query that calls the stored function and returns the packed binary data. This takes care of writing the data, as the builder ensures that the packed bit_string is correct on construction. For reading, I use the original wrapper view and mark the enum fields as insertable=false, updateable=false (although I might move to Hibernate @Formula annotations here).
Compared to the custom Hibernate type approach, the builder pattern is both shorter code (as we can use JPA itself to do the queries rather than writing JDBC code), and avoids any Hibernate-specific code at all. Callers do need to be aware to use the Builder and need access to an EntityManager, but that's usually not a problem.
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Blog Pages..
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Fluid
Have you ever seen a still lake.. you pop one stone into it and the whole thing floats, forms beautiful ripples -layer by layer, ring by ring it spreads. It oscillates, it vibrates to that one motion set in by an unknown object tossed in, right there, out of the blue. At that moment the stillness of the lake- It's natural balance loses it's sheen. It gets a whole new meaning to it. As it was fluid just to feel this. It is it's very basic nature - fluid.
Many times it happens that we are like the still lake. Clam. Serene and peaceful in our own lives and suddenly "plub" somebody tosses in a emotion unfamiliar, unknown unexpected- out of the blue. It could be the inexplicable pain you experience by looking at a child begging because he knows nothing better. It could be the unexpressed fear for a old stranger who is crossing a busy road. It could be the love that fills your heart when you see someone you never knew- madly into each other. It could be the joy, that smile on an unknown face that makes you happy without knowing what happened. It doesn't matter- if you don't know.
In a moment the emotion hits us and before we know and realize.. there are these little crests formed in our fluid lives. Molecule by molecule. Affecting us. These emotions float on the surface like a weighless leaf that gently glides on the water leaving a trail.Or they are like the ripples that make the otherwise dull lake relive with dynamic enthusiasm. We don't comprehend how these people surrounding us are tossing in there emotions. How we are tossing our emotions into their lives. It is beautiful. If you truly understand what I say.. because I have no words to describe that feeling.
At the end of that moment when the motion ceases. The crests, the waves vanish. It is not the end. What happens to the stone that gets tossed in the lake? It slides down and slips to the bottom. It rests on the bed. And the lake and the unknown object. Co-exist. That's what happens to us too. The emotions we feel for no particular reason- we find balance in them. They sink in our souls- teach us something and we live with them. Still again yet fluid. And it is beautiful.
Feedjit
Unless mentioned otherwise, the images used on this blog are usually taken from the net. I do not own the copywrites for these images. In case any owner has an issue. Kindly let me know and I will take it off.
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Q:
Driving a MOSFET with fastest rise time possible
I'm working a circuit to send very short pulses to a load, with the requirement that the pulses have the fastest rise time possible (~10ns or less).
I've picked out a driver that has a fast rise time, the UCC27524P (http://www.ti.com/lit/ds/symlink/ucc27525.pdf).
I have a question about choosing a MOSFET, is it the driver that determines the rise time or the MOSFET's rise time in it's datasheet?
I couple of MOSFETs I'm looking at has rise times of around 20ns, are they simply unable to switch any faster?
I've attached a simple circuit to illustrate.
A:
It's both the driver and the mosfet that determine the rise time. The net rise time is going to be about twice if both driver and mosfet are similar. You might also be interested in fall time and this can be harder to achieve especially if the gate isn't driven negatively when removing gate charge.
If the data sheets say 20 ns and there isn't some obvious improvement in the example circuit used to measure rise time then you are probably out of luck. Keep plugging away and look for better mosfets. I think there is a new type out referred to as something like silicon-carbide technology but don't quote me on it.
A:
Here's your solution. 400V, 4 ns.
https://www.avtechpulse.com/medium/avrf-4a/
The fact it costs $15k could hint at the fact that it is not a problem that can be easily solved with 2 active devices... hmmmmm...
Now, if you really insist...
Okay, you want to turn on a MOSFET really fast. The MOSFET gate is a capacitor. So you need to pump lots of current into it really fast. This means lead inductance is not your friend. This means leaded packages like TO-220 will only result in more pain. So, I searched DigiKey for a suitable part, and whaddya know, found one!
Tada!
(It is also available in TO220, if you want to take chances).
Now, this is not your average MOSFET. It's actually a cascoded GaN-FET. Ths cascode handles your other problem, Miller effect of Cgd capacitor, which at 400V is going to be truly humongous.
Notice how the gate charge is ludicrously low compared to your IRF840 (like 10x less). Also the rise/fall times are very fast (like 5ns).
And the TPH3206LSB version has the Source on the big fat cooling pad on the back, which means you can solder it to your ground plane to cool it. (If it had been the drain, extra capacitance on the output would have been introduced). Note the TO220 version also has the Source on the tab, so you can ground the heatsink and even remove the insulator.
I've never used a GaN-FET, but damn, this part looks like it means business!
With a solid layout and a bit of luck, it could work. Maybe... Well, you can always try... Although you should really work on your specs first, since we don't know anything about the load yet, so this is really a shot in the dark.
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Melissa's Produce - Citrus Crate
Oranges can be eaten in many ways -- juiced, peeled and eaten fresh -- but why waste the peel? Peter Tutera suggests using the halves of orange peels as "bowls" for a scoop of vanilla ice cream.
In citrus fruits, it's the vitamin C that is the fat-burning component because it reduces fat’s effectiveness and can liquefy or dilute it so that it exits the body. Add some lemon to your water, drink orange juice, and eat grapefruit in the morning.
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Little Bull Lake (Algoma District)
Little Bull Lake is a lake in Algoma District, Ontario, Canada. It is about long and wide, and lies at an elevation of . The primary inflow is an unnamed creek from Bull Lake, and the primary outflow is an unnamed creek to Burnett Lake, which flows via Low Creek into the West River aux Sables, a tributary of the River aux Sables.
Bull Lake is about north of the community of Massey, where the River aux Sables joins the Spanish River.
See also
List of lakes in Ontario
References
Category:Lakes of Algoma District
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Fiber types and fiber diameters in canine respiratory muscles.
In the present study, we measured fiber types and fiber diameters in canine respiratory muscles and examined regional variation within the diaphragm. Samples of eight diaphragm regions, internal intercostals, external intercostals, transversus abdominis, and triceps brachii were removed from eight adult mongrel dogs, frozen, and histochemically processed for standard fiber type and fiber diameter determinations. The respiratory muscles were composed of types I and IIa fibers; no IIb fibers were identified. Fiber composition differed between muscles (P less than 0.0001). Normal type I percent (+/- SE) were: diaphragm 46 +/- 2, external intercostal 85 +/- 6, internal intercostals 48 +/- 3, transversus abdominis 53 +/- 1, and triceps 33 +/- 7. The diaphragm also contained a type I subtype [6 +/- 1% (SE)] previously thought only to occur in developing muscle. Fiber composition varied between diaphragm regions (P less than 0.01). Most notably, left medial crus contained 64% type I fibers. Fiber size also varied systematically among muscles (P less than 0.025) and diaphragm regions (P less than 0.0005). External intercostal fiber diameter was largest (47-50 microns) and diaphragm was smallest (34 microns). Within diaphragm, crural fibers were larger than costal (P less than 0.05). We conclude that there are systematic differences in fiber composition and fiber diameter of the canine respiratory muscles.
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Acute hypokalemia as a possible cause of death in a patient with advanced muscular dystrophy.
A patient with advanced muscular dystrophy of the Duchenne type developed severe hypokalemia thought to be secondary to moderate gastro-intestinal losses in association with reduced intracellular potassium stores. With correction of the hypokalemia, the cardiac rhythm became more normal. In patients with advanced dystrophy, hypokalemia may be functionally significant.
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Marriage of Convenience (1960 film)
Marriage of Convenience is a 1960 British crime film directed by Clive Donner and starring Harry H. Corbett, John Cairney and John Van Eyssen. Part of the long-running series of Edgar Wallace Mysteries films made at Merton Park Studios, it is based on the 1924 novel The Three Oak Mystery.
Synopsis
A convict escapes from jail, only to discover that his girlfriend has married the police officer who arrested him.
Cast
Harry H. Corbett as Inspector Bruce
John Cairney as Larry
John Van Eyssen as John Mandle
Jennifer Daniel as Barbara Blair
Moira Redmond as Tina
Russell Waters as Sam Spencer
Trevor Reid as Superintendent Carver
Howard Goorney as Onion Seller
Alexander Archdale as Governor
Geoffrey Denton as Uniformed Inspector
Patrick Ludlow as Registrar
Barry MacLean as 1st. Warder
Basil Beale as 2nd. Warder
Alex Scott as Vic Ellis
Patricia Burke as Woman in the Apartment
Pauline Shepherd as Evie Martin
Leila Williams as Secretary
Duncan Burns as Garage Apprentice
Trevor Maskell as Sergeant Collins
References
Bibliography
Goble, Alan. The Complete Index to Literary Sources in Film. Walter de Gruyter, 1999.
External links
Category:1960 films
Category:British films
Category:British crime films
Category:1960s crime films
Category:English-language films
Category:Films set in England
Category:Merton Park Studios films
Category:Films directed by Clive Donner
Category:Films based on British novels
Category:Films based on works by Edgar Wallace
Category:Edgar Wallace Mysteries
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Welcome to Asymmetric Cryptography and Key Management!
In asymmetric cryptography or public-key cryptography, the sender and the receiver use a pair of public-private keys, as opposed to the same symmetric key, and therefore their cryptographic operations are asymmetric. This course will first review the principles of asymmetric cryptography and describe how the use of the pair of keys can provide different security properties. Then, we will study the popular asymmetric schemes in the RSA cipher algorithm and the Diffie-Hellman Key Exchange protocol and learn how and why they work to secure communications/access. Lastly, we will discuss the key distribution and management for both symmetric keys and public keys and describe the important concepts in public-key distribution such as public-key authority, digital certificate, and public-key infrastructure. This course also describes some mathematical concepts, e.g., prime factorization and discrete logarithm, which become the bases for the security of asymmetric primitives, and working knowledge of discrete mathematics will be helpful for taking this course; the Symmetric Cryptography course (recommended to be taken before this course) also discusses modulo arithmetic.
This course is cross-listed and is a part of the two specializations, the Applied Cryptography specialization and the Introduction to Applied Cryptography specialization.
À partir de la leçon
Diffie-Hellman Key Exchange
Diffie-Hellman Key Exchange is an asymmetric cryptographic protocol for key exchange and its security is based on the computational hardness of solving a discrete logarithm problem. This module explains the discrete logarithm problem and describes the Diffie-Hellman Key Exchange protocol and its security issues, for example, against a man-in-the-middle attack.
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31 December 2016
Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher, their deaths capped off a terrible year.
"Sometimes everything seems just like a dream. It's not my dream, it's somebody else's. But I have to participate in it. How do you think someone who dreams about us would feel when he wakes up. Feeling ashamed?" - From Ingmar Bergman's Shame (1968).
"Happy New Year to all, including to my many enemies and those who have fought me and lost so badly they just don't know what to do. Love! "
The above was tweeted earlier today by the US president elect. I think it sums the “man” up rather well. He is utterly lacking in any class or grace. Never mind the fact that he brings to the highest office in the land not a shred of understanding for his position nor any empathy for the people he was “elected” to serve. His presidency — however long it may last — could prove to be the undoing of the United States. Democracy as we know it is in grave danger. Corporations will be unregulated to such an extent that they will attain unimaginable profits while the poor plunge even further into poverty. Capitalism was an interesting idea but it is clearly an out of control monster that devours everything in its path and must be under the strictest of controls.
He is liar. A cad. A cheat. A hypocrite. A narcissist. He lacks ethics, morals or values. He is an inspiration to racists everywhere. Not to mention sexists, idiots and the lowest form of life and conservative evangelicals who have perfected the art of hypocrisy to an extent that even the president elect can only aspire to.
So will begin 2017. A year that — difficult as it may be to imagine — might be worse that 2016.
So there’s that. There’s also something else troubling: the social fascism of millennials. Recently Steve Martin tweeted about the death of Carrie Fisher “When I was a young man, Carrie Fisher was the most beautiful creature I had ever seen. She turned out to be witty and bright as well.” He was lambasted for being sexist because he had the gall to point out her beauty and list it ahead of her other attributes. Martin deleted the tweet. Outrage is easy. Manufacturing outrage is easy. In today’s world with comments, opinion, sentiments and just plain old sentences flying about social media, finding some silly thing to get riled about is a particularly simple matter.
People with common sense came forward and defended Martin and raged at the raged. As one person commented: “I’m so tired of all this binary thinking and heartless self righteous anger….” Exactly. You can’t use these words. You can say anything about these or those people. These people can’t make jokes about those people. You shouldn’t say that or even think this. Increasingly we are seeing — from the left, mind you — strictures on free speech that will mute social commentary, dialogue, humor, expressions of grief and truth telling. Words and expressions are being taken away. Thin skinned self righteous millennials are particularly guilty of moral indignation and consequent hissy fits anytime someone steps over a line that none of us knew even existed. Somewhere Cotton Mather is smiling.
All is not bleak. It just feels that way. This feeling, of course, stems from horrible national and international events but is worsened by the losses of still more deaths of beloved celebrites, the aforementioned Ms. Fisher and then her mom, Debbie Reynolds are only the latest in a long line who have died these past 12 months. No word on whether anyone born this year is capable of filling the void.
But I look forward to the coming year. “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice,” Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said. (We could sure use his like today.). I hope he’s right. It is worth noting that the world is in many respects a safer, cleaner place than it ever has been. In more and more countries women are gaining more rights and protections as are gays, children, the elderly, the handicapped and other minorities. However, there is — as we have seen in the US — blowback with the rise of racist national groups and xenophobia, but that is inevitable. Hopefully we shall overcome. It has happened. Pessimism gains no one anything, other than an excuse to sit out the struggle. And struggle we need.
There is music, there is art, there is literature, there is film, there are still some uncorrupted sports competitions. There are parks, forests, beaches and other natural wonders. There is instant communication and air travel. There is scientific progress. There are advances in medicine. There is love. There is hope. And I don’t mean Bob.
So what's next? How about this? "Whatever happens, it's time to bury neoliberalism. We need genuine wealth + power redistribution. Only a real left can fight fascism." - Naomi Klein
23 December 2016
It’s cold, rainy and windy. Typically one adds: outside. I don’t see the point. If you are blessed with four walls and a roof and your windows are closed you should be experiencing neither rain nor wind in your domicile. Cold is another matter. This requires a heating system and proper insulation to avoid frigid weather. So as I was saying, it is cold, rainy and windy. My reaction to this is: huzzah! It’s December, it’s nearly Christmas and it is most appropriate that we have what many call “foul” or “bad” weather. I call it beautiful weather because I’m just the slightest bit odd. I guess you could scratch the “slightest bit” part. I find sunny cloudless days to be boring. Oh I don’t mind them now and again, particularly after a good hearty storm.
Despite my leftward political leanings and my indifference to religion and to the notions of god, jesus and virgin births, I love the Christmas season. I’ve made much of this fact in the past. The religious over tones of the holiday don’t bother me so much because I was raised with them and now find it simple enough to ignore them. The commercialization of Christmas is something people have been complaining about since I was a child (yes Christmas started before I was born ) and furthermore those complaints date back at least as far as the early 1900s. I like the break from the usual that Christmas provides. The colors, the trees, the gift giving, the huge meals, the family gatherings, the carols and Jolly Old Saint Nick himself. Plus you’ve got some darn good Christmas-related films (not to mention a plethora of bad ones) and a few good Christmas specials on TV. Most of these are from 50 years ago.
I have many other things on my mind besides Yuletide. I was asked recently what I thought would happen under a Trump presidency. Anyone who tries to predict the next four months, let alone the next four years, is full of it (I’ll leave to your imagination what “it” is). I challenge anyone to correctly predict the next four weeks. We are in unknown territory. The United States has never had a president who in anyway resembles this unbalanced individual. The potential for serious havoc being wreaked is unmeasurable. It does seem likely that Trump will violate the constitution (much as he has violated women) and suffer an impeachment. Indeed its hard to imagine this not happening. How much damage will be done in the meantime is incalculable. The president elect is a prolific liar, notoriously thin skinned, utterly capricious, malicious, narcissistic and totally incapable of understanding the niceties of diplomacy.
Meanwhile the country may well be torn asunder. Virulent racists are crawling out from under rocks, spewing their hatred, sometimes on the internet, sometimes in speechs, sometimes through graffiti and vandalism and sometimes directly at a person of color. Trump’s election has emboldened white nationalists, nazi wannabes, the KKK and all manner of racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic and Islama phobic nut jobs. There will come a point when shots will be fired -- literally -- people will clash in the streets and more bombs will be explode. Because Trump has assembled a cabinet chock full of million and billionaires who have no regard for anyone beneath their station (i.e. the overwhelming number of the people they serve) we can expect massive indifference and devastating funding cuts to little things like education, research, alternative energy, housing and the social safety net. The Affordable Care Act may suffer and there’s but little question that — at this extremely critical time — efforts to combat climate change will be cast aside. It’s dumbfounding and depressing that we will have a president and his cabinet who deny what the rest of the world knows and what over 90% of climate scientists says is a verifiable fact. The inmates will be running the asylum.
Will Trump trample on basic first amendments rights? He may try. Will he ever release his tax returns. On a cold day in hell. Will he ever hold a press conference. Probably one, eventually, and likely he won't like the experience and it will be nigh on impossible to get him to do another.
As I alluded to earlier, I am very far to the left of the political spectrum (something I will address on this blog in the very near future). Trump’s election and his forthcoming presidency are pushing me farther to the left. My reading of late has included a lot about Vietnam, Nixon, Watergate, and most especially the radical movements of the Sixties and Seventies including two sets of memoirs by former members of the Weather Underground. Trumpism may well lead to a huge revival of radical leftist politics. It will unquestionably further arouse the progressive populism that Bernie Sanders stirred last year. It is conceivable that, in the long run, much good could come out of Trump’s buffoonery. It may lead to a meltdown of conservative politics and do severe damage to the republican party. Meanwhile the Democrats could move further left. They may, ala Bernie, stop trying to compete with republicans for moderates and state their case from the position of a purer form of liberalism. Republicans successfully shifted far to the right in the Eighties with much success. Since FDR was president, Democrats, at least those who have earned the presidency and others in power, have betrayed their progressive roots in order to seduce conservative Democrats and die-hard moderates. While Obama did as much as he could given congressional interference to carry out strong liberal domestic policies, his foreign policy did not differ significantly from that of his predecessors from either party. Drone strikes killing civilians and damaging US status, were carried out pell mell. The fight against terrorism has gotten nowhere fast.
But enough about depressing topics. My own personal depression has abated significantly recently with nine of the last ten days seeing yours truly perfectly happy. I bring a message of hope to fellow sufferers that there are good days in your future no matter how bad it feels now. I’ve had some dark days that suggested my permanent condition would be one of terrible melancholy. I’m not out of the proverbial woods yet but I’m enjoying what I can one day at a time. Having experience with a 12 step program makes a lot of things in life easier to cope with. I have also been coping with the diagnosis that I am bipolar. I wasn’t surprised to learn that this was the case but I was amazed and hugely disappointed that something so obvious was not previously recognized. Especially since I bear all the characteristics of someone on the bipolar spectrum. Indeed I was ultimately quite relieved by the diagnosis as it gave me a label for some of my “problems” and one that I share with a great many people.
I am happy today and I look forward to enjoying tomorrow when I will be with daughters, wife, nieces, nephews, their spouses and their children and my sister-in-law for a traditional Finnish Christmas Eve celebration. Damn it I like Christmas and don’t care who knows it. Trump on the other hand….
17 December 2016
Bill Allen, 38, of Wicketsborough Connecticut went out to get a loaf of bread one night last year. It was a little after 8:00 on a cold autumn night. Three days later he was in a Turkish prison being raped by Bahar Aslan, a suspected murderer. It seems that Bill Allen, photography store owner and notary public, bore a striking resemblance to a Russian spy, one Yuri Ivanovich.
In the aftermath of his abduction no one back in Wicketsborough, nor anywhere else in the US, had the foggiest notion where Bill Allen was. His wife of 15 years, Debra Allen and his daughter Lisa (9) and son Buster (nee Robert) (6) were, unsurprisingly worried. So too was the family dog, Chester, (4) who could sense unhappiness within the family circle. The Allen’s cat, Rusty seemed to be carrying on as usual.
A month prior, Bill Allen had been in New York city to check out some new photography accessories being previewed at an exhibition. At some point while strolling through Manhattan, Bill was spotted by a Turkish agent who was in New York tailing a Saudi operative. The agent notified his superiors who sent a man to do what used to be called in movies, a tail job. Allen’s resemblance to Yuri Ivanovich was unmistakable, right down to their short blonde hair parted on the left. It also was a fact that Ivanovich, very much wanted by the Turks as well as other nations, had not been seen in two years. Apprehending the Russian spy would be quite a coup as he was the bearer of many secrets that the Turks dearly wanted.
What no one then knew was that Yuri Ivanovich was no longer of this Earth having drowned while fishing in Australia and subsequently being feasted upon by a seawater crocodile. What remained of him could hardly be used to certify identification, especially given the amount of time said remains had been in the water.
That fateful night two Turkish agents had lured Bill Allen toward their van under the pretext of asking for directions. Bill was a notoriously trusting fellow who had no reason to suspect that anything was amiss. He took things at face value. Sadly for this trusting fellow, the agents very neatly and quickly rendered Mr. Allen unconscious and tied him up in the back of the van. By the time the man who resembled a Russian spy regained consciousness, he was somewhere over the Atlantic. Needless to say Allen had no clue what was happening to him and was quite frightened. Actually more like terrified.
None of the Turks spoke to their captive, not even to answer any of his questions. Their silence continued after the airplane arrived and he was driven to the prison. As a tactic of many agencies when having captured a foreign spy; Allen was left to wonder at his fate even as he was thrown into a prison cell alongside the aforementioned Mr. Aslan.
One might wonder if the Turks were at all suspicious of the fact that their captive was not speaking a word of Russian and that his English was fluent and without an accent. However the late Mr. Ivanovich was known to be fluent in several languages betraying nary an accent in any of them.
It was five days before Bill Allen was brought out for interrogation. By this time he had cried, screamed, wailed and nearly gone insane contemplating the horrific and unknowable events that had visited him. He was ordered to sit in a chair at a table facing two Turkish men in suits. The room was absolutely sterile ,windowless, clean and stark. A bright overheard light shone on the middle of the table. A uniformed guard stood by the door.
Mr. Allen was addressed as Yuri Ivanovich by one of the men across from him and spoken to in Russian. The confused and terrified Mr. Allen cried that he didn’t understand them and demanded to know what was happening. He then sobbed. One of the two men then spoke English to the prisoner saying that they would “play this portion of the game” his way. He then asked Mr. Allen, “what have you to tell us?”
Bill Allen, owner of a photography store and notary public, wailed that he didn’t even know where he was or why he was here. “Very good Yuri Ivanovich, we’ll just have to allow you more time in your cell to decide that you will talk to us and tell us everything we ask.”
The men started to get up. Bill Allen, in a loud, desperate, pleading voice cried, “wait! what did you call me? You’ve got the wrong guy. I'm not even Russian!”
“Surely,” one of the men said, “you can do better than that. Why don’t you quit this charade and save us all precious time by talking to us.”
“I’ll talk! I’ll talk!” insisted Mr. Allen.
The two men retook their seats. “Let us start by you telling us who was responsible for the killing of our man in Athens and why he was killed.”
Bill Allen was dumbstruck. He did not possess a great intellect. Yes he’d managed good enough grades in school, but he merely learned what was required and possessed no intellectual curiosity. He was a simple man of simple tastes who, besides spending time with his family, enjoyed nothing so much as watching TV with his wife. But it was now clear to him that he was mistaken for a spy, probably a Russian one, as he correctly believed that that was the language they’d spoken to him in.
“Do you think I’m a Russian spy? Is that what you think? You’ve made a mistake, a terrible mistake. My name is William Allen, I own a photo shop in Wicketsborough. That’s my hometown, you see. You can ask anyone there about me. I have a wife and children and they must be desperately worried. Oh please, take me to the American embassy and we can straighten this whole thing out. I’ve just got —- ”
“That’s enough, Mr. Ivanovich,” said one of the men as he raised a hand. It seems you’ve chosen not to cooperate. I must say you are a splendid actor. I could well imagine you fooling many people.” Then the man nodded at the guard.
“But I’m not acting. I really am who I say. I can’t even speak Russian.” But the guard pulled Bill Allen out of his chair and led the sobbing man back to his cell and into the loving arms of his cellmate.
Three days later Bill Allen was brought into the same room and seated in the same chair across from the same people with the same guard at the door. Questions were asked and innocence was pleaded. Allen grew nearly hysterical and the two men calmly watched. Then one stood and slapped the prisoner across the face. Then hit him in the chest. Then spat in his face. Then slapped him again and yet again Then punched him in the stomach.
“You see, Yuri Ivanovich, we can talk calmly or we can be rough. In fact, if we talk calmly you will soon have your own room and be served very nice meals. So what do you say? Will you cooperate?
Bill Allen’s face was crimson and there were flecks of blood on it and his shoulders. His chest ached and it had taken awhile to breath normally after the punch to the gut. He had never been struck before and had never even played a contact sport. The poor man was sobbing uncontrollably, large strings of snot were streaming out of his nose. It was then that two men began to consult with one another, speaking quietly in Turkish. They expressed doubts that this was really Yuri Ivanovich. For one thing, said the man who had struck him, he is so soft, hardly like a Russian agent. Yes, said the other, and this sobbing like a woman does not seem to be acting, it’s too good. Plus, they both agreed, no Russian agent, particularly not one as notoriously tough as Yuri Ivanovich would sob at all, let alone so passionately.
Mr. Bill Allen was placed in a room with a small, but comfortable bed with clean sheets. There was even a window that looked out onto a field. The photograph store owner had not seen the outdoors since going out for the loaf of bread. He was also given clean clothes and allowed a shower.
There he stayed for three more days, receiving decent meals and fresh water to drink. Bill Allen was far from happy but in his misery he was suffering less. He was left to wonder why the change, as welcome as it was, and what to expect next.
Meanwhile the Turkish agents conducted a rigorous investigation (or more precisely had fellow agents in the US do it) into the background of William Allen of Wicketsborough, Connecticut. It took three days to receive a report saying that the man was just who he claimed to be. As for Yuri Ivanovich, there was no trace of him and more importably for Bill Allen, no record of him ever being in Connecticut. Indeed there were reports that he’d last been seen in Australia.
Now it had to be decided what was to be done with Bill Allen. Turning him over to the American embassy was out of the question, it would be far too embarrassing and injurious to US-Turkish relations. There was talk of merely shooting him and burying his remains where they’d never be found but that was dismissed on humanitarian grounds. Finally it was decided to put Mr. Allen right back to where they had taken him. Just leave him on the street where he had been abducted. He could thus re-unite with his family and surely no one, at least not in an official capacity, would believe his story — if he could himself to tell it.
So it was that Mr. Bill Allen was heavily sedated and flown back to the United States. By the time he was in the van — the same one he’d rode to out of Wicketsbourough in, Allen was awake, if groggy. He was alone in the back left to his thoughts having no clue where he was going.
Allen was dropped off on the same street where he’d been picked up at virtually the same spot at the same time of night. Even his loaf of bread was replaced. He wore the same clothes he’d had on that night, nearly two weeks ago. The driver of the van and his companion drove off as soon as they had deposited Bill Allen.
Bewildered, dazed, confused and terribly anxious, the poor man walked on wobbly legs the two and half blocks to his home. When he walked through the front door his wife Debra screamed — half in delight and half in shock. Lisa and Buster, who had been staring numbly at the TV set, leapt to their feet, crying “daddy, daddy, daddy” over and over again. Chester barked and jumped wagging his tail furiously. Rusty looked up from his perch atop the sofa, licked a paw, then resumed his slumber.
Amidst all the weeping and hugging and kissing, Mrs. Allen finally asked her husband what had happened and where had he been. Bill Allen veritably staggered to his easy chair and plopped down. He looked up lovingly at his wife, smiled at his kids and said, “you’d never believe me, not in a million years.” On the walk home Mr. Allen had wondered what he could possibly say to anyone about his disappearance. The real story would seem bizarre and beyond belief. His own recourse was a lie. One he was still trying to concoct as he sat down.
“For heaven’s sake, Bill, tell me!” his wife demanded.
Mr. Allen paused a moment then said, “I don’t know, I guess I fell or something and got amnesia because I can’t remember a thing. The last thing I remember is paying for the bread. The next thing I knew I was staggering down the street with a blinding headache, knowing that some time had passed since I left for the store."
"I wonder where you could have been? People were looking all over for you. Your disappearance was on the local TV news and in the papers. Anyway we're just so glad you're home.
"I'm confounded by all of this too. So tell me, how long have I been away?”
11 December 2016
“I drink too much. The last time I gave a urine sample it had an olive in it.” - Rodney Dangerfield
Hey guess what I got to struggle with last night? My worst ever case of insomnia. Woke up at 12 something, 1 something, 2 something, 3 something and when I work up at 4 something there was no getting back to dreamland. I had both tossed and turned to no avail and so finally got up and spent an hour on the computer. I tried at last to sleep on the sofa and did so quite fitfully for 90 minutes before giving up on that too. So guess how I feel now? If you said like warmed over ostrich vomit you are correct.
The day after a bad night of sleep recalls the many hangovers I used to suffer. In fact one day a few months ago I woke up after not sleeping well adding to this I was severely depressed, had an upset stomach and a headache. If my wallet had been empty and I’d only recalled parts of the previous night it would have been exactly like a hangover.
When I was drinking, hangovers were just part of the deal like being sore after a good workout. Sometimes there’d be a point in the evening at which I realized that if I continued imbibing I’d be in for that morning after feeling. Usually I said, “aw screw it” and carried on nonplussed.
The typical hangover consisted of a blinding headache, achy bones, weakness, queasiness, guilt, anxiety, regret and a dash or two of depression. Hangovers varied according to what you drank. I found beer hangovers to be the most tolerable unless the evening’s grog had consisted of heavy malts. Those could produce some dozzies. Wine hangovers were the ones most likely to cause nausea. Hard alcohol made for the worst headaches. Mixing drinks could also be lethal. The worst though was the Irish Coffee hangover. Whiskey, sugar and coffee are a brutal combination plus the concoction kept you up longer thus allowing you to drink more. Irish coffee hangovers made suicide seem an inviting option.
Hangovers could be blunted in two ways: drink plenty of water before going to bed, take two Tylenol. The problem is that you’re often too sloshed to think of it. As for hangover cures I found the best thing to do was to sleep as late as possible. After rising a shower would be in order and then, if at all possible, a hearty breakfast. But no matter these, the only real cure was a hair of the dog. A beer or two would take the edge off and if you could stop at a buzz you were usually good for the day. The risk, of course, was going beyond a few and starting in another evening of bacchanalia.
Another addition to hangover woes was cocaine, the more you’d partaken the worse the morning after. The cocaine itself could cause a nasty hangover and the copious amounts of liquor that the coke kept you awake to partake in furthered the damage. You may wake up next to a stranger. I did twice. In one instance I had no idea what her name was and we clearly been "intimate" the night before. Upon waking up she left and I never so her again nor did I discover her name. I remain particularly ashamed of that night/morning. I also woke up a few times to find vomit not far away. In one cases it had splashed upon a new book I'd just purchased that featured stills from all of Humphrey Bogart's films.
Drunks are perfectly happy to discuss and compare hangovers. The imagination runs wild in describing the hangover. One regular description was that a hole had been bored into the brain and sand had been poured in. There was also the claim that jackhammers were busy at work inside one’s head. Of course some swore off alcohol for a few days, a week or even longer when in the throes of a nasty one. You could tell a drunkard by the fact that the drinking would recommence well short of the goal. Often that very day. A real sot wouldn’t bother with promises and just get on with the drinking.
The real problem with hangovers was the guilt, shame and regret at what you did remember and the horror associated with large chunks of the evening that you had no memory of. God knows what you had done. Sometimes you can strain your brain and recall an image or person or a snippet of conversation. The worst was when the whole evening was a blank. You may well have insulted someone, flirted with the wrong woman, made a fool of yourself in front of the right woman or just made an ass of yourself in front of everyone. Sometimes you’d see a fellow reveler the next day and hear something to the effect of, “boy were you a mess last night” Or, “do you even remember last night?” Sometimes it wasn't so bad as in, “you were hilarious last night.” I once had a woman tell me what a good dancer I’d been and how funny I was. I neither recalled dancing nor making jests.
One day I woke up with no memory at all of the previous night. Total blank. Later that day I went to meet the people I’d been with that night at our favorite watering hole. They weren’t there. I asked around and someone told me that they’d gone to another bar. Funny, nobody told me. When I entered they turned their backs to me and pretended I wasn’t there. A collective cold shoulder. Freezing cold. I had a love/hate relationship with the most prominent member of our group and I’m sure that while in my cups I’d brought up every grievance I’d ever had with her. I slunk off, chastened, never to see “the gang” again. No matter, I moved out of the town shortly thereafter. Some years later I heard that the aforementioned woman had died of cancer while still in her early forties. I regret to this day that I didn’t make amends with her.
When you have a serious pain somewhere your body is telling you that something is wrong. Similarly if you are ill there is cause that sometimes requires investigation. With that in mind a hangover is certainly an internal memo to your brain and body that what took place the previous evening did damage and is to be avoided in the future. A heavy drinker is not interested in that missive.
One of the great joys of sobriety is the complete and total absence of hangovers. Other ailments come along but they do not visit us out of our stupidity and there is no shame, no empty wallet and no gaps in the memory.
If you partake every now and again but rarely get tipsy and do not suffer hangovers, I congratulate you. Mind you I don’t understand this ability at all. Even today when I see or hear of someone having “a couple of drinks” and truly no more, I’m dumbfounded. How is it possible? Sure there were a few occasions when I stopped after one or two but they were the exception.
Now the exception is when I wake up not feeling well. Life can get better — provided you get enough sleep.
04 December 2016
I wanted to write about how annoyed I get with bicyclists and people who talk on cell phones in public and how ridiculous cigarette smokers are but I decided to go into a more positive direction which means I’ll also not be talking about commuting as it’s nigh on impossible to have anything positive to say about commuting other than, “today's commute was relatively free of agonizing delays and horrible incidents.” So the gist of all this is that I have to be positive. Oh my lord that can make for some boring writing. Plus how positive can you be in the age of Trump?
Challenges. We claim to like them. I remember as a middle school teacher we were supposed to stop referring to students who were a pain in the arse as “bad kids” or “trouble makers” or even “difficult.” They were to be known as “challenging students.” Oh good a “challenge.” It will be a real “challenge” to teach this kid, hell it might be a real "challenge" to get the little bastard to stay in his seat.
But again I fear that is being negative and my purpose here is to spread sunshine, rainbows, fairy dust and moonbeams and do so in the age of Trump. Speaking of that buffoon. Could his election mark the decline of the US? Sure, some would argue that said decline started awhile back. Maybe with Watergate, or Vietnam or either of the Red Scares. But the country has remained propped up and holding its own although still dispensers of terror from the sky often in the form of drone strikes which have the nasty habit of incinerating innocent people. But at least the US stood for something. (Come to think of it, I’m not sure what it stood for, maybe, to quote the great Groucho Marx, “it stood for plenty.”)
Now we’ve got a megalomaniac bigot with conflicts of interests positively bursting from the seams whose appointing every regressive person he can find to dismantle as many progressive changes as we’ve been able to manage recently. The first Twitter Troll in Chief. The most thin skinned of all presidents, and the least prepared and maybe the one least interested in the job. My goodness a president who can make George W look bad. Seems impossible.
So if you say someone did the impossible you are guilty of grammatical fiction. You may, however, say that someone has done something that was previously thought to be impossible. Our we clear on this?
So that wasn’t all so positive so maybe I should change the topic. Maybe. Then again maybe I’m just not in the mood. Funny thing is that as I write this I’m enjoying about my sixth day in a row with little or no depression*. Longest streak since April. Maybe I’m cured. Yeah I doubt it too. But its good not to be slumped in a chair looking deep into nothing, seeing nothing, hearing nothing feeling only existential pain and wondering if there was ever really such a thing as happiness. Along came some new meds. So now I skip merrily down the street tossing daises in the air and singing a happy song. Oh joy.
Actually I do want to make a point about bike riders: stay off sidewalks, obey the traffic laws, and don’t intentionally ride slowly in front of cars. And another thing, keep your fucking bikes off public transportation. They take up space, bump people on the train on the platform and on the escalator.
Sorry that was another example of a lack of positivity on my part. I’ll try harder. Here we go: I saw a cute squirrel the other day. Reminded me that I grew up with a walnut tree in my backyard which was regularly visited by squirrels. Most of them were skittish and did not like to fraternize with homo sapiens. I remember a few who would approach you if you had a nut in your hand and one particularly bold furry friend who actually took a nut from my hand. I also recall a rabid squirrel. What an awful racket it made and how fearsome it seemed. Amazing that a little furry tailed creature can be so frightening -- but it was -- particularly knowing that its bite would pass along rabies. As a child I was given to believe that the cure for rabies came from a very long thick needle that caused almost as much pain as would rabies.
Movies. I’ve seen two fantastic films this year, the best I’ve seen in theaters since Birdman. The two are (drum roll) Moonlight and Manchester By the Sea. Both have received nearly unanimous critical acclaim and have won some of the early bird film awards for 2016. So in saying they are great movies I’m not exactly breaking new ground. Still this is encouraging, especially in light of the fact that I’ve seen some other very good films. I keep thinking that the movie industry is dying but they keep cranking out the odd excellent film every now and again. It doesn't always seem so because of the flood of stupid comedies and ridiculous action films and zombie films that permeate cineplexes throughout the year.
What’s so good about Moonlight and Manchester is that they don’t pander. They are not targeted to a particular demographic, they aren’t reboots of older films, on another in a series of a franchise or a cinematic version of a comic book. They do not have dazzling special effects, a big Hollywood mega star, a booming soundtrack. They are not rife with cliches or at all predictable. They are honest original films that tell human stories. That’s really all you want out of a film along with good cinematography, proper direction, editing and locations that compliment the story. (Well this part was kind of positive.)
The Holiday of Christmas Season is open us. That means many of you will go to your battle stations to help fight for or against the War on Christmas. The forces trying to “protect” Christmas are in a much superior position. They have great economic strength, millions of adherents to the holiday and traditions galore. One might even argue that there really is no war to speak of. People saying Happy Holidays in place of Merry Christmas may at times be silly and at other times appropriate, but in any case its nothing that’s going to tackle the behemoth that is Christmas. Nor will the removal of a nativity scene or the failure to put a Christmas tree in a public space nor anyone responding to Christmas with an emphatic “bah humbug!” Yes the very notion of a War on Christmas, perpetrated by right wing loonies is laughable. Deck the halls, everyone.
Notice in the above paragraph I did not write: The so-called War on Christmas. I had so-called. It is called that. Why do we need to put a so-called in front of terms? Often it is to demean the term. Why not refer to everything as so-called? The so-called Rocky Mountains, the so-called Jennifer Lawrence, the so-called open heart surgery.
So how’ve I done? Being positive is not so easy. Not when you are in a constant struggle with depression and not when Trump and his gang of conservative zealots is about to pillage the US. But one must try. Optimism never hurt anyone and indeed has helped many. Provided of course that one makes any efforts at their disposable to see that their optimism is not misplaced. Cynicism is an easy trap to fall into and does no good. It’s baby brother pessimism is hardly any better. As Oscar Wilde once said, “a cynic sees the price of everything and the value of nothing.” If we don’t have hope we are lost.
Keep a good thought, everybody.
* I wrote this bit last week. Since then my streak went to seven days then abruptly stopped and now I'm on day four of having the blues. So it goes.
About Me
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And I quote:
"Read anything I write for the pleasure of reading it. Whatever else you find will be the measure of what you brought to the reading". - Ernest Hemingway
"They have a mind to till the soil and the love of possession is a disease with them. These people have made many rules that the rich may break but the poor may not. They take their tithes from the poor and weak to support the rich and those who rule." - Sitting Bull
"Here's what we can do to change the world, right now.... Take all that money we spend on weapons and defenses each year and instead spend it feeding and clothing and educating the poor of the world, which it would pay for many times over, not one human being excluded, and we could explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace." - Bill Hicks
“Everything can happen, everything is possible and probable. Time and place do not exist; on a significant bases of reality, the imagination spins, weaving new patterns; a mixture of memories, experiences, free fancies, incongruities and improvisations.” - August Strindberg
We got to face some facts. That the masses are poor, that the masses belong to what you call the lower class, and when I talk about the masses, I'm talking about the white masses, I'm talking about the black masses, and the brown masses, and the yellow masses, too. We've got to face the fact that some people say you fight fire best with fire, but we say you put fire out best with water. We say you don't fight racism with racism. We're gonna fight racism with solidarity. We say you don't fight capitalism with no black capitalism; you fight capitalism with socialism. -- Fred Hampton
Kerouac quotes
I know by now the children must be crying in the land where they let the children cry, and tonight the stars'll be out, and don't you know that God is Pooh Bear? -On the Road
Everything belongs to me because I’m poor. - Visions of Cody
“Finding Nirvana is like locating silence.” - Dharma Bums
“I'm right there, swimming the river of hardships but I know how to swim...” - Desolation Angels
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Category: Posts
JER 6:17 Also, I set watchmen over you, saying, ‘Listen to the sound of the trumpet!’ But they said, ‘We will not listen.’
This ministry was founded to warn Christian believers …of false teachings and teachers… of the coming apostasy …It has been the watchman on the walls.
But what exactly does apostasy mean? Compton’s defines Apostasy thus…a-pos-ta-sy ( past se) n. , pl. -sies [[ME apostasie < LL(Ec) apostasia < Gr apo- , away + stasis , a standing: see STASIS]] an abandoning of what one has believed in, as a faith, cause, or principles [1]
Paul referred to apostasy as ‘falling away’ 2THES 2:3 Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away (apostasy) comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition,
Many Christians will simply not get it; so I will reiterate. ‘Apostasy’ or ‘falling away’ is the abandoning of what one has believed in ...the apostasy talked of by Holy Scripture comes out of the Physical keeping of the Mosaic laws by born again Christians. Allow me to give you some examples…for hundreds of years the Church has used Sunday to worship our Lord; great preachers have come and gone and not even given it a thought; Sunday was the day set aside to honor and worship corporately, it was never referred to as the Sabbath, and as such it has never replaced it. But now in the last days, cults are arising insisting that Saturday is the only Sabbath because the Mosaic laws demand it; and they back up their fallacies by using Jesus’ words in MT 5:19 "Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. These people then go on to say that by breaking the Sabbath we Christians are breaking all of the commandments. The apostasy comes in because many Christians do not understand that Jesus not only suffered and died for our sins on Calvary’s cross, but that He fulfilled the Mosaic Commandments written in His own hand on Mount Sinai …EX 31:18 And when He had made an end of speaking with him on Mount Sinai, He gave Moses two tablets of the Testimony, tablets of stone, written with the finger of God.
But do we recall what the LORD said to Moses before he climbed the mount to receive the Law?
EX 19:23 But Moses said to the LORD, "The people cannot come up to Mount Sinai; for You warned us, saying, 'Set bounds around the mountain and consecrate it.' "
When God set bounds around Mount Sinai, telling Moses no-one could enter , it was a shadow of the laws, that He was about to give Moses; that certain conditions had to be met before anyone could enter His rest, these became known as the 10 commandments. When Jesus died on Calvary the Curtain of the Holy of Holies split in two …the Law was ended…there were no more ‘bounds set around the mountain’
Paul explains it so well to those in Rome … why is it so difficult for us to understand today? ...we are no longer under the Mosaic Laws; we are under Grace through faith.
ROM 13:9 For the commandments, "You shall not commit adultery," "You shall not murder," "You shall not steal," "You shall not bear false witness," "You shall not covet," and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."
It cannot be plainer than in Jesus’ words either
Mk 12:30 'And you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.' This is the first commandment.
12:31 "And the second, like it, is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."
The law is now within us…God is love...we must be love, just as He is…
If anyone comes to you trying to convince you that you must, as a Christian, be Torah observant …SHOW THEM THE DOOR…Torah means LAW…the next thing they will be insisting is that you use ONLY the original sacred names for God, Lord and Jesus and that you will lose your salvation unless you worship on the proper Sabbath i.e. Saturday of the Torah; and many cults even go as far as insisting upon circumcision…Please I beg of you dear reader …read what Paul said to the congregation at Galatia who had this very problem…
Gal 5:1 Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.( The Law)
5:2 Indeed I, Paul, say to you that if you become circumcised, Christ will profit you nothing.
5:3 And I testify again to every man who becomes circumcised that he is a debtor to keep the whole law.
5:4 You have become estranged from Christ, you who attempt to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace.
5:5 For we through the Spirit eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness by faith.
5:6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but faith working through love.
These were believers who turned back to the Law and fell from grace …don’t let it be you. If it is you then repent now, you are in error…grave error.
2 John 1:10 If anyone comes to you and does not bring this doctrine, do not receive him into your house nor greet him;
1:11 for he who greets him shares in his evil deeds.
Surely we have all heard the story of David slaying Goliath with a well aimed pebble from his slingshot? Let us look at the true version…and how very relevant the story is to today’s believers.
1 Sam 17:32 Then David said to Saul, “Let no man’s heart fail because of him; your servant will go and fight with this Philistine.”
17:33 And Saul said to David, “You are not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him; for you are a youth, and he a man of war from his youth.”
Every sermon that I have ever heard, and every picture I have ever seen, portrays David as a frail looking youngster. Saul, in the verse above only refers to David as a youth in age …there is no reference to David’s physique…We are told that Saul had his armor put on David… and because Saul was a man and David a youth the armor only ‘fitted where it touched’, and David looked like some overdressed clown …This is simply not true; nowhere does it say that the armor did not fit David .
Was David some frail youngster? … On the contrary this young David had singlehandedly caught a lion by its beard and killed it…
1 Sam 17:34 But David said to Saul, “Your servant used to keep his father’s sheep, and when a lion or a bear came and took a lamb out of the flock,
17:35 I went out after it and struck it, and delivered the lamb from its mouth; and when it arose against me, I caught it by its beard, and struck and killed it.
The scripture tell us that David had also, singlehandedly, slain a bear as well…David a young frail wimp? …I don’t think so.
Then why didn’t he wear Saul’s armor?… In David’s own words, “I cannot walk with these, for I have not tested them.” So David took them off. David took them off not because they did not fit him perfectly…but because he had not tested them, he had never worn human armor, and as such had never had time to practice in them to prove their worth
….But he did have armor that he had tested and that he was extremely comfortable with… and that was the armor of God.
1 Sam 17:36 “Your servant has killed both lion and bear; and this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, seeing he has defied the armies of the living God.”
17:37 Moreover David said, “The LORD, who delivered me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear, He will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine.” And Saul said to David, “Go, and the LORD be with you!”
I wonder whether Paul was considering David when he told those at Ephesus.1 Eph 6:10 Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.
6:11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
In this day and age with so much false teaching in our Churches and media, we do well to learn from David afresh…put on the full armor of God before you engage the enemy.
I now let Paul’s words close this missive…let him talk deep into your soul…
EPH 6:10 Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.
6:11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
6:12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.
6:13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.
6:14 Stand therefore, having girded your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness,
6:15 and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace;
6:16 above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one.
6:17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God;
The EVIL DAY referred to by Paul above, is coming and coming fast, RV 12:7 And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, 12:8 but they did not prevail, nor was a place found for them in heaven any longer.
12:9 So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.
EPH 6:11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.
There is no better time than right now to spread the Gospel; why not do it?
We know beyond doubt that we are saved by Grace EPH 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, …note that we are saved by grace THROUGH FAITH …. How many times have I heard people saying “I am saved by grace and grace alone”.
When we are called by God, a process is put into action …the first step being an inexplicable urge within us to turn from your sinful, wicked ways (in many spheres this is known as Prevenient Grace); and it is the initial prompting of the Holy Spirit of God for us mere sinful mortals to ask for forgiveness and turn to Him; a process referred to as repentance; this happens after hearing or reading of the Kingdom and Jesus’ work on Calvary’s cross… we may respond immediately to this anomaly; or it may takes days, weeks or even months for us to respond…or we may never respond. ROM 10:17 So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
Jesus referred to this process in His parable of the Sower Matt 13:18 “Therefore hear the parable of the sower:
13:19 “When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, then the wicked one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is he who received seed by the wayside.
13:20 “But he who received the seed on stony places, this is he who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy;
13:21 “yet he has no root in himself, but endures only for a while. For when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he stumbles.
13:22 “Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful.
13:23 “But he who received seed on the good ground is he who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and produces: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.”
From the above parable we can see various ways that the message (seed) is received and our subsequent responding to it by faith. We must ask ourselves the question “Were those that received the word by the wayside, or on stony ground, or among the thorns saved, and then subsequently lost their salvation?” How many times have I heard the argument “Oh he or she obviously was not saved in the first place” or “If they were truly saved they would never have done that”…
Jesus never ever said that ‘being saved’ would be easy and He tells us this in Matt 7:13 “Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it.
7:14 “Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it. That is correct dear reader THERE ARE FEW WHO FIND SALVATION.
We as believers get so hooked up on certain elements of doctrine that sometimes we are blinded to the truth…we are so frightened of this word ‘works’ that we believe that we can do nothing to enter into salvation it is solely by grace … well possibly we are wrong. Paul tells those at Philippi 2:12 Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling;
2:13 for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.
John writes in his epistles of the importance of loving our brothers and he goes on to say 1 John 5:13 These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God. The inference here is that there are some who did not continue to believe and no longer have eternal life…
Jude tells us categorically that we are justified by our works
Jude 2:17 Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.
2:18 But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.
2:19 You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe-and tremble!
2:20 But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is dead?
2:21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered Isaac his son on the altar?
2:22 Do you see that faith was working together with his works, and by works faith was made perfect?
2:23 And the Scripture was fulfilled which says, “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.” And he was called the friend of God.
2:24 You see then that a man is justified by works, and not by faith only.
Jesus tells all the believers Matt 24:12 “And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.24:13 “But he who endures to the end shall be saved. Please note that these are true believing Christians Jesus is referring to, not some group of ‘Left behind’ Jews as some Dispensationalist preachers would have us believe in there false “Rapture’ doctrine.
Here Jesus is talking to the likes of you and me and He is saying “Keep the faith….keep going in spite of all tribulation…Love your God with all your heart mind and soul…love your neighbor as yourself …do unto others as you would have them do unto you…THEN YOU WILL BE SAVED….
Paul did exactly that until he breathed his last and fell asleep 2TM 4:7 I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.
Jesus paid the price for our sins upon Calvary’s cross, this gift comes with a price (nowhere does it say that it is a FREE gift) Love the Lord your God with all your mind, heart and soul and your fellow man as yourself…If you are not doing that, then I would suggest you start right away…remember well what happened to the man who never used his Talent?
Matt 25:30 ‘And cast the unprofitable servant into the outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’
There is no better time than right now to spread the Gospel; why not do it?
Luke 23:32 There were also two others, criminals, led with Him to be put to death.
23:33 And when they had come to the place called Calvary, there they crucified Him, and the criminals, one on the right hand and the other on the left.
23:34 Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.” And they divided His garments and cast lots.
Jesus, nailed to the cross by Roman soldiers, cried out “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.”
There are few Christians who have not heard these words from the lips of our Savior Christ Jesus …But the question begs to be answered …who are the ‘them’ whom Jesus is asking The Father to forgive? Most Christians have never questioned who specifically Jesus is asking His Father to forgive.
Is it the Pharisees?…Is it the Scribes?…Is it the Sadducees?…Is it the Jewish crowd who cried “Crucify Him” …Is it Caiaphas? …Is it Pontius Pilate?… No it appears that it is none of these people.
If we exercise sound Hermeneutics, we have to come to one conclusion only; it has to be the Roman soldiers who were following orders and were the only ones who had the authority to fulfill the Roman command… if we follow the text of Luke he specifically says ‘there they crucified Him’ …’they’ also crucified the two criminals ‘and the criminals, one on the right hand and the other on the left’. And so that we were in no doubt who the ‘they’ are Luke continues ‘And they divided His garments and cast lots’
The Gospels of Matthew and Mark are very specific of the ill treatment laid upon Jesus by the Roman soldiers; from their mocking, scourging and final nailing of Jesus to that dreadful cross…
It was the Roman soldiers who Jesus requested forgiveness for and no-one else…not even the Jews who cried “Crucify Him”…for they knew what they were doing.
Peter being a Hebrew, believed as most did in his day, that the Hebrews had a uniquely special place in God’s eye, and this was denied to the Gentiles.
When Jesus encountered the Pharisees, who had rebuked His Disciples, Jesus told them in no uncertain terms…Mark 7:8 “For laying aside the commandment of God, you hold the tradition of men-the washing of pitchers and cups, and many other such things you do.”
7:9 He said to them, “All too well you reject the commandment of God, that you may keep your tradition.
Jesus then goes on to tell them 7:13 “making the word of God of no effect through your tradition which you have handed down. And many such things you do.” 7:14 When He had called all the multitude to Himself, He said to them, “Hear Me, everyone, and understand:
7:15 “There is nothing that enters a man from outside which can defile him; but the things which come out of him, those are the things that defile a man.
7:16 “If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear!”
Now even His own Disciples were confused by what He had said to the Pharisees, and the Parable which he had told them; so He explained to them 7:17 When He had entered a house away from the crowd, His disciples asked Him concerning the parable.
7:18 So He said to them, “Are you thus without understanding also? Do you not perceive that whatever enters a man from outside cannot defile him,
7:19 “because it does not enter his heart but his stomach, and is eliminated, thus purifying all foods?”
In this explanation to His Disciple, Jesus has told them that ALL FOODS ARE CLEAN; and in one sentence ANNULED the Levitical Law…and in annulling this law proclaimed that there are no differences between Jew and Gentile.
Peter had to be given a vision by God on his rooftop in Joppa to make him realize this fact Acts 10:10 Then he became very hungry and wanted to eat; but while they made ready, he fell into a trance
10:11 and saw heaven opened and an object like a great sheet bound at the four corners, descending to him and let down to the earth.
10:12 In it were all kinds of four-footed animals of the earth, wild beasts, creeping things, and birds of the air.
10:13 And a voice came to him, “Rise, Peter; kill and eat.”
10:14 But Peter said, “Not so, Lord! For I have never eaten anything common or unclean.”
10:15 And a voice spoke to him again the second time, “What God has cleansed you must not call common.”
The story continues with Peter being prompted by The Holy Spirit and summoned by an angel to go to the Gentile Cornelius’s house; and after ministering to Cornelius, Peter’s eyes are opened Acts10:34 Then Peter opened his mouth and said: “In truth I perceive that God shows no partiality.
10:35 “But in every nation whoever fears Him and works righteousness is accepted by Him.
In a nutshell Peter is saying ‘ALL FOODS ARE ‘KOSHER’, AND ALL MEN ARE EQUAL’
If the Holy Scriptures are so abundantly clear on this teaching, that God shows no partiality or special favors to any race, why do the vast majority of Professing Christians still believe that the Jews are His chosen people; and that He still has a special agenda for them? That they should be revered and honored by Christians? …Can we not see that we are going against God?… Is it not time that we take God’s word, and not man’s word?
Jesus did not simply ask us… He orders us! …MT 28:19 “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,…
There is a very clear and accurate chronology of the events leading up to the Crucifixion, the entombment, and the resurrection, of Jesus Christ of Nazareth.
Found in the pages of the New and Old Testament
Sunday. Jesus rides into Jerusalem and is greeted by the crowds waving Palm branches. He immediately enters the Temple and thrashes those who were desecrating it Matt21:10 And when He had come into Jerusalem, all the city was moved, saying, “Who is this?”21:11 So the multitudes said, “This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth of Galilee.” 21:12 Then Jesus went into the temple of God and drove out all those who bought and sold in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves. Notice that Jesus was not hailed as the Messiah, but as a prophet, by the Jewish crowds.
Monday. After spending the night in Bethany, Jesus again walks to Jerusalem, on the way cursing the Fig tree Matt 21:18 Now in the morning, as He returned to the city. He again goes into the Temple, and again drives out those who are defiling it MK 11:12 Now the next day, when they had come out from Bethany, He was hungry.
11:13 And seeing from afar a fig tree having leaves, He went to see if perhaps He would find something on it. When He came to it, He found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs.
11:14 In response Jesus said to it, “Let no one eat fruit from you ever again.” And His disciples heard it.
11:15 So they came to Jerusalem. Then Jesus went into the temple and began to drive out those who bought and sold in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves.
Tuesday. Again they left Bethany in the morning on their way to the Temple and passed by the now ‘dead to its roots’ fig tree….This is when Jesus has his infamous altercation with the Scribes and Pharisees in Matt 23. Matt 26:1 Now it came to pass, when Jesus had finished all these sayings, that He said to His disciples,
26:2 “You know that after two days is the Passover, and the Son of Man will be delivered up to be crucified.”
26:3 Then the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders of the people assembled at the palace of the high priest, who was called Caiaphas,
26:4 and plotted to take Jesus by trickery and kill Him.
26:5 But they said, “Not during the feast, lest there be an uproar among the people.”
Wednesday. Jesus supposedly sends them out to prepare the Passover on the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread 26:17 Now on the first day of the Feast of the Unleavened Bread the disciples came to Jesus, saying to Him, “Where do You want us to prepare for You to eat the Passover?” …but Holy Scripture teaches that the Feast of Unleavened Bread follows the day of Passover…They eat the Passover a day early, on preparation day, the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread simply because the Pharisees in those days had joined the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread to make it a eight days of feasting instead of seven…and the first day of unleavened bread was the day that all leaven had to be removed from the homes and a thorough ‘spring-cleaning’ took place and this could not take place on a high Sabbath i.e. Passover, so it was done the day before on preparation day. JN 19:31 Therefore, because it was the Preparation Day, that the bodies should not remain on the cross on the Sabbath (for that Sabbath was a high day), the Jews asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away.
…Judas betrays Jesus and He is arrested that night in Gethsemane. Wednesday morning Jesus is tried and convicted and sent to be crucified…JESUS IS CRUCIFID IN THE MIDDLE OF THE WEEK ON WEDNESDAY i.e. preparation day, the SAME DAY AS THE LAMBS WERE SLAUTERED
Thursday. At the start of Thursday (Passover high day Sabbath) Jesus is laid in the Tomb…1st full night and day …Remember well that the day of Thursday started at sunset on WEDNESDAY and ran to sunset the next day , Thursday the first full night and full day…
Friday. In the Tomb 2nd full night and day ( first day of Feast of Unleavened Bread also a Sabbath high day)…From Thursday 6PM to Friday 6 PM
Saturday. Normal Sabbath Day in the tomb; 3rd full night and day ; from Friday 6PM to Saturday 6PM…Remember well that After 6PM on Saturday the Sabbath is ended and it is now Sunday…Then, and only then, after three full days and three full nights comes the Resurrection after 6PM Saturday night…MT 12:40 “For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.…
After three and a half days Jesus appears to Martha in the early hours of Sunday morning possibly around 6AM…He has been entombed Thursday, Friday and Saturday; then resurrected Sunday…Remember well what the Lord Jesus said to the Scribes and Pharisees quoting from the OT Matt 15:8 ‘These people draw near to Me with their mouth, And honor Me with their lips, But their heart is far from Me.
15:9 And in vain they worship Me, Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ”
And, are we not doing the same in this very day and age….Teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ”
So there it is …and has been so for two thousand years… when John said that the Sabbath was a high day, Sabbath is actually plural in the original text as well. You see my dear reader there were actually THREE SABBATHS The first The Passover on the 14th of Nisan (the first month) followed by The Feast Of Unleavened bread on the 15th of Nisan and then followed the normal weekly Sabbath on the 16th day of Nisan.
MK 2:28 “Therefore the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbaths.”
JN 8:32 “And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”
17:10 Then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews.
17:11 These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.
Recently I have been writing on a very controversial subject…that of the Jews…I have been called Ant-Semitic, racist, ‘Jew hater’ and many other derogatory names; all because I have questioned the validity of the ‘Jewish’ nation, in present day Israel, who refer to themselves as Jews; but should someone else (a Goyim or a Gentile) call them a Jew, then out comes the race card…and its color is red.
I would never put a name to myself like ‘Apostle’ or ‘Prophet’; but one thing I can tell you without fear of contradiction, is that I have a pretty good idea now of how the Prophets of the OT and the Apostles of the NT where treated by the Jews.
Let us pause for a moment and go back to when Jesus first sent His Disciples out to preach the Word and prepare a way for Him… LUKE 10:1 After these things the Lord appointed seventy others also, and sent them two by two before His face into every city and place where He Himself was about to go.
10:2 Then He said to them, “The harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few; therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.
10:3 “Go your way; behold, I send you out as lambs among wolves.
Jesus had made it abundantly clear that they were to go ONLY to the lost sheep of the house of Israel… MT 10:6 “But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. So He must have been referring to the Israelites (Jews) as wolves in Luke10:3…
Did Jesus tell them to go out and buy new clothes, and the best donkeys available so that they would be seen as being successful preachers? No of course He didn’t…This is in fact what He told them….10:4 “Carry neither money bag, knapsack, nor sandals; and greet no one along the road.
10:5 “But whatever house you enter, first say, ‘Peace to this house.’
10:6 “And if a son of peace is there, your peace will rest on it; if not, it will return to you.
10:7 “And remain in the same house, eating and drinking such things as they give, for the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not go from house to house.
Jesus tells them to stay in one particular house, and not go from door to door. The Jehovah’s Witnesses should read this passage.
10:8 “Whatever city you enter, and they receive you, eat such things as are set before you.
10:9 “And heal the sick there, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’
Jesus now says something truly amazing
10:10 “But whatever city you enter, and they do not receive you, go out into its streets and say,
10:11 ‘The very dust of your city which clings to us we wipe off against you. Nevertheless know this, that the kingdom of God has come near you.’
10:12 “But I say to you that it will be more tolerable in that Day for Sodom than for that city.
History records that this prophecy was fulfilled in AD 70 in the siege of Jerusalem and its destruction and the destruction of many other cities in Israel…
Professing Christians will just not come to grips with the fact that Jesus did everything humanly possible to preach to the Jews of His Kingdom…but they not only rejected Him… they crucified Him. John1:11 He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him.
1:12 But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name:
The lesson I have gleaned from these passage is very simple …there are those who are prepared to listen as ‘Sons of peace’ and there are those who simply will not. There where Jews in Israel who where waiting for the Messiah to come and were ‘the son’s of peace’ … Simeon was a prize example… LUKE 2:25 And behold, there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, and this man was just and devout, waiting for the Consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. But the majority were interested only in being released from the grips of Roman occupation.
All I have ever asked of my readers is to act as Bereans …ACTS 17:11 These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.
There is a frightening warning from God; and we should all take fearful notice of it …
EZEK 3:18 “When I say to the wicked, ‘You shall surely die,’ and you give him no warning, nor speak to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life, that same wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood I will require at your hand.
Most professing believers in Jesus Christ, hate, loath and detest one thing …BEING TAKEN OUT OF THEIR COMFORT ZONES!!
It truly is no remarkable revelation when you consider that Holy Scripture refers to Jesus’ believers as sheep …1PT 2:25 For you were like sheep going astray, but have now returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.
MT 9:36 But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd.
Many of us are exactly that… ‘Mindless sheep’.
I wrote some time ago about Christians being conformists. Living in their own ‘little boxes’ or ‘cocoons’ of belief; and woe betide any man who comes into that comfort zone of their cocoons, to tell them that what they believe, is not what the holy Scriptures actually teach.
To those that respond with the classic catch phrase “Well I have believed that all of my life”…. My answer is simple “Then you could possibly have been wrong all of your life”
I do not write these missives to preach at you, I write to give you other precepts which you may, or may not, have overlooked; or possibly have never crossed your mind…We have to get out of this ‘tunnel vision syndrome’ which we adopt in our cocoons…It prevents us from seeing the overall picture, and that can be fatal.
What if I were to tell you that the Jews are no longer God’s chosen race and ceased to become the ‘Apple of His eye’ when they crucified His Son… would you be out of your comfort zone ?
What if I were to tell you that the present day country of Israel is not blessed by God, but is indeed cursed by God …would you be out of your comfort zone?
What if I were to tell you that the ‘Great city Babylon’ of John’s Revelation is none other than Jerusalem…would you be out of your comfort zone?
What if I were to tell you that the Jesus warns ‘My people’ (who can only be Christian believers) to come out of the ‘Babylonian’ belief system ( commonly known today as Christian Zionism) RV 18:4 And I heard another voice from heaven saying, “Come out of her, my people, lest you share in her sins, and lest you receive of her plagues. …Would you be out of your comfort zone?
What if I were to tell you that the Zionist Jews are attempting to take over the leadership of the world and are using the richest and most powerful nation ever known, namely the USA to help them … Would you be out of your comfort zone?
What if I were to tell you that the word ant-Semite has only been introduced by Zionists after the Holocaust, and forms part of their plan to bring fear into Christians regarding the nation Israel…you are being held in bondage to them namely by their misquoting of Gen 12:3 I will bless those who bless you,
And I will curse him who curses you; … Would you be out of your comfort zone?
What if I were to tell you that Jesus, when He shouted “Father forgive them” was not referring to the Jews who had turned on Him but the Romans soldiers who had physically crucified Him and were dividing His clothes… would you be out of your comfort zone?
What if I was to tell you that according to OT Prophets God will once again ‘Remember’ the Jews but it will only be right at the end of the age and that only when they REPENT …RV 1:7 Behold, He is coming with clouds, and every eye will see Him, even they who pierced Him. And all the tribes of the earth will mourn because of Him. Even so, Amen.
What if I were to tell you that God loves you with all His heart and only wants the best for those who believe in His Son, but He wants sacrifice from you as well MT 10:38 “And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me… JMS 2:20 But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is dead? …would that take you out of your comfort zone?
What if I was to tell you that your salvation is not automatic and one can lose it…MT 10:22 “And you will be hated by all for My name’s sake. But he who endures to the end will be saved… JMS 1:12 Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him.
I sincerely hope and pray that this missive has taken you out of your comfort zone cocoon; and encourages you to search the Holy Scriptures…
There is a frightening warning from God through His Prophet Ezekiel; and we should all take fearful notice of it …
EZEK 3:18 “When I say to the wicked, ‘You shall surely die,’ and you give him no warning, nor speak to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life, that same wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood I will require at your hand.
For many professing Christians this map would illustrate the boundaries of the so called “Promised Land” …this land of Canaan which was promised conditionally to the Jews by God, from the Nile to the Euphrates… Holy Scripture proves that they have already occupied this land at some time in their history.(That is another missive)
But it is not so in Holy Scripture, in fact, the future of Israel as we know it today is not very encouraging at all for the Jews in the spiritual sense; but on the other hand, in the worldly sense Israel will boom and become a very, very powerful nation.
How do we know this?… well it is all recorded by John in the book of Revelation…specifically around the Great City…Jerusalem…
If we correctly interpret John’s Revelation, we find a ‘Great City’… and what’s more ‘A Great City, like none other’; remembering that Revelation was written after the destruction of Jerusalem in 70CE (John is recorded as having died in about 100CE; and Jerusalem was destroyed in 70CE). So he must have lived about 30 odd years after Titus destroyed Jerusalem…Revelation must have been penned after the destruction of Jerusalem…so the great city John refers to is a future great city.
Rev 14:8 And another angel followed, saying, “Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she has made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication.”
But John is given a vision of this ‘Babylon’, which has made ALL the nations become somehow involved in her evil…Please remember that the early Disciples referred to Jerusalem as Babylon. 1PT 5:13 She who is in Babylon, elect together with you, greets you; and so does Mark my son. And Jerusalem sits on one of seven hills !!!!
Rev16:19 Now the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell. And great Babylon was remembered before God, to give her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of His wrath
John reveals to us progressively what is to happen to this ‘Great city …this ‘Babylon’ …it will be divided in three parts, whilst the cities of the nations fall…Zechariah talks of something similar happening across the Kidron valley on the Mount of Olives when Jesus returns ZECH 14:4 And in that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, Which faces Jerusalem on the east. And the Mount of Olives shall be split in two, From east to west, Making a very large valley; Half of the mountain shall move toward the north And half of it toward the south.
Rev 18:2 And he cried mightily with a loud voice, saying, “Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and has become a dwelling place of demons, a prison for every foul spirit, and a cage for every unclean and hated bird!
18:3 “For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich through the abundance of her luxury.”
When Jesus returns and sets His feet upon the Mount of Olives…Jerusalem would have become a dwelling place of demons and great evil. The nations of the world who have supported her and traded with her, had become rich on her. Here we have a picture of the absolute wealth of Israel when Jesus comes. It may surprise you to know that an independent survey done on the Dead Sea alone in 1971, revealed that the wealth of minerals in it exceeded $1,7 TRILLION. Israel also has enormous deposits of shale oil, but as it is expensive to refine the price of oil must be maintained at a high price to make it viable…Israel has long been known as the Jewel box of the world. It is little wonder why the Zionist don’t want to share it. Not with anyone…
18:4 And I heard another voice from heaven saying, “Come out of her, my people, lest you share in her sins, and lest you receive of her plagues.
18:5 “For her sins have reached to heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities.
Here is one of the most profound warnings to the Christian Church by Jesus Himself…”Come out of her, MY PEOPLE” lest you become contaminated by her false teachings, because God has remembered the iniquities of the Zionist Jews and Zionist Christians.
18:6 “Render to her just as she rendered to you, and repay her double according to her works; in the cup which she has mixed, mix double for her.
18:7 “In the measure that she glorified herself and lived luxuriously, in the same measure give her torment and sorrow; for she says in her heart, ‘I sit as queen, and am no widow, and will not see sorrow.’
Does Jesus tell us here to Love the Pharasitical Zionist Jews and give them aid because they are the ‘Apple of His eye’? No He doesn’t; He says the exact opposite …He says “GIVE THEM TORMENT AND SORROW” and why must we do this? Because she still thinks that she sits as a Queen, because she still thinks that she is the BRIDE OF GOD and as such will see no sorrow.
18:8 “Therefore her plagues will come in one day-death and mourning and famine. And she will be utterly burned with fire, for strong is the Lord God who judges her.
18:9 “The kings of the earth who committed fornication and lived luxuriously with her will weep and lament for her, when they see the smoke of her burning,
The ABSOLUTE TOTAL DESTRUCTION of Jerusalem will come in one hour by fire. Rev 18:8 “Therefore her plagues will come in one day-death and mourning and famine. And she will be utterly burned with fire, for strong is the Lord God who judges her. God’s final wrath will be released on the unrepentant Jews. But for some there will be a place to escape. God is a God of wrath and of mercy. He wishes that all should be saved…
18:10 “standing at a distance for fear of her torment, saying, ‘Alas, alas, that great city Babylon, that mighty city! For in one hour your judgment has come.’
18:11 “And the merchants of the earth will weep and mourn over her, for no one buys their merchandise anymore:8:12 “merchandise of gold and silver, precious stones and pearls, fine linen and purple, silk and scarlet, every kind of citron wood, every kind of object of ivory, every kind of object of most precious wood, bronze, iron, and marble;
18:13 “and cinnamon and incense, fragrant oil and frankincense, wine and oil, fine flour and wheat, cattle and sheep, horses and chariots, and bodies and souls of men.
18:14 “The fruit that your soul longed for has gone from you, and all the things which are rich and splendid have gone from you, and you shall find them no more at all.
18:15 “The merchants of these things, who became rich by her, will stand at a distance for fear of her torment, weeping and wailing,
18:16 “and saying, ‘Alas, alas, that great city that was clothed in fine linen, purple, and scarlet, and adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls!
18:17 ‘For in one hour such great riches came to nothing.’ Every shipmaster, all who travel by ship, sailors, and as many as trade on the sea, stood at a distance
18:18 “and cried out when they saw the smoke of her burning, saying, ‘What is like this great city?’
Here we are given a picture of how rich Israel will become in the future…Jewish owned banks govern the world ..they own most of the worlds gold and silver production; they control the diamond industry; They control the weaving industries; and many manufacturing industries; the oil industry; the entertainments and media industries.
It is pretty certain that at the time of Jesus’ return Israel will, in some way or another, control every person living on planet earth …
18:19 “They threw dust on their heads and cried out, weeping and wailing, and saying, ‘Alas, alas, that great city, in which all who had ships on the sea became rich by her wealth! For in one hour she is made desolate.’
18:20 “Rejoice over her, O heaven, and you holy apostles and prophets, for God has avenged you on her!”
18:21 Then a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and threw it into the sea, saying, “Thus with violence the great city Babylon shall be thrown down, and shall not be found anymore.
18:22 “The sound of harpists, musicians, flutists, and trumpeters shall not be heard in you anymore. No craftsman of any craft shall be found in you anymore, and the sound of a millstone shall not be heard in you anymore.
18:23 “The light of a lamp shall not shine in you anymore, and the voice of bridegroom and bride shall not be heard in you anymore. For your merchants were the great men of the earth, for by your sorcery all the nations were deceived.
Rev 18:24 “And in her was found the blood of prophets and saints, and of all who were slain on the earth.”
For all of you reading this who still doubt that the ‘Great city Babylon’ is in fact Jerusalem; I simply ask you to read the words of Jesus Himself …
Matt 23:37 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing!
23:38 “See! Your house is left to you desolate;
23:39 “for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you say, ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD!’ ”
Jer. 22:8 “And many nations will pass by this city; and everyone will say to his neighbor, ‘Why has the LORD done so to this great city?’
22:9 “Then they will answer, ‘Because they have forsaken the covenant of the LORD their God, and worshiped other gods and served them.’ ”
And indeed in AD 70 their ‘house’ was left desolate …their house of prayer was totally destroyed as was most of Jerusalem…when Jesus returns Jerusalem will again be destroyed and replaced by the New Jerusalem… RV 21:2 Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. Jesus as the one and only true Christ would have fulfilled His great promise to us Jn14:1 “Let not your heart be troubled; you believe in God, believe also in Me.
14:2 “In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.
14:3 “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.
Note well the promise is that we will only receive this promise WHEN HE COMES AGAIN ….And He is coming again with that city that all the Patriarchs and prophets of old where looking forward to …the true promised land.
HEBREWS 13:14 For here we have no continuing city, but we seek the one to come.
13:15 Therefore by Him let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name.
13:16 But do not forget to do good and to share, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.
If You truly love the Jews, don’t try to be like them…show them Jesus their true Messiah …Evangelize them, don’t mimic them…
MT 7:7 “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. MT 7:8 “For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.
I have been writing these missives for over ten years now…God has opened doors, and God has closed doors for me. He has molded and shaped my thinking on Holy Scripture and has reminded me, that in order to find the truth of His word we have to want and desire it with a passion… We have to come to Him prayerfully asking for Holy Scripture to be opened up to us …in turn we have to seek that knowledge in the pages of His Word, guided by His Holy Spirit.
Too many of us professing believers in Jesus simply take, as gospel, what we are taught in our churches…we never question anything… Jesus was correct in assimilating Christians to sheep… MT 9:36 But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd.
It is only when we start questioning Doctrines and dogmas that we start acting like the early believers, who searched the Scriptures to make certain that what they had heard or read, was in fact correct… Acts 17:10 Then the brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea. When they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the Jews.
17:11 These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.
I do not write from any pre-determined or pre-conceived theological stance …I write from what God has opened my eyes to in His Word, as I have asked Him to reveal His truth to me.
In 1973 I did the Xerox selling course called PSS (Professional selling skills)…If it taught me one thing and one thing only, I am forever grateful…It taught me never to assume anything ….NEVER ASSUME ANYTHING…the lecturer added an addendum… “To assume makes an ASS out of U and ME”.
Satan has long ago hijacked the truth of Holy Scripture from many of us …remember what he said to Eve GEN 3:4 Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die.
So what do most Christians today believe? Try this little test to see how you fare with the following statements…
1. If you accept Jesus as Lord and Savior you are instantly saved for eternity…no matter what you do…(yes/no)
2. If you should die to-day you will go immediately to heaven…somewhere, but no-one is certain exactly where…(yes/no)
3. If one is a believer in Jesus then are they His Bride… (yes/no).
4. If we are in heaven with Jesus we will all return with Him one day…(yes/no)
5. Will Jesus reign on earth for only one thousand years …(yes/no)
6. When Jesus returns will we fly up to meet Him in the clouds, and return to heaven to prepare for His great coming as King of kings …(yes/no)
7. There is going to be more than one resurrection of the dead…(yes/no)
8. There is going to be more than one judgment day …(yes/no)
9. The Jews are God’s chosen people and He is coming back to save all of present day Israel…(yes/no)
10. We will never go through any tribulation on earth prior to Jesus’ return…(yes/no)
11. If we say anything bad about the Jews, God will punish or curse us…(yes/no)
12. God has a separate plan for the Jews…(yes/no)
13. Jesus was born on Christmas day 25 December…(yes/no)
14. Jesus was crucified on a Friday…(yes/no)
15. Do we have to keep the Sabbath…(yes/no)
16. Is tithing 10% scriptural…(yes/no)
17. Should the book of Revelation be interpreted literally…(yes/no)
18. Is the Babylon of Revelation the Roman Catholic Church…(yes/no)
19. Is Jesus returning to save Jerusalem…(yes/no)
20. Will all of present day Israel be saved by Jesus when He returns…and all Israel will be saved…(yes/no)
How do you think you fared? Well if you answered any of the above with a YES, then you fall into the category of those who assume biblical facts…your assumptions are not what the Holy Scriptures divulge.
If you answered NO to all the above, you are not assuming what the Holy Scriptures divulge.
In conclusion I ask all of you to really take note of what Jesus says to us; because many of us fall into the trap of assuming that things are going to happen a certain way, but will not… Matt7:13 “Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it.
7:14 “Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.
Matt 25:30 ‘And cast the unprofitable servant into the outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’
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About Seeking SafetySeeking Safety is an evidence-based, present-focused counseling model to help people attain safety from trauma and/or substance abuse. It can be conducted in group (any size) and/or individual modality. It is an extremely safe model as it directly addresses both trauma and addiction, but without requiring clients to delve into the trauma narrative (the detailed account of disturbing trauma memories), thus making it relevant to a very broad range of clients and easy to implement. Any provider can conduct it even without training; however, there are also many options for training. It has also been delivered successfully by peers in addition to professionals of all kinds and in all settings. It can be conducted over any number of sessions available although the more the better when possible.
You may be interested in some of these key documents to get a better feel for Seeking Safety:
Reviews of the Seeking Safety book by Marsha Linehan, Aaron Beck, and others
Seeking Safety was begun in 1992 under grant funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse. It was developed by Lisa M. Najavits, PhD at Harvard Medical School and McLean Hospital. It has been used in many countries and has been translated into numerous languages.
Highly flexible across a broad range of clientsThe model is highly flexible. It can been conducted in group or individual format; for males, females and across all gender identities; adults or adolescents; for any length of treatment; any level of care (e.g., outpatient, inpatient, residential); any type of trauma, any type of substance. Clients do not have to meet formal criteria for PTSD or substance abuse-- it is often used as a general model to teach coping skills. Seeking Safety has been successfully implemented for many years across vulnerable populations including homeless, criminal justice, domestic violence, severely mentally ill, veterans and military, and others. It has been successfully used for decades across all types of traumas and all types of addictions, and for those who may have problems in both areas (trauma/addiction) or just one or the other.
25 topics, each a safe coping skill Seeking Safety offers 25 topics that can be conducted in any order and as few or many as time allows: Introduction/Case Management, Safety, PTSD: Taking Back Your Power, When Substances Control You, Honesty, Asking for Help, Setting Boundaries in Relationships, Getting Others to Support Your Recovery, Healthy Relationships, Community Resources, Compassion, Creating Meaning, Discovery, Integrating the Split Self, Recovery Thinking, Taking Good Care of Yourself, Commitment, Respecting Your Time, Coping with Triggers, Self-Nurturing, Red and Green Flags, Detaching from Emotional Pain (Grounding). Life Choices, and Termination. You can read a brief description of all 25 topics.
The key principles of Seeking Safety1) Safety as the overarching goal (helping clients attain safety in their relationships, thinking, behavior, and emotions). 2) Integrated treatment (working on both trauma and substance abuse at the same time)3) A focus on ideals to counteract the loss of ideals in both trauma and substance abuse4) Four content areas: cognitive, behavioral, interpersonal, case management5) Attention to clinician processes (clinicians' emotional responses, self-care, etc.)
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Lee Jun-hyeob
Lee Jun-hyeob (, born 30 March 1989) is a South Korean football player who plays for National Defense Ministry as a forward.
Club career
Kwandong University
In university level, he and his university team that consist of freshman and sophomore student consecutively won the university championship of freshman and sophomore in 2009 spring and autumn competition.
Gangwon FC
He parted 2010 K-League draft, but he wasn't called any clubs in 2010 K-League draft. Lee was joined Gangwon FC lately in the preseason. His first K-League match was against Seongnam Ilhwa Chunma in Seongnam that Gangwon lose by 0-3 in away game by substitute on 27 February 2010.
Eintracht Braunschweig
During the second half of the 2013–14 Regionalliga season, Lee played for the reserve side of Eintracht Braunschweig in Germany.
Terengganu
On 4 February 2018, Lee signed a one-year contract with Malaysia Super League club Terengganu FC I, scoring his first goal with the club on 23 Feb 2018. He was later transferred to Terengganu's developmental team, Terengganu FC II on April the same year. He was released from his contract with Terengganu in June 2018.
Club statistics
References
External links
Category:1989 births
Category:Living people
Category:Association football forwards
Category:South Korean footballers
Category:South Korean expatriate footballers
Category:South Korean expatriate sportspeople in Germany
Category:South Korean expatriate sportspeople in Japan
Category:Ulsan Hyundai Mipo Dolphin players
Category:Gangwon FC players
Category:Gangneung City FC players
Category:Eintracht Braunschweig II players
Category:Matsumoto Yamaga FC players
Category:K League 1 players
Category:Korea National League players
Category:J2 League players
Category:Expatriate footballers in Germany
Category:Expatriate footballers in Japan
Category:Expatriate footballers in Cambodia
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Editorial Note on the Review Process
====================================
[F1000 Faculty Reviews](http://f1000research.com/browse/f1000-faculty-reviews) are commissioned from members of the prestigious [F1000 Faculty](http://f1000.com/prime/thefaculty) and are edited as a service to readers. In order to make these reviews as comprehensive and accessible as possible, the referees provide input before publication and only the final, revised version is published. The referees who approved the final version are listed with their names and affiliations but without their reports on earlier versions (any comments will already have been addressed in the published version).
The referees who approved this article are:
1. Victor Serebrauny, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA [^2]
2. John Zafiris, George Papanikolaou General Hospital, Thessaloniki, Greece [^3]
3. David R. Holmes, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN, USA [^4]
Introduction
============
Atrial fibrillation (AF) is associated with a five-fold increase in the risk of stroke, and AF-related stroke patients have a higher mortality and greater morbidity than patients with non-AF-related stroke ^[@ref-1]^. It is anticipated that by 2030 an estimated 14--17 million patients will be diagnosed with this most prevalent arrhythmia within the European Union.
Over recent years, the need for early detection and use of appropriate thromboprophylaxis have proved to be central in the prevention of AF-related stroke, which in itself carries a higher morbidity and mortality than non-AF-related stroke ^[@ref-2]^. The use of oral anticoagulation (OAC), whether with the vitamin K antagonists (VKAs, e.g. warfarin) or, more recently, the non-VKA OACs (NOACs), results in a marked reduction in stroke and all-cause mortality ^[@ref-3],\ [@ref-4]^. Many guidelines now emphasize that the default should be to offer thromboprophylaxis to all patients with AF, unless "truly low risk" is evident such that OAC confers no advantage ^[@ref-5]^. Aspirin has been proven to offer little net clinical benefit and is not recommended for stroke prevention in AF ^[@ref-6]^.
Various systemic reviews have highlighted the common risk factors associated with AF-related stroke ^[@ref-1],\ [@ref-7]^. There are a number of independent "stroke risk factors", but each may not necessarily contribute equally to stroke risk in AF. To aid in the practical evaluation of stroke risk in AF, various risk stratification schemes have been proposed to aid decision-making regarding thromboprophylaxis ^[@ref-8]^. Such schemes are based on risk factors derived from the non-VKA arms of the historical clinical trial cohorts, large observational studies, and consensus opinion, and the resulting schemas vary greatly in their complexity and number of risk factors ^[@ref-9]^. Even one stroke risk factor confers excess risk of stroke and mortality. In essence, patients with risk factors should be offered OAC unless contraindicated, given the positive net clinical benefit for treating such patients ^[@ref-6],\ [@ref-10],\ [@ref-11]^.
The aim of this review article is to provide an overview of the recent advances in the diagnosis and management of patients with AF with a focus on stroke prevention.
Pathophysiology of atrial fibrillation and its complications: a brief overview
==============================================================================
External stressors such as hypertension, diabetes mellitus, and AF itself can stimulate a process of atrial remodeling and subsequent fibrosis, which acts as a substrate for AF (along with other cardiac arrhythmias) ^[@ref-12]^. The structural remodeling that takes place leads to an alteration in the electrical conduction pathway in the atrium, leading to a low threshold re-entry circuit and propagation of arrhythmias ^[@ref-13]^. AF itself takes place after the process of cardiac remodeling and fibrosis. Thus, treatment aimed at minimizing this adverse remodeling pathway should be initiated at the earliest opportunity ^[@ref-14]^.
The rhythm of AF itself along with the structural remodeling that takes place predisposes the atrial myocardium to a prothrombotic state (especially within the left atrial appendage) ^[@ref-15]^. Furthermore, short episodes of AF can cause myocardial damage within the atrium, which in turn stimulates the release of prothrombotic factors onto the endothelial surface, leading to the aggregation of platelets. This, in part, explains why even short episodes of AF can confer long-term stroke risk ^[@ref-16],\ [@ref-17]^.
The mechanisms that cause AF are heterogeneous. For example, in patients with structural heart disease, there is a prolonged atrial refractory period that acts as the substrate to AF, whereas patients who develop AF in the absence of ischemic heart disease often have a shortening of the atrial refractory period due to the downregulation of inward calcium channels and the upregulation of potassium inward currents ^[@ref-18],\ [@ref-19]^. This alteration in calcium handling by the atrial myocardium in line with atrial remodeling appears to be the most plausible explanation of how changes in autonomic tone can initiate AF ^[@ref-20]^.
Screening for atrial fibrillation
=================================
The adverse outcomes associated with AF are preventable by the appropriate and timely introduction of medical therapy. Given the fact that AF-related stroke carries with it a poorer outcome than does non-AF-related stroke, the appropriate use of OACs provides a means by which the detrimental thromboembolic effects of AF can be avoided.
In an ideal setting, AF would be negated by the introduction of effective primary preventative therapies, with the next best option being the early initiation of treatment if and when AF is detected. However, with 30% of AF being found in asymptomatic patients, how best to detect this arrhythmia is of some growing concern ^[@ref-21]^. A proportion of patients are fortunate enough to have AF detected by chance, often because of routine medical examinations for other reasons.
The absence of symptoms does not remove or reduce the risk of associated stroke, with this cohort of patients often found to have a higher CHA ~2~DS ~2~VASc (congestive heart failure, hypertension, age 65--74/\>75, diabetes mellitus, stroke/transient ischemic attack \[TIA\]/thromboembolism, vascular disease, female sex) score than symptomatic patients ^[@ref-22]^. Unfortunately, for the vast majority of patients with asymptomatic AF, the first opportunity to detect this arrhythmia is in the context of an acute stroke ^[@ref-2]^. One in five ischemic strokes are attributable to AF, of which greater than 20% represent AF diagnosed after the stroke event ^[@ref-23]^. Without question, such events could have been avoided with earlier detection and initiation of OAC.
The suggestion of widespread screening for AF is not new, with previous studies within community healthcare practices and meta-analyses showing a clear benefit ^[@ref-24]^. However, the optimal method by which to go about detecting asymptomatic AF is unclear.
The cryptogenic stroke and underlying AF (CRYSTAL AF) study was designed to evaluate whether continuous cardiac monitoring in the way of an implantable cardiac monitor was superior to detecting AF versus "conventional follow-up" in patients with a cryptogenic stroke or TIA ^[@ref-25]^. During the 3-year study period, 447 patients were enrolled into this study. Of the 221 patients receiving an implantable cardiac monitor, 8.9% had AF detected at 6 months versus only 1.4% in the control group. Importantly, the benefit of prolonged monitoring was maintained at 12-month follow-up, with a 12.4% AF detection rate in the implantable cardiac monitoring group. Most poignantly, ischemic stroke or TIA occurred in 11 patients with the intracardiac monitor versus 18 patients in the control group. This favorable outlook in the intracardiac monitor group corresponded to a higher use of OACs at the 6-month interval (10.1% versus only 4.6% in the control group).
The EMBRACE trial was another randomized controlled trial aimed at quantifying the benefit of longer monitoring periods for patients with potential AF in the context of secondary prevention of stroke ^[@ref-26]^. Of the 572 patients enrolled, 16.2% of patients had at least 30 seconds of AF detected over 90 days of monitoring compared to only 3.2% in those who underwent 24-hour monitoring. This correlated with an absolute difference of OAC uptake of 7.5% in favor of prolonged monitoring.
Recently, the SEARCH AF study analyzed the feasibility and cost-effectiveness of opportunistic, community-based screening in Australia in patients aged over 65 ^[@ref-22]^. A structured screening method including a brief history and pulse palpation, and a handheld phone-based ECG recording was taken. A total of 1000 pharmacy customers were screened with newly identified AF in 1.5% of the cohort. The sensitivity and specificity for this automated iECG algorithm was 98.5% and 91.4%, respectively. A cost-effective analysis showed that most benefit was observed in relation to quality-adjusted life years in those patients in whom anticoagulation adherence was optimal.
With the fruition of large randomized studies showing a clear benefit for prolonged monitoring in patients at risk of AF along with a cost benefit, guidelines will no doubt begin to incorporate a more structured approach for the detection of asymptomatic AF. At present, pulse palpation and ECG rhythm strip are recommended for primary prevention and short-term monitoring of at least 72 hours in those patients having suffered a TIA or ischemic stroke ^[@ref-5]^.
How much atrial fibrillation is significant?
============================================
For a long time, evidence-based guidelines have questioned whether "AF burden" is relevant to stroke risk. As such, current guidelines do not distinguish between types of AF with regard to thromboprophylaxis, as observational data suggest that stroke risk is similar regardless of AF subtype in the presence of stroke risk factors ^[@ref-27],\ [@ref-28]^. The European Atrial Fibrillation Trial (EAFT) with a follow-up of 594 patient-years found AF duration \>1 year was an independent risk factor for secondary stroke ^[@ref-29]^.
One meta-analysis examined stroke rates in 134,847 patients with paroxysmal AF (PAF) versus permanent AF off anticoagulation and reported an odds ratio (OR) of 0.75 (95% confidence interval \[CI\] 0.61--0.93) in favor of less stroke risk in patients with PAF ^[@ref-30]^. In anticoagulated patients, the OR also favored patients with PAF (OR 0.77, 95% CI 0.68--0.88). This was confirmed in a further systematic review and meta-analysis ^[@ref-31]^.
Furthermore, analysis of data from "The AF Clopidogrel Trial with Irbesartan for prevention of vascular events" (ACTIVE-A) and "Apixaban Versus Acetylsalicylic Acid to Prevent Stroke in AF Patients Who Have Failed or Are Unsuitable for VKA Treatment" (AVERROES) trials also pointed to the idea that a pattern of AF was a strong independent predictor of stroke risk, second only to previous TIA or stroke ^[@ref-32]^. In the 6,563 patients included in this analysis, permanent AF had an annual stroke risk of 4.2% compared to 2.1% with PAF and 3.0% with persistent AF. Hazard ratios of 1.83 for permanent AF versus PAF and 1.44 for persistent AF versus PAF were found, respectively. A subanalysis of the "Rivaroxaban Once daily oral direct factor Xa inhibition compared with VKA for prevention of stroke and Embolism Trial in AF" (ROCKET AF) also found that anticoagulated patients with persistent AF (11,548 patients) were at higher risk of stroke versus those with PAF (2,514 patients) ^[@ref-33]^. Patients with persistent AF had higher rates of stroke and all-cause mortality (adjusted rates for stroke 2.18 versus 1.73 events/100 patient-years, p=0.048).
Despite trials showing that the pattern of AF has an impact on stroke risk, there appears to be marked heterogeneity amongst the respective trials, making comparisons difficult. Furthermore, the fluctuations in OAC use between trials makes conclusive links between patterns of AF and stroke risk difficult to extrapolate. Within types of AF, there can be marked heterogeneity. In PAF, for example, those with one paroxysm once a year are labeled as PAF, as would a patient with paroxysms of AF 364 days per year.
Therefore, at present, patients diagnosed with AF, regardless of type or duration, require assessment for stroke and bleeding risk using guideline recommendations ^[@ref-5],\ [@ref-34]^.
Anticoagulation in patients with atrial fibrillation
====================================================
Stroke prevention in patients with non-valvular AF requires careful consideration of the risk versus benefit of starting OAC therapy. Stroke and bleeding risk factors in patients with AF are not homogeneous, and risk stratification schemes such as the CHA ~2~DS ~2~VASc and HAS BLED (hypertension systolic blood pressure \>160 mmHg, abnormal liver/renal function \[with creatinine ≥200 μmol/L\], stroke, bleeding history or predisposition, labile international normalized ratio \[INR\] \[eg. Time in Therapeutic Range \<60%\], elderly ^[@ref-65]^, concomitant drugs/alcohol) scores are well validated and provide a simple and quick yet concise method of assessing a patient's suitability for anticoagulation without the necessity of complex composite scores or multiple biomarkers ^[@ref-8],\ [@ref-35]^.
For more than 50 years, the VKAs, e.g. warfarin, have been the mainstay of anticoagulation in patients with non-valvular AF, significantly reducing stroke and mortality ^[@ref-36]^. Aspirin monotherapy, on the other hand, is ineffective for stroke prevention and indeed unsafe ^[@ref-6]^.
In 2009 came the introduction of the NOACs, which revolutionized the management of stroke prevention in non-valvular AF. Initially referred to as new or novel OACs, or sometimes direct OACs (DOACs), the NOAC acronym has been retained to refer to non-VKA OACs ^[@ref-37],\ [@ref-38]^. The four major drugs (dabigatran, apixaban, rivaroxaban, and edoxaban) compare favorably with warfarin, showing at least non-inferiority in regards to stroke prevention, with a superior safety profile with regard to major bleeding ^[@ref-39]--\ [@ref-42]^. Recent data from ancillary analyses of the major trials show that patients taking NOACs are at 30--50% lower risk of major bleeding than with warfarin ^[@ref-43]--\ [@ref-45]^. As yet, no head-to-head trials amongst the NOACs have been undertaken.
Dabigatran
----------
Dabigatran is an oral direct thrombin inhibitor, binding to the active catalytic site of thrombin in a reversible manner. This action blocks the conversion of fibrinogen to fibrin. Dabigatran is available as a non-active pro-drug that is converted to its active form *in vivo* (gut mucosa, liver, and plasma). Renal elimination is the dominant pathway of excretion for this anticoagulant (up to 80%).
The efficacy and safety of dabigatran was first evaluated in a large randomized controlled study in 2009. The RE-LY study compared dabigatran (150 and 110 mg bis die \[b.d.\]) to dose-adjusted warfarin. Efficacy analysis showed non-inferiority of the 110 mg b.d. dose (1.54%/year) and superiority of the 150 mg b.d. dose (1.11%/year) compared to warfarin (1.71%/year) for the prevention of stroke and systemic embolism ^[@ref-39],\ [@ref-46]^. Both dosing regimens were associated with lower risk of intracranial hemorrhage (ICH) compared to warfarin ^[@ref-39],\ [@ref-46]^. This was consistent across a range of stroke risk strata ^[@ref-47]^. Of note, however, was the higher gastrointestinal bleeding risk with dabigatran 150 mg b.d. (1.51% versus 1.02%/year for warfarin) ^[@ref-39]^. Dabigatran 150 mg b.d. was associated with a lower cardiovascular mortality ^[@ref-39],\ [@ref-46]^, which has been confirmed in a recent meta-analysis of observational data ^[@ref-48]^. Since the RE-LY trial, subsequent "real world" evidence has provided further supportive evidence for the superiority of dabigatran over warfarin ^[@ref-49]--\ [@ref-51]^.
Apixaban
--------
Apixaban is a factor Xa inhibitor that is approved for patients with non-valvular AF in need of stroke prevention. Major trials excluded patients with a creatinine level of 2.5 mm/dL or a creatinine clearance of \<25 mL/min/1.73 m ^2^. A dose reduction is available from 5 mg b.d. to 2.5 mg b.d. for patients who have two of the following factors: age ≥80 years, weight \<60 kg, or serum creatinine \>1.5 mg/dL ^[@ref-52],\ [@ref-53]^.
In 2011, the AVERROES trial showed a clear benefit of apixaban over aspirin ^[@ref-54],\ [@ref-55]^. There were no significant differences in the risk of major bleeding or ICH between apixaban and aspirin. In 2012, the ARISTOTLE (apixaban for the reduction in stroke and other thrombotic events in atrial fibrillation) trial compared apixaban to warfarin in 18,201 patients ^[@ref-41]^ and found apixaban to be superior to warfarin for the primary outcome of stroke and systemic embolism (1.27% versus 1.6%, respectively). Apixaban was also associated with a significantly lower incidence of major bleeding, ICH, and mortality ^[@ref-56]^. In recent observational data, apixaban has been shown to provide greater treatment persistence versus warfarin in AF patients, which in itself could lead to fewer cardioembolic events and stroke burden ^[@ref-57]^.
Rivaroxaban
-----------
The ROCKET AF trial enrolled 14,262 patients at moderate to high risk of stroke to either warfarin (target INR 2--3 or rivaroxaban 20 mg, with a dose reduction to 15 mg in those with creatinine clearance of 30--49 mL/min) ^[@ref-40]^. Rivaroxaban was non-inferior to warfarin for the composite end point of stroke and systemic embolism, with similar rates of major bleeding and ICH, but rivaroxaban had a higher incidence of gastrointestinal bleeding compared to warfarin. Prospective, non-interventional registries have provided reassuring data for rivaroxaban compared to VKAs, along with better treatment compliance ^[@ref-58],\ [@ref-59]^.
Edoxaban
--------
Like apixaban and rivaroxaban, edoxaban is a selective factor Xa inhibitor and was tested in the phase III ENGAGE AF TIMI-48 trial, which enrolled 21,105 patients to the high-dose edoxaban strategy arm, the low-dose strategy arm, or warfarin ^[@ref-42]^. The high-dose edoxaban arm was not inferior to warfarin for the primary endpoint of stroke and systemic embolism, with a significant reduction in major bleeding and ICH, although there were more gastrointestinal bleeds with edoxaban 60 mg versus warfarin. Efficacy appeared to diminish in patients with a high creatinine clearance, with edoxaban 60 mg once daily having a trend towards higher strokes with creatinine clearance of ≥95 mL/min, leading to a US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) black box for use in such patients. "Real world data" for edoxaban are limited, although indirect comparisons of edoxaban to anti-platelet therapies or placebo have been published ^[@ref-60]^.
Reversal agents
---------------
There remain concerns regarding the bleeding risk with the NOACs and -- until recently -- the lack of a specific antidote ^[@ref-61]^. With the introduction of idarucizumab (a fully humanized antibody fragment) recently licensed for use in patients taking dabigatran, such concerns may be unwarranted ^[@ref-62]--\ [@ref-64]^. In addition, andexanet alfa (a truncated form of enzymatically inactive factor Xa which binds factor Xa inhibitors and reverses their anticoagulant effects) was investigated for the reversal of oral factor Xa inhibitors ^[@ref-65]^. Also under development is ciraparantag ^[@ref-66]^, which is at an earlier stage of development as a universal reversal agent for all NOACs.
Practical issues
----------------
As part of the initiation of NOAC therapy, the involvement of patient education is of central importance ^[@ref-67],\ [@ref-68]^. The patient must be made aware that missing a dose of NOAC potentially removes the stroke protection due to their relatively short half-life versus that of VKAs. Guidelines also emphasize the need for patient education and involvement in decision-making when deciding on the most appropriate anticoagulation ^[@ref-5]^. Thus, NOACs provide a better, safer, and more convenient anticoagulation option with a greater net clinical benefit ^[@ref-69]^. Accordingly, NOACs are now a well-established option (in addition to warfarin) for the prevention of thromboembolic events in non-valvular AF and venous thromboembolism and are given preference over warfarin in many updated clinical guidelines on the management of AF ^[@ref-5],\ [@ref-34],\ [@ref-70]^.
How do clinical trial results compare with "real world data"?
=============================================================
Clinical trial data are not always reproducible in everyday clinical practice. Reassuringly, NOACs have continued to show a net clinical benefit when introduced in "real world" clinical settings, with the real world observational evidence being complementary and supportive of the trial results.
Dabigatran has been licensed and available the longest, hence many comparisons to warfarin in real world studies are with this direct thrombin inhibitor ^[@ref-71]^. The real world results for dabigatran have largely echoed the clinical trial findings ^[@ref-72]^. In a large US database compromising 12,793 patients with a mean age of 74 years, dabigatran was superior to warfarin with regard to stroke prevention (adjusted hazard ratio 0.73, 95% CI 0.55--0.97) with a lower incidence of major bleeding (adjusted hazard ratio for intracranial bleeding 0.49 \[0.3--0.79\]) ^[@ref-73]^. Other registry data have shown similar findings ^[@ref-49],\ [@ref-74]^. A recent meta-analysis of these observational data (with over 20 studies, totaling 711,298 patients) found a lower risk of ischemic stroke compared to warfarin (hazard ratio 0.86, CI 0.74--0.99) with a lower incidence of intracranial bleeding (0.45, CI 0.38--0.52) but higher risk of gastrointestinal bleeding (1.13, CI 1.00--1.28) ^[@ref-51]^.
Real world data regarding rivaroxaban and apixaban have recently also gathered pace. The XANTUS observational study was a prospective, observational study of patients treated with rivaroxaban for stroke prevention in AF. A total of 6,784 patients were initiated on rivaroxaban across 311 centers in Europe, Israel, and Canada. Rates of stroke were found to be low in this cohort of patients, with 43 patients suffering a stroke and 43 a major bleed (0.7 events per 100 patient-years and 2.1 events per 100 patient-years, respectively) ^[@ref-75]^. More recently, Coleman *et al*. compared data for AF patients newly started on rivaroxaban, apixaban, or warfarin ^[@ref-76]^. When compared to warfarin, rivaroxaban was associated with a reduction in ICH (0.49% versus 0.96% per year, hazard ratio 0.53, CI 0.35--0.79), with a non-significant reduction in ischemic stroke (0.54% versus 0.83% per year, hazard ratio 0.71, CI 0.47--1.07).
The current industry-funded GARFIELD AF registry aims to recruit between 55,000 and 60,000 patients with AF, analyzing trends of anticoagulant use in patients with AF. In the fourth cohort of GARFIELD AF, more than 70% of AF patients are anticoagulated, with a growing proportion being initiated on NOAC therapy over warfarin (37%), and OAC use was associated with a 35% lower risk of death ^[@ref-77]^. Other registry data have since been published for comparative effectiveness and safety data for dabigatran, rivaroxaban, apixaban, and warfarin ^[@ref-50],\ [@ref-78],\ [@ref-79]^.
What does the future hold for non-vitamin K antagonist oral anticoagulation and stroke prevention?
==================================================================================================
With the superior net clinical benefit of NOACs over VKAs, the opportunity to offer anticoagulation to a wider spectrum of AF patients is clearly evident. Previously, with the use of warfarin, the inconvenience of multiple blood tests for INR monitoring and food/drug interactions meant not all eligible patients would accept or be offered OAC for stroke prophylaxis. With the need for minimal monitoring in regards to blood tests and a reduction in major bleeding risk, older and arguably frailer populations who have AF will now have the benefit of stroke prophylaxis without increasing their major bleeding risk to unacceptable levels. At present, patients with mechanical prosthetic heart valves are not eligible for NOAC therapy.
What do we do for patients not suitable for OAC?
------------------------------------------------
In a minority of cases, OAC may be absolutely contraindicated despite patients being at high risk of AF-related stroke. Aspirin is no longer recommended for stroke prophylaxis in patients with AF owing to its inferior efficacy in stroke prophylaxis along with an unacceptable heightened bleeding risk ^[@ref-6]^. After careful consideration by a multidisciplinary team and discussion with the patient, alternative interventions need to be sought.
Recent trial evidence has focused on the feasibility of left atrial appendage (LAA) closure devices. The PROTECT-AF trial compared the LAA device Watchman to warfarin in a randomized multi-center study of 707 patients, where patients were assigned in a 2:1 fashion to either LAA closure device with discontinuation of warfarin or warfarin with an INR target of 2--3 ^[@ref-80]^. Primary end point data (stroke, cardiovascular death, and systemic embolization) showed non-inferiority of the Watchman device over warfarin (event rate 3 per 100 patient-years in the intervention group versus 4.9 per 100 patient-years in the warfarin-treated cohort). Primary safety events (major bleeding, pericardial effusion, and device embolization) were more frequent in the intervention group than in the control group (7.4% per 100 patient-years versus 4.4% per 100 patients-years). Of note, 15% of patients in this trial remained on warfarin despite being in the interventional arm. At 3.8-year follow-up, long-term data from the PROTECT-AF trial appear to be consistent with initial analysis showing non-inferiority of Watchman to warfarin. The PREVAIL trial compared Watchman to warfarin in 407 high-risk patients (CHA ~2~DS ~2~VASc = 3.8) ^[@ref-81]^. The primary efficacy end points of stroke (hemorrhagic and ischemic), systemic embolization, and cardiovascular/unexplained death were similar (6.4% versus 6.3%) but did not meet the criteria for non-inferiority, meaning there was a potential for the device to be inferior to standard care. A recent patient-level meta-analysis found lower rates of hemorrhagic stroke with the Watchman device and non-inferior differences in the composite end point of all-cause stroke or systemic embolization. Of note, ischemic stroke per se occurred nearly twice as often in the Watchman arm compared to the warfarin arm (hazard ratio 1.95, p = 0.05) ^[@ref-82]^.
However, evidence also exists for improvements in quality of life ^[@ref-83]^, reduction in late bleeding ^[@ref-84]^, and economic benefit ^[@ref-85]^ with the use of LAA closure devices. More recently, other devices in addition to Watchman (although not yet FDA approved) have provided favorable outcomes ^[@ref-86],\ [@ref-87]^.
At present, we still do not know whether OAC-ineligible patients benefit from LAA closure, as the present trials were not inclusive of such patients, or how an LAA closure device would compare against the NOACs. Present treatment guidelines do state non-inferiority of LAA closure to standard-care warfarin, but this should be treated with caution as more data from long-term follow-up emerge.
Conclusion
==========
The detection and management of AF is a core component of stroke prevention in the AF patient population. A proposed method of screening and managing AF is shown in [Figure 1](#f1){ref-type="fig"}. With an increasingly aging population with multiple comorbidities, the diagnosis of AF becomes more likely. Most guidelines advocate simple opportunistic pulse check in primary care practices, but more prolonged forms of monitoring increase the yield of AF detection. With the introduction of NOACs, there appears to be little reason not to offer anticoagulation to all AF patients with one or more stroke risk factors, apart from those truly deemed "low risk" using the CHA ~2~DS ~2~VASc score.
![Proposed algorithm for the detection and management of atrial fibrillation (AF).\
CHA ~2~DS ~2~VASc, congestive heart failure, hypertension, age 65--74/\>75, diabetes mellitus, stroke/transient ischemic attack/thromboembolism, vascular disease, female sex; ECG, electrocardiogram; HAS BLED, hypertension systolic blood pressure \>160 mmHg, abnormal liver/renal function \[with creatinine ≥200 μmol/L\], stroke, bleeding history or predisposition, labile international normalized ratio \[range \<60% of the time\], elderly \[\>65\], concomitant drugs/alcohol; NOAC, non-vitamin K antagonist oral anticoagulant; OAC, oral anticoagulant.](f1000research-5-10962-g0000){#f1}
[^1]: **Competing interests:**Farhan Shahid and Eduard Shantsila declare that they have no competing interests. Gregory Y. H. Lip has served as a consultant for Bayer/Janssen, BMS/Pfizer, Biotronik, Medtronic, Boehringer Ingelheim, Microlife, and Daiichi-Sankyo and a speaker for Bayer, BMS/Pfizer, Medtronic, Boehringer Ingelheim, Microlife, Roche, and Daiichi-Sankyo.
[^2]: No competing interests were disclosed.
[^3]: No competing interests were disclosed.
[^4]: No competing interests were disclosed.
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Follow the author of this article
Follow the topics within this article
Attempts to reboot the Government’s retirement reforms will start this week with an unveiling of the long-awaited pensions dashboard.
A pilot version of the online dashboard is due to get under way next March before the public is given full access in 2019, allowing the public to see their state pension and workplace savings in one place for the first time.
Simon Kirby, the new economic secretary to the Treasury, is expected to announce on Monday that 11 pension providers have signed up to support the trial, which is managed by the Association of British Insurers.
Pensions experts working on the project are getting to grips with reams of customer data that will eventually be pulled together...
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When a soft tissue, or a portion of a tissue, such as muscle, ligament, or cartilage, tears, surgery to repair the detached soft tissue is often required. The goal of such surgery is to suture the torn portion of the tissue to thereby repair the tear and reconstitute the tissue back to its original status. Traditionally, repair was accomplished by sewing the tissue together with two needles and a suture, then tying knots to secure the suture within the tissue. To simplify the wound closure procedure and to improve fixation, various types of suture anchors have been developed, such as those described in U.S. Pat. No. 7,153,312 B1 to Torrie et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 6,972,027 B2 to Fallin et al.
Torrie et al. disclose a closure device for repairing a tear in soft tissue comprising a suture coupled with two fixation members. Each fixation member comprises two holes through which the suture is received. The suture is immovably fixed to the first fixation member, but is freely movable relative to the second fixation member. Therefore, a retaining element, in the form of a slip knot or overhand knot, must be provided on the free end of the suture to prevent the suture from loosening between the fixation members when a tension is applied. When an overhand knot is used, the surgeon must use a knot pusher in order to shorten the length of suture between the fixation members and close the tear. As illustrated in FIGS. 2A-2I and 13-13B, the knots required by this system are particularly complicated to tie and correctly position.
Fallin et al. disclose a suture anchor delivery system comprising two suture anchors secured together by a suture. Similar to Torrie et al., the suture is immovably fixed to the first fixation member. The suture is received in the second fixation member such that pulling on the loose end of the suture causes it to selectively lock to the second anchor. Once the fixation members are implanted, tightening the portion of the suture between them requires a highly coordinated procedure. The surgeon must simultaneously pull back on both free ends of a retraction line and the free end of the suture to cause the suture to unlock from the second fixation device. Then, while continuing to pull back on the free end of the suture, the surgeon must slowly release the retraction line at a complementary rate. If necessary, this process is repeated until all of the slack is removed from between the anchors.
Unfortunately, the devices of Torrie et al. and Fallin et al. are unsatisfactory for a variety of reasons. What is desired, therefore, is a suture holding system for use in the repair of soft tissue tears that does not require the use of knots, knot pushers, and retraction lines in order to implant and utilize the devices.
Several devices are also known for the delivery of such suture anchors. Both Fallin et al. and Torrie et al. disclose delivery devices in which two or more suture anchors are delivered via a single needle and single pusher mechanism. Such devices provide the surgeon with little freedom for individually deploying the suture anchors and make it difficult to make adjustments once deployment of the first anchor has begun. As a result, delivery devices which allow for the independent delivery of at least two suture anchors have been developed. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 7,905,904 to Stone et al. discloses a delivery device having separate needles and pushers for delivering each of two implants. However, this device undesirably has the pusher mechanisms extending from opposing surfaces of the body of the device. Further, this device does not provide any means for the surgeon to rigidly fix the position of the delivery needle, which would offer more flexibility in the deployment process. What is desired, therefore, is a suture holding system for use in the repair of soft tissue tears with a delivery device that allows for independent and prioritized deployment of at least two suture anchors that also allows a surgeon to fix one or more of the driver mechanisms in at least one position.
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Q:
Can You Attend a Purim Party Dressed as a Pig?
Another thread inspired this question. Can one attend a Purim party or parade in a pig costume?
This question is Purim Torah and is not intended to be taken completely seriously. See the Purim Torah policy.
A:
It ought to be forbidden as the pig is an impure animal and we are commanded to make a separation between our holy selves and impure beasts as we are instructed לְהַבְדִּיל בֵּין הַטָּמֵא וּבֵין הַטָּהֹר (Levit. 11:47). However, the gimatria of pig (חזיר) is הטהור (the pure one) this reveals that it too contains ניצוצי קדושה and intrinsic holiness which is why it will be permitted in the messianic age. Therefore, on Purim it would be permitted to dress up as a pig for it is really a pure kosher animal (deep down).
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Q:
Sharing photo on facebook using intent Android?
i want to send photo using intent
i have try this code but my problem is if i use this code for sharing than it open all the applciation related to sharing i want to open only FACEBOOK AND TWITTER APP for sharing
Intent sharefacebook = new Intent(Intent.ACTION_SEND);
sharefacebook.setType("image/*");
sharefacebook.putExtra(Intent.EXTRA_TEXT, "From Android");
sharefacebook.putExtra(Intent.EXTRA_STREAM, Uri.parse("file://"+filepath.toString()));
startActivity(Intent.createChooser(sharefacebook, "Sharing"));
it open email,skype,gmail everthing i want to open only facebook and twitter it is possible
A:
You can query the client apps(activities) and start the activity only if it's a fb/twitter client like this:
final PackageManager pm = getPackageManager();
final List<ResolveInfo> matches = pm.queryIntentActivities(shareIntent, 0);
for (final ResolveInfo info : matches){
if (info.activityInfo.name.toLowerCase().contains("facebook") || info.activityInfo.name.toLowerCase().contains("twitter")){
Intent sharefacebook = new Intent(Intent.ACTION_SEND);
sharefacebook.setType("image/*");
sharefacebook.putExtra(Intent.EXTRA_TEXT, "From Android");
sharefacebook.putExtra(Intent.EXTRA_STREAM, Uri.parse("file://"+filepath.toString()));
startActivity(Intent.createChooser(sharefacebook, "Sharing"));
}else{
Toast.makeText(getApplicationContext(), "FB or twitter client not installed", Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
}
}
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Current trends in cataract and refractive surgery in Japan--1994 survey.
A third annual survey was carried out by mail in January 1995 to investigate the current trends in cataract and refractive surgery in Japan. A questionnaire was sent to 837 ophthalmologist among members of the Japanese Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery. Data received from 48.5% of the recipients were cross-analyzed and compared with those from the previous surveys.
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Q:
Returned data type from a numeric expression in query
In cloudera's Impala Guide (
https://www.cloudera.com/documentation/enterprise/5-8-x/topics/impala_conversion_functions.html) there's an example that demonstrates the use of typeof() function to check the returned data type of a numeric expression:
+--------------------------+
| typeof(5.30001 / 2342.1) |
+--------------------------+
| DECIMAL(13,11) |
+--------------------------+
When I do :
select typeof(5.30001),typeof(2342.1),typeof(5.30001 / 2342.1);
What it gives is something like this
DECIMAL(6,5) DECIMAL(5,1) DECIMAL(13,11)
I mean the first two are obvious but I have no idea why the data type for the 3rd one is like that.Can the returned data type be determined from the numeric expression itself? Also, for columns division expressions which I represent as decimal(13,5)/decimal(25,4)(e.g.) is there a way to determine what the returned data type should be? Thanks.
A:
This is indeed a bit obscure. Here is the related code doing arithmetic decimal type conversions.
/**
* Returns the result type for (t1 op t2) where t1 and t2 are both DECIMAL, used when
* DECIMAL version 2 is enabled.
*
* These rules are similar to (post Dec 2016) Hive / sql server rules.
* http://blogs.msdn.com/b/sqlprogrammability/archive/2006/03/29/564110.aspx
* https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms190476.aspx
*
* TODO: implement V2 rules for ADD/SUB.
*
* Changes:
* - There are slight difference with how precision/scale reduction occurs compared
* to SQL server when the desired precision is more than the maximum supported
* precision. But an algorithm of reducing scale to a minimum of 6 is used.
*/
private static ScalarType getDecimalArithmeticResultTypeV2(Type t1, Type t2,
ArithmeticExpr.Operator op) throws AnalysisException {
Preconditions.checkState(t1.isFullySpecifiedDecimal());
Preconditions.checkState(t2.isFullySpecifiedDecimal());
ScalarType st1 = (ScalarType) t1;
ScalarType st2 = (ScalarType) t2;
int s1 = st1.decimalScale();
int s2 = st2.decimalScale();
int p1 = st1.decimalPrecision();
int p2 = st2.decimalPrecision();
int resultScale;
int resultPrecision;
switch (op) {
case DIVIDE:
// Divide result always gets at least MIN_ADJUSTED_SCALE decimal places.
resultScale = Math.max(ScalarType.MIN_ADJUSTED_SCALE, s1 + p2 + 1);
resultPrecision = p1 - s1 + s2 + resultScale;
break;
case MOD:
resultScale = Math.max(s1, s2);
resultPrecision = Math.min(p1 - s1, p2 - s2) + resultScale;
break;
case MULTIPLY:
resultScale = s1 + s2;
resultPrecision = p1 + p2 + 1;
break;
case ADD:
case SUBTRACT:
default:
// Not yet implemented - fall back to V1 rules.
return getDecimalArithmeticResultTypeV1(t1, t2, op);
}
// Use the scale reduction technique when resultPrecision is too large.
return ScalarType.createAdjustedDecimalType(resultPrecision, resultScale);
}
So 5.30001 is of precision 6 and scale 5, and 2342.1 precision 5 and scale 1. We have s1 = 5 and p2 = 5. The output scale is of s1 + p2 + 1 == 11, and precision is 6 - 5 + 1 + 11 == 13 . These rules are better explained in the comment links.
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The Score in the Performer’s Hands: Reading Traces of the Act of Performance as a Form of Analysis?
ABSTRACT: This paper focuses on the chamber concerts led by the violinist Pierre Baillot in 1820s Paris, exploring how performers understood their role and creative agency in bringing the score to life. The archival evidence connected with the activities of Baillot’s ensemble includes an extensive library of sheet music that the players annotated in pencil. I discuss the methodological feasibility and aims of putting these traces of the act of performance under academic scrutiny.
[1] While carrying out research on the Parisian chamber music scene of the 1820s—specifically, on that pioneer of chamber concerts, Pierre Baillot—I discovered a group of sources that one would not expect to be available after nearly two hundred years. Not only have the programs of these chamber concerts survived, but so has the sheet music—the very parts from which the players performed. What is more, these parts contain a wealth of handwritten annotations, in the form of pencil marginalia that the performers added during or in preparation for these chamber soirées: from fingerings to ensemble colors and dynamics.(1) The present article discusses some methodological questions prompted by the study of these annotations. Indeed, it is appropriate to ask in the first place: to what extent can such traces of the performers’ interpretative processes be analyzed? What knowledge is inscribed in these traces? How can we access it and for what purpose? What sort of perspective do we gain in looking at the players’ fingerings, added nuances, articulation, or other annotations? What should we do with them?
[2] It is telling that I stumbled upon these annotations; the library catalogs would have never led me to them. The system in place for organizing musical knowledge was not sensitive to such traces of the act of performance. This is likely a symptom of the fact that musicology has long been centered on composers and their works: when they were written, published, by whom, and so forth, all elements to which the cataloguing system is still dedicated.(2) Yet in considering such handwritten annotations left by the performers, I realized there was a potential to engage with these sources capturing aspects of the performers’ point of view on the musical event; the potential, in other words, to add a further perspective in telling the story of these chamber music concerts.
[3] To turn the spotlight on these musicians, caught almost in medias res in their act of music-making (yet two hundred years after the act took place), raises concerns similar to those that arise when studying composers’ creative processes from sketches or what survives of their working papers. There is a risk of crystallizing the performance, transforming it into a motionless and inert text. There is, put another way, a danger of making the whole inquiry an archaeological quest, converting the search for the composer’s intentions into that for the performers’ intentions. One may even be tempted to speculate on how a performance by Baillot’s ensemble of, say, a Beethoven string quartet might have sounded. Yet that sound cannot be reconstructed with confidence, even on the basis of performers’ annotations. On one hand, ample evidence demonstrates that marginalia by Baillot and his colleagues were not produced as an finite set of instructions (i.e., as if they were meant to be followed by someone else); they are rather fragmentary traces of an interpretative process. On the other hand, these performers evidently kept revising and adapting their annotations from one performance to the next. Hence, more often than not, the leftovers of different performances—some of which were years apart from each other—blur together on the same page.(3)
[4] For these reasons I have not attempted to determine the specific interpretive choices made by Baillot’s ensemble in a particular passage or piece. My interest in these annotations lies, rather, in that they offer snapshots of how performers approached the musical text more generally: how they handled it. These annotations give insights into how the musicians understood their role in bringing the score to life. What were the principles guiding the performers’ choices? What did they mean to achieve and how did they achieve it? Concentrating on the performers’ agenda and agency, my purpose is to discuss the categories they created or followed in conceptualizing what they were doing. Chances are that such categories will be different, or differently nuanced, from those used in current conceptualizations of early nineteenth-century music.
[5] Between the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the expansion of an amateur-driven market for sheet music often prompted publishers and composers to include more detailed indications—for example, by spelling out ornaments or articulation markings—as an aid to inexperienced performers (Beghin 2007, 166–67). Professional musicians were well aware of this revolution that was taking place in sheet music (Morabito 2015). In his treatises, Baillot warns of the risk that such over-specification might make experienced performers lazy, transforming creative artists into automata, merely hands at the service of someone else’s creativity (1835, 162). Baillot’s and his affiliates’ handwritten annotations on these more detailed scores, on the contrary, tell a story of resistance. Unmistakably, these performers did not feel constrained to simply reproduce what was indicated. As advocated in Baillot’s writings, in facing these “modern” scores the players’ task was to keep using their inventiveness and to create nuances as they did for earlier music bearing little or no performing clues.(4) Similar accounts of the relationship between the score and performance have emerged in recent studies of the philosophical and pedagogical writings of the period (Hunter 2005; Doğantan-Dack 2012). Yet inspecting these annotations allows us to gain an insider’s perspective, and to ask how or to what extent these musicians may have pursued such aims in practice. Analyzing the performers’ processes sheds light on how they saw themselves within the broader cultural transformations that affected the way music was notated and marketed. In this light, pencil marginalia are a political statement about the scope of performers’ creative input into the musical event.
[6] The marginalia also offer a perspective on the planning that went into these performances. Investigating which aspects of the performance musicians chose to prearrange—or even rehearse—to some extent exposes their own values and priorities; i.e., what they cared about in shaping their performances. In a chamber-music context, such a perspective often reveals how the players conceived of the group’s dynamics and its internal hierarchies. For instance, the parts annotated by Baillot’s ensemble provide evidence for moments in which these players took time and effort to coordinate musical gestures and ensemble colors. Such attention to the group interplay evokes a different picture from the one traditionally associated with Baillot, in which he stands while the other three players sit. (This disposition has often led scholars to argue for an eccentric “French manner” of playing quartets in this period, with a virtuosic first violin that is not attentive to the exchange among the parts.)(5) The players’ annotations, in other words, offer a more nuanced perspective on what they thought about the genre itself: what a string quartet was for them, and in their hands; how this kind of music was supposed come to life.
[7] Reading such traces of the act of performance allows us to investigate not the musical text in itself, but aspects that cannot be found in the score: the “rules of the game,” how the text is thought of and handled, as it were, its social life (Davies 2006). Such an approach to analyzing performances can complicate and enrich our perspectives on what music is (or was) for people within their social context. It anchors the analysis of performance onto the hands and perceptions of flesh-and-blood individuals without relying on circumstantial details which in historical investigations are often scanty or ambiguous, such as the physical dispositions of the musicians, or accounts of an ensemble’s rehearsals. Coming out of a long tradition in which the focus of music was thought to reside in the “work of art” rather than in the “action of art,” these traces can open up new avenues to integrate the perspectives and agency of performers in our research.
1. Most of this chamber music library, previously owned by Pierre Baillot and still bearing abundant traces of the ensemble’s performances, is kept today between the Bibliothèque nationale de France (particularly in the Fonds Lainé) and the private collection of Daniel Lainé, one of Baillot’s living heirs. Several documents from both archives have been digitized and made available on Bru Zane Mediabase (Ressources numériques autour de la musique romantique française) at http://bruzanemediabase.com/Fonds-d-archives/Fonds-Baillot. It is telling, however, that this digitization has focused on diaries, letters, catalogues, concert programs, and similar materials, while it has almost entirely overlooked these annotated parts. There is a sense that their usefulness for present-day scholars—or even the methodological feasibility of putting these traces of the act of performance under academic scrutiny—remains to be assessed.Return to text
2. A similar case can be made, for instance, for the Fondo Borciani at the library of the Conservatorio di Milano. The collection includes the entire chamber music library previously owned by Paolo Borciani and Elisa Pegreffi, the first and second violinists of the celebrated Quartetto Italiano (active 1945–1980). Rather than serve as a tool to investigate these performers and their music-making, the Fondo is described—and also, crucially, handled—as “including almost the complete repertoire for string quartet” (http://www.consmilano.it/it/biblioteca/storia-collezioni-biblioteca/altre-importanti-collezioni). In other words, the parts previously owned and used by the Quartetto Italiano are valued for their completeness with regards to “works,” which adds repertoire to the conservatoire’s library, but not for the traces they bear of these musicians’ activity: what they did with this music. Indeed, conservatory students can borrow these parts for their performances and add their own pencil markings or rub off those they find already annotated. The focus, once again, is on the “music itself’” contained in the collection rather than on the histories of how and why this music was handled by the Quartetto Italiano.Return to text
3. The impression that these players were not interested in formalizing a single sanctioned and all-encompassing performing version of a piece (the way they would perform it, or instruct others to do so) is further endorsed by Baillot’s own writings on the matter: he specifies that “even with the aid of all possible signs,” attempting to notate performing nuances in full would be pointless (Baillot 1835, 190). Aside from their liminal status—being traces of a process (or multiple processes) rather than a text—the prospect of simply reproducing such annotations in today’s historically-informed performances adumbrates a further paradox. According to the values and performance culture with which Baillot was imbued, at its best performance was understood as a gesture of appropriation: the act of creating one’s own narrative of nuances was at the core of what performers were ideally expected to accomplish. Ironically enough, trying to replicate Baillot’s fingering or other annotations as literally as possible would be considered, at least in this conception, a resort only for incompetent players who were not up to their task; see Morabito 2015, chapter 1.Return to text
4. Baillot’s pencil annotations show the same attitude (for instance, in changing the written slurs into his actual bowings, and adding or adapting the prescribed articulation), regardless of how many details of performance a composer had already attempted to include. The “rules of the game” and particularly, the understanding of the performer’s task, do not seem to change whether approaching a Boccherini quintet or a late Beethoven quartet; see Morabito 2015, chapter 2.Return to text
5. This virtuosic “French manner” of playing string quartets or quintets is often linked with the presence in Paris at the time of a flourishing violin school and distinguished soloists such as Giovanni Battista Viotti, Pierre Rode, Pierre Baillot, and Rodolphe Kretzer; see Fauquet 1986, 48 and Fournier 1999, 260–61.Return to text
Most of this chamber music library, previously owned by Pierre Baillot and still bearing abundant traces of the ensemble’s performances, is kept today between the Bibliothèque nationale de France (particularly in the Fonds Lainé) and the private collection of Daniel Lainé, one of Baillot’s living heirs. Several documents from both archives have been digitized and made available on Bru Zane Mediabase (Ressources numériques autour de la musique romantique française) at http://bruzanemediabase.com/Fonds-d-archives/Fonds-Baillot. It is telling, however, that this digitization has focused on diaries, letters, catalogues, concert programs, and similar materials, while it has almost entirely overlooked these annotated parts. There is a sense that their usefulness for present-day scholars—or even the methodological feasibility of putting these traces of the act of performance under academic scrutiny—remains to be assessed.
A similar case can be made, for instance, for the Fondo Borciani at the library of the Conservatorio di Milano. The collection includes the entire chamber music library previously owned by Paolo Borciani and Elisa Pegreffi, the first and second violinists of the celebrated Quartetto Italiano (active 1945–1980). Rather than serve as a tool to investigate these performers and their music-making, the Fondo is described—and also, crucially, handled—as “including almost the complete repertoire for string quartet” (http://www.consmilano.it/it/biblioteca/storia-collezioni-biblioteca/altre-importanti-collezioni). In other words, the parts previously owned and used by the Quartetto Italiano are valued for their completeness with regards to “works,” which adds repertoire to the conservatoire’s library, but not for the traces they bear of these musicians’ activity: what they did with this music. Indeed, conservatory students can borrow these parts for their performances and add their own pencil markings or rub off those they find already annotated. The focus, once again, is on the “music itself’” contained in the collection rather than on the histories of how and why this music was handled by the Quartetto Italiano.
The impression that these players were not interested in formalizing a single sanctioned and all-encompassing performing version of a piece (the way they would perform it, or instruct others to do so) is further endorsed by Baillot’s own writings on the matter: he specifies that “even with the aid of all possible signs,” attempting to notate performing nuances in full would be pointless (Baillot 1835, 190). Aside from their liminal status—being traces of a process (or multiple processes) rather than a text—the prospect of simply reproducing such annotations in today’s historically-informed performances adumbrates a further paradox. According to the values and performance culture with which Baillot was imbued, at its best performance was understood as a gesture of appropriation: the act of creating one’s own narrative of nuances was at the core of what performers were ideally expected to accomplish. Ironically enough, trying to replicate Baillot’s fingering or other annotations as literally as possible would be considered, at least in this conception, a resort only for incompetent players who were not up to their task; see Morabito 2015, chapter 1.
Baillot’s pencil annotations show the same attitude (for instance, in changing the written slurs into his actual bowings, and adding or adapting the prescribed articulation), regardless of how many details of performance a composer had already attempted to include. The “rules of the game” and particularly, the understanding of the performer’s task, do not seem to change whether approaching a Boccherini quintet or a late Beethoven quartet; see Morabito 2015, chapter 2.
This virtuosic “French manner” of playing string quartets or quintets is often linked with the presence in Paris at the time of a flourishing violin school and distinguished soloists such as Giovanni Battista Viotti, Pierre Rode, Pierre Baillot, and Rodolphe Kretzer; see Fauquet 1986, 48 and Fournier 1999, 260–61.
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What is trvth?
When Pontius Pilate asked Jesus, ‘What is truth?’, he put his finger on a big issue. Many of us have been brought up with the belief that a thing can only be true if it can be proved scientifically. Even though post-modern philosophers have questioned assertions of this kind and even scientists struggle with what we mean by scientific truth, it has remained doggedly part of the way that we understand our world.
Now I am a liberal. This doesn’t mean that I am wishy-washy, uncommitted or morally weak. It means that I don’t adhere to aggressive fundamentalist creeds, whether they be religious or scientific. It’s not just the ultimate paucity of the thinking that supports all forms of fundamentalism, the need for certainty and the need to be right at all costs, it’s the way in which fundamentalists treat people who disagree with them.
In the past fundamentalist crusaders have tended to slice pieces off each other or burn each other at the stake. More recently fundamentalists of all persuasions have taken to blowing themselves and each other up, so I suppose we can only be grateful when attempted assassinations are of a literary kind.
However, the result is the same and manifests itself in a lack of respect for the other person. I am one of those Christians who believes that all human life is holy ground and that to engage with another person is to recognise that they are made in God’s image and worthy of respect, and I know that this belief lies at the heart of all the great world religions.
You see, I tend to agree with educationalists like James Fowler who equate fundamentalist thinking with a stage of human development we call adolescence. It’s a stage of thinking that cannot cope with complexity and with the creativity associated with uncertainty. For me truth is a slippery guest that needs to be tested by our experience of life and by our best aspirations.
I am a Christian because I believe that truth is manifest most clearly in Jesus Christ who is the human face of God and through whom we can know something of the One who creates and redeems the universe. I am grateful to the scriptures for helping us to glimpse the reality that Jesus makes known and I am grateful to his disciples for getting it all wrong time and time again.
I am a Christian because I believe that the picture of a God who gives human beings freedom but takes human suffering and pain into himself through the crucifixion of Jesus when it all goes pear shaped, makes more sense of the universe than anything else I have encountered. It certainly helps me to make sense of my own life and experience.
And I am a Christian who, like the disciples who knew the earthly Jesus, fails to understand what God is trying to do in my life, in the church and in our world on a regular basis.
The Christian faith is however a creed that I try to live by even though it constantly challenges me and draws me into perplexity.
I am not renowned for my humility, but I am constantly disciplined by the truth I seek and fail to see.
And that’s why I am grateful for the story that the Church tells through its worship and through its Creeds.
This story tells me that God creates and sustains the world. It tells me that human beings are deeply flawed and capable of great acts of wickedness.
It tells me that Jesus Christ is the human face of God, truly God and truly man who, through his life and death and resurrection, has given us the potential for new and eternal life. It tells me that God is present with us through his Spirit who leads us into truth.
It tells me that God will one day bring the whole creation to fulfillment in him.
It tells me more than I can understand and more than I can believe at any one time, but it gives me a framework in which I can explore.
As a deeply flawed human being I don’t presume to tell other people how to lead their lives, but I do think we should all be encouraged to seek out truth for our own lives and that we should give each other the space to make that journey. Christianity isn’t about certainty, its about faith, faith enough to go on the journey through life with other likeminded people.
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I am bint Rhoda, the daughter of Rhoda. I grew up in a village near Jerusalem, I am a follower of Christ, a lover of books, mother of two little ones. I am passionate about filling up our bodies and hearts with good things.
Gaza Mom
Laila El-Haddad is a Palestinian journalist, writer, blogger, and media activist based between Gaza and the United States, who writes principally for the al-Jazeera English website and the Guardian Unlimited.
Loonwatch.com
A blogzine to monitor and expose the web’s plethora of anti-Muslim loons, wackos, and conspiracy theorists.
Right Web
A program of the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) that assesses the work of organizations and individuals who promote militarist U.S. foreign and defense policies, with a special focus on the “war on terror.”
Ship of Fools
For people who prefer their religion disorganized — helps Christians be self-critical and honest about the failings of Christianity, to make sense of the Christian faith in today’s complex world.
The Immanent Frame
Publishes interdisciplinary perspectives on secularism, religion, and the public sphere.
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An irate black student at the University of Virginia blasted her white classmates for taking advantage of the school’s new, expanded multicultural center, shocking video shows.
The footage, which has gone viral on social media, shows an unidentified student of color at the 16,000-student public research university in Charlottesville giving what she dubbed a “public service announcement” to other students sitting nearby.
“Excuse me, if y’all didn’t know, this a [Multicultural Student Center] and frankly there’s just too many white people in here and this a space for people of color,” the young woman said. “So just be really cognizant of the space that you’re taking up because it does make some of us POCs uncomfortable when we see too many white people in here.”
The expanded space – billed by the university as a place to “embrace and support the diversity” of UVA – had only been open for four days, according to the miffed student.
“And frankly, there’s the whole university for a lot of y’all to be at and there’s very few spaces for us,” she said. “So keep that in mind, thank you.”
A number of students can be heard clapping and hollering as the footage ends. The video was tweeted Wednesday by the Young America’s Foundation, which blasted the student’s behavior as “racist intolerance” rather than inclusiveness befitting of a university setting.
“Leftists at the University of Virginia are dictating who is and who isn’t allowed in the new Multicultural Student Center,” the conservative youth organization tweeted.
As of Friday, the post had been retweeted nearly 10,000 times. It also prompted university officials to release a statement later Wednesday clarifying exactly who is welcome at the revamped space.
“As UVA President Jim Ryan said at the opening of these centers, ‘I believe deeply that we need to build a community that is not just diverse, but also inclusive,’” the statement read in part. “In order to foster the diversity of experience and ideas that make UVA a great and good place to study and work, these centers are open to all members of the university community.”
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Double Drinking Fountains are quite worthwhile as their stylish and versatile features provide complete drinking water solutions at public and private places. It is important to have double drinking fountains at schools, colleges, shopping centers, offices or any other place of commercial use. With 100% functional vandal-resistance, they come with a stainless steel body that preserves the water for its nutrients and provide the pure and completely nutritious drinking water to the drinkers.
No one can imagine a life without water and to remain healthy it is necessary to have healthy water to drink. The double drinking fountains can be the source for such healthy water.
The following are the features that add more attraction to these fountains and should be considered when making a purchase:
Safe appearance and body. The drinking fountains have modern appearance with steel body with the availability of more than 40 mm waste outlets. They also have a coating of Optional Coastguard’s that preserve their body by providing them the most secured packaging. They have a kind of grill panel at the front which has stain finishing with perfect outer edge. Some of their models are found in light gray granite that is made specifically to suit the design or color of these fountains.
Cooling system. The cooling system of these water dispensers consists of the best features that assure maximum cooling at desired level. They have motor compressors, condensers, refrigerant control, temperature control and cooling units. All these are the perfect cooler needs.
Remotely activated bubblers. The double drinking fountains have a remotely run bubbler as well that is worked with a push button available on the front. It makes the task easier for the users to get the bubbles with just a single push.
Double drinking fountains come in a variety of models to fulfill the needs of water at home and at public centers because health is crucial to everyone and it cannot be maintained with tap water. For this reason, Westside Wholesale has brought this product with variant price range and from reliable brands like Elkay. In order to provide healthy means of intake for the public and the loved ones, it is important that these double drinking fountains are installed immediately to avoid the possible diseases and illness.
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487 F.2d 370
UNITED STATES of America, Appellee,v.James Edward EDSON, Defendant-Appellant.
No. 73-1323.
United States Court of Appeals,First Circuit.
Argued Oct. 16, 1973.Decided Oct. 23, 1973.
Joseph F. Flynn, Rockland, Mass., for defendant-appellant.
Henry H. Hammond, Asst. U. S. Atty., with whom James N. Gabriel, U. S. Atty., was on brief, for appellee.
Before ALDRICH and CAMPBELL, Circuit Judges.
ALDRICH, Senior Circuit Judge.
1
Defendant appeals from an order of the district court setting bail pending trial. The facts are somewhat unusual. On March 1, 1972 defendant was convicted upon a plea of guilty of possessing heroin with the intent to distribute, in violation of 21 U.S.C. Sec. 841(a)(1). Following indictment, defendant had been incarcerated because of his inability to supply bail set by the court in the amount of $25,000 with surety. On his plea he was sentenced to eight years imprisonment with the additional parole term provided by 21 U.S.C. Sec. 841(b)(1)(A), with credit for time served. On September 24, 1973 the judgment of conviction was vacated because the sentencing judge had failed to comply with F.R.Crim.P. 11.1 Defendant was then brought before a magistrate for a determination of bail.
2
At this time defendant had served twenty-five months, and, taking into account good time credits, would have been eligible for parole in seven months. We are informed that because of his good prison record he had been granted three "furloughs" and would have been allowed to attend classes at a local university which had accepted him for the current semester.
3
The magistrate recommended that bail be set again at $25,000 with surety. This recommendation was "adopted and approved" the same day by the district court without evidentiary or other hearing. There is no contradiction of defendant's claim that he is unable to comply. Defendant is twenty-four years old and unemployed and has no demonstrated resources, nor have his parents. The undisputed effect of this order is that defendant not only remains incarcerated, but, ironically, unlike the situation when he stood convicted, he is no longer entitled to furloughs or to attend school.
4
Passing the diminished strength that we are disposed to accord to district court findings that merely adopt, without even opportunity for a hearing, the report of a magistrate,2 the defendant has a considerable burden on appeal. However, in view of the substantial errors contained in the magistrate's memorandum, we proposed under the special circumstances of this case to exercise the authority vested in us by virtue of the Bail Reform Act, 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3147(b), and order our own bail conditions.
5
The magistrate's finding commences, after reciting the procedural history, with a statement that he proposed to disregard the fact that two jail officers had supplied letters expressing their opinion that defendant was sufficiently rehabilitated to resume the responsibilities of living in a free society. He considered the previous sentence to have been awarded not for rehabilitation, but for "punishment . . . not yet complete." Defendant argues from this last that the magistrate was disregarding the presumption of innocence which was fully restored by the setting aside of his conviction. We agree, except that so far as bail is concerned the presumption is not that, but, as to an untried defendant, a "presumption in favor of releasability." United States v. Leathers, 1969, 134 U.S.App.D.C. 38, 412 F.2d 169, 171. We add that, rather than being "of no consequence," the opinions of the jail officials had a direct bearing upon defendant's "character and mental condition," as to which the magistrate was specifically directed to inquire. 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3146(b).
6
Next, the magistrate drew the conclusion that following another trial the defendant would receive "no less a sentence." He omitted, however, any consideration of the fact that against such a sentence defendant would receive substantial credit for time already served, making the situation quite different from what it was when bail was originally set.
7
The magistrate then pointed to the fact that the defendant had received two sentences in the state court for similar offenses, but which had been suspended, with probation, very possibly on the ground that defendant was already serving a federal sentence. He opined that to release defendant under these circumstances would be "a slap in the face of the state court." We have no reason to suppose that the state court would be affronted or would expect the magistrate to do other than his duty. In any event, this court holds no possible obligation to the state court at the expense of defendant's federal rights. It should be unthinkable that a magistrate would disregard the clear command of Congress because of its indirect effect upon the feelings of judges of another court.
8
The seriousness of the crime of distributing narcotics may have distracted the magistrate's attention from the priorities established by Congress by the Bail Reform Act. Until a defendant has been convicted, the nature of the offense, as well as the evidence of guilt, is to be considered only in terms of the likelihood of his making himself unavailable for trial. Determination of what is needed "reasonably [to] assure" defendant's appearance, not considerations of state comity, controls the setting of bail under the Bail Reform Act.
9
This defendant, as a practical matter, may well face less than one year in jail. If he were to default, even on personal recognizance, he faces an additional federal sentence. What might seem even more pressing, while conviction of the original offense would not be a violation of his state probation, defaulting even federal bail presumably would be such. Hence defendant would face, in addition, a reactivation of his state sentences. As against this, no affirmative reason has been offered why defendant is likely to flee the state where all his past and present connections appear to be.
10
Under these circumstances we cannot feel that the government, quite apart from the commendation defendant has earned during his present incarceration, has met the burden now imposed on it by the Bail Reform Act of showing that defendant would violate any bail order that we presently impose. The order setting bail at $25,000 with surety is vacated. The case is remanded forthwith to the district court with instructions to set bail at $5,000 without surety, and to release the defendant in the custody of his mother, who has indicated a willingness to assume such.
1
Uncomfortable as it may be for the U. S. Attorney, particularly in the case of a judge who persists over the years in not observing this rule, we place some burden upon him, at least to call the court's attention at the time to the oversight (not the judge from whom the present appeal is taken.)
2
Under F.R.A.P. 9(a) the district court should have stated its "reasons." We do not remand in this instance to ascertain whether it agreed in the magistrate's reasoning because of our decision to consider the matter de novo
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An Automated Framework for Characterizing and Subsetting GPGPU Workloads.
Vignesh Adhinarayanan, Wu-chun Feng.
In Proceedings of the IEEE International Symposium on Performance Analysis of Systems and Software (ISPASS),
Uppsala, Sweden,
April 2016.
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r + 3*r, 0 = -2*r + 6. What is the tens digit of q?
5
Suppose 90 = 5*n - 10. Let m be (-8)/n - 52/(-5). Let b = m - 7. What is the units digit of b?
3
Suppose -2*r + 22 = 2*r + 5*l, -4*l = 8. What is the units digit of r?
8
Let y(j) = -2*j**3 + j**2 + j + 1. Let o be y(-1). Suppose 2*p + 5*z - 21 = 0, -o*p + 5*z - 9 = -p. Suppose -3*i - p + 27 = 0. What is the units digit of i?
8
Suppose 0 = 2*j - 3*y + 2, 0 = -2*j + 4*y - 0 - 2. Let b be (-4 - j)*2/3. What is the units digit of b/4 + 38/4?
9
Suppose -3*s + 10 = -2. Suppose 3*r = -3*i + 39, s*i + 0*i - 54 = -2*r. Let o = i + -4. What is the units digit of o?
0
Let v = -129 - -219. What is the tens digit of v?
9
Let j(f) = f**3 - 5*f**2 + 5*f - 6. Let b be j(4). Let w be (-20)/25*15/b. Let l = w + -3. What is the units digit of l?
3
Let l = 94 + -53. What is the tens digit of l?
4
Let k(h) = h + 4. Let g be k(-7). Let q = -4 - g. Let v = q - -8. What is the units digit of v?
7
Let u = -22 + 107. What is the units digit of u?
5
Let c be 3/(-3 - 3)*-4. Suppose 0 = -c*w - w + 3. Suppose w - 5 = -2*u. What is the units digit of u?
2
Let f be (-6)/9 - 6/(-9). Suppose 40 = 5*d - f*d. What is the units digit of d?
8
Let k(f) be the first derivative of f**2/2 + 3*f - 1. What is the units digit of k(4)?
7
Suppose 3*c = 2*f - 32, 2 = -2*c - 3*f - 2. Let o = 14 - c. What is the tens digit of o?
2
Suppose 0 = -5*l - 67 - 23. Suppose -5*k + 8 = -2. What is the units digit of l/(k*-1 - 0)?
9
Let q = -23 - -54. What is the units digit of q?
1
Let j(g) be the third derivative of g**5/60 - g**4/24 + g**3/6 + 3*g**2. What is the tens digit of j(-3)?
1
Let i(c) = c + 33. What is the tens digit of i(-14)?
1
Suppose -1 = -w + 6. What is the units digit of ((-2)/(-3))/(w/21)?
2
Suppose 4*p = -2*b + 28, 5*p - 20 = p. Suppose b*i = 3*i. Suppose -1 = -a - i. What is the units digit of a?
1
Suppose -5*g = 3*p + 2 + 4, -2*p - 5*g - 9 = 0. Let n = 5 - p. Suppose -n*x + 8 = 2. What is the units digit of x?
3
Suppose 0 = -3*y + 6*y - 48. Let c = y - 8. Let p = c + -5. What is the units digit of p?
3
Suppose 0 = -2*l + l. What is the units digit of 2 - (-10)/(l - -2)?
7
Let o be 12/10*(-7 - -2). Suppose 2*j - 3 = i, 4*i - 5*j + 9 = 2*i. What is the tens digit of (-86)/o + i/(-9)?
1
Let z = 5 + -3. Suppose 2*q = -0*n + 4*n + z, 5*q - 2*n + 35 = 0. Let s = -6 - q. What is the units digit of s?
3
Let t be 64/2 + 4/(-2). Suppose t = 2*i + i. Suppose z = -p - p + i, 3*p = -z + 12. What is the units digit of z?
6
Suppose 3*k - 506 = -5*i + 95, -4*i + 468 = -4*k. What is the tens digit of i?
1
Let s = 6 - 2. Suppose -15 - 13 = -3*j + 5*x, 2*x - 46 = -s*j. What is the tens digit of j?
1
What is the units digit of (62 - -7)/(-1 + 2)?
9
Let j be (-5)/1*(0 + -1). Suppose 0*i + 3*i + 5*k - 235 = 0, -j*i + 401 = -k. Suppose 3*d = -d + i. What is the units digit of d?
0
Let h be 12/(-1 - 0/(-4)). Let y = h - -38. What is the units digit of y?
6
Let i be 2/(-3) - 10/(-6). Let j be i - (2/1 + -26). Suppose j = 5*f - h - 0*h, -4*f + 5*h - 1 = 0. What is the units digit of f?
6
Suppose 0*s + 2*s - 118 = 0. Suppose 2*r + 3*g = -2*r + s, -38 = -3*r - g. What is the tens digit of r?
1
Suppose -162 = -3*w - 12. What is the units digit of w?
0
Let c(n) be the second derivative of n**4/12 - 4*n**3/3 + 2*n**2 + n. What is the units digit of c(8)?
4
Let l(v) = -v**2 - 9*v + 7. Let d be l(-8). Let x(i) = d - 15 - 4*i + i**2. What is the units digit of x(6)?
2
Let d(l) = -2*l - 8. What is the units digit of d(-10)?
2
Let k = 108 - -102. What is the units digit of k?
0
Let n = 32 - 18. Let a = n - 6. What is the units digit of a?
8
Suppose 4*n + 0*n = 1620. What is the tens digit of n?
0
Let i(k) = k**3 - 3*k**2 - 3*k - 1. Let y be i(4). Suppose -2*n - 2*n + y*g + 93 = 0, 0 = 4*n + 4*g - 72. What is the units digit of n?
1
Let r = -327 + 461. What is the tens digit of r?
3
Suppose 12 = 3*c, -4*c - 1 + 5 = -2*v. Suppose v*w + 72 = 11*w - 2*u, -3*u = 3*w - 39. What is the units digit of w?
4
Suppose -3*y - 37 = 44. Let z be 6/(-2)*18/y. Suppose -29 = -z*p - 9. What is the units digit of p?
0
Suppose 2*f + 4 - 11 = -5*p, 5*f = -5*p + 25. Suppose c = 10 + f. What is the tens digit of c?
1
Suppose -2*m = 3*m - 3*i - 26, i - 18 = -5*m. Suppose 0 = 3*h - m*t - 21, -5*h + 18 = -h - 2*t. What is the units digit of h?
3
Let s(n) = -4*n - 2 - 1 - 2. What is the tens digit of s(-4)?
1
Suppose -21*t = -9*t - 852. What is the units digit of t?
1
What is the units digit of 2 + (-5)/2 + (-313)/(-2)?
6
Let t be 39*(4 - 39/9). Let l = 31 + t. What is the units digit of l?
8
Suppose 37 - 7 = 5*d. Suppose -l - 3*q = -20 - 70, 3*q = -d. Suppose -16 = 5*c - l. What is the units digit of c?
6
Let x(a) = -a**3 + a**2 + a + 12. Suppose -4*c - 20 = 3*m, 3*m = 2*c - 3*c - 5. What is the tens digit of x(m)?
1
Suppose 4 = 2*q - 2. Suppose -2*g = -3*g + q. What is the units digit of g?
3
Suppose -2*g = -39 - 39. Suppose -4*s + 9 = -g. What is the tens digit of s?
1
Let c(b) = -4*b**2 - 2*b**2 - 6 + 7*b**2 - 4*b. What is the units digit of c(6)?
6
Let k = 40 + -29. Let y be 0/((-6)/((-4)/(-2))). Let g = y + k. What is the tens digit of g?
1
Let l(p) be the second derivative of p**6/360 - p**5/60 - p**4/8 - p**3/3 - 2*p. Let a(j) be the second derivative of l(j). What is the units digit of a(4)?
5
Suppose 1975 - 235 = 6*i. What is the units digit of i?
0
Suppose -17 = -4*l + 63. What is the tens digit of l?
2
Let a = 5 + -19. What is the units digit of (-42)/a - (1 + 1)?
1
Suppose 0*c - 2 = 2*c. What is the units digit of -1 + c + (13 - -1)?
2
Suppose -30 = 5*d - 70. Suppose 0 = -2*k - 0 + d. What is the units digit of k?
4
Let p = -10 + 10. Suppose p = -0*z + z - 16. What is the tens digit of z?
1
Let h be 3/2*(-36)/(-27). What is the units digit of (0 - 1)/(h/(-4))?
2
Let a be (-2)/11 - (-8)/44. Suppose -3*q + a*q + 3 = 0. What is the units digit of q/2 - (-102)/12?
9
Let l(i) = -i**3 + i**2 + i + 13. Let b be l(0). What is the tens digit of b + ((-4)/(-4) - -2)?
1
Suppose -l = -3*c - 9, -18 - 31 = -4*l - c. What is the tens digit of l?
1
Suppose 0 = -o - 1 + 3. What is the units digit of 10 - o*6/4?
7
Let o(x) = -x - 1. Suppose 5*g = q - 5, 0*q - 5 = 5*q + 5*g. Let u be o(q). Let b = u - -6. What is the units digit of b?
5
Let b be -1*58 - (-1 - -2). Let m = b - -84. What is the units digit of m?
5
Let a be 16/(-4)*(-38)/8. Suppose 0 = -5*u + 181 + a. What is the tens digit of u?
4
Let a = -20 - -51. What is the units digit of a?
1
Let u(p) = 4*p. Let x be u(-4). What is the units digit of x/(-3) - 2/(-3)?
6
Suppose -10 = -p + 6. Let g = 25 - p. What is the units digit of g?
9
Suppose -2*t + 7 = -5*l + 3, 0 = 5*t - 5*l + 5. Let k(q) = -q**3 - 2*q**2 + 2*q - 1. What is the units digit of k(t)?
2
Suppose -3*b + 12 + 3 = 0. What is the units digit of b?
5
What is the units digit of 138 + (-12)/4 + 5?
0
Let t(v) = -v**3 - 4*v**2 + 7*v - 21. What is the tens digit of t(-9)?
2
Suppose -2*b + 5*d = -35, 2*d - 7*d = 2*b - 5. What is the tens digit of b?
1
Let o = -9 + 11. Suppose -5*b - o*h + 32 + 53 = 0, -4*h - 96 = -4*b. What is the units digit of b?
9
Let c(o) = 2*o + 4. Let w be c(-6). What is the tens digit of 0 + 29 + w + 10?
3
Suppose v - 4*v + 3 = 0. What is the units digit of (-16)/(-8) - (-12 - v)?
5
Let v = -8 - -13. Suppose -2*j = -5*u + 3*u - 24, 0 = -4*j - v*u + 21. What is the units digit of j?
9
Suppose 0 = -4*o + o - 9. What is the units digit of (-7)/o + 2/3?
3
Let y = 3 - 0. Suppose 4*u + 4*s - 24 = 0, u - 5*s + 9 = -y. Suppose -5*i + 3*o + o = u, 4*o - 11 = -3*i. What is the units digit of i?
1
Let i be -8 + 6 + (18 - 0). Let f = i - 25. Let l = 18 + f. What is the units digit of l?
9
Suppose 29 = -4*m + 153. What is the tens digit of m?
3
Let b(f) = f**3 + 7*f**2 + 5*f + 4. Let z be b(-6). Suppose 3*g = 5*n - n - 20, -2*n + z = -2*g. What is the units digit of (2 - (g - -2)) + 5?
5
Suppose -5*q = -2*q. Suppose 1 = -q*b + b. What is the units digit of b?
1
Let m(c) = c - 1. Let r be m(1). Suppose 6 = 2*w + 2*p, -15 = -5*w + p - r*p. Suppose 3*f + j - 27 = 0, 0 = -w*f - 2*j - 0*j + 30. What is the units digit of f?
8
Let r be -2 - -2 - 1/1. What is the units digit of ((-2)/r)/(4/14)?
7
Let l be (4/3)/((-1)/(-3)). Suppose 24 = l*b + 4. What is the units digit of b?
5
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FILE PHOTO: Logo of Bayer AG is pictured ahead of the the annual results news conference of the German drugmaker in Leverkusen, Germany February 27, 2019. REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay/File Photo
BERLIN (Reuters) - Bayer’s supervisory board fully supports the company’s management regarding its strategy, including the acquisition of Monsanto, Chairman Werner Wenning told business daily Handelsblatt on Thursday.
The company’s executive board had assessed all risks related to Monsanto and its glyphosate weedkiller in “a most professional” way and fulfilled all relevant legal requirements, Wenning was cited as saying.
“I am convinced that we are doing the right thing,” the paper quoted him as saying.
Company filings showed this week that the supervisory board sought law firm Linklaters’ expert opinion for reassurance that the management board had complied with their duties when acquiring Monsanto for $63 billion last year.
Wenning backed the Monsanto deal throughout, sources familiar with the matter have told Reuters.
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Introduction {#sec1-1}
============
Emphysematous pyelonephritis (EPN) is defined as an acute, severe necrotizing infection of the renal parenchyma and perirenal tissue, which results in the presence of gas within the renal parenchyma, collecting system, or perinephric tissue.\[[@ref1]\] EPN is a radiological diagnosis, as symptoms and signs are vague and nonspecific. Fever and flank pain in a diabetic patient should raise the suspicion of EPN.\[[@ref2]\] X-ray and ultrasound abdomen are preliminary investigations but lack sensitivity and precision; hence, they cannot be always relied upon to visualize the kidney.\[[@ref3]\] Computed tomography (CT) scan of the abdomen is the investigation of choice.\[[@ref4]\] CT classifications are useful in the decision making regarding treatment and prognostication. This case is reported to highlight the importance of CT scan in the management of EPN, as treatment options have evolved over the years from an aggressive surgical approach to a more conservative approach of percutaneous drainage (PCD) and antibiotics.
Case Report {#sec1-2}
===========
A sixty-four--year-old male, obese, diabetic, and hypertensive for five years presented with pain in the abdomen localized to the right flank, vomiting, and burning micturition with increased frequency of a seven-day duration. On examination, he was febrile and blood pressure was 160/100. Abdominal examination revealed tenderness over the right renal angle. Examination of the central nervous system revealed the presence of sensory motor neuropathy. Rest of the systemic examination was normal. On investigation, hemoglobin was 12 g% and peripheral smear revealed neutrophilic leukocytosis. Random blood glucose was 255 mg% and glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) was 7.8%. Serum urea was 77 mg% and creatinine was 1.7 mg%. Liver functions, serum electrolytes, and arterial blood gases were normal. Urine examination showed numerous pus cells, 1+ albumin, and positive ketones. Plain X-ray of the abdomen revealed gas distributed over the right kidney \[[Figure 1](#F1){ref-type="fig"}\]. Ultrasound of the abdomen was suggestive of EPN of the right kidney \[[Figure 2](#F2){ref-type="fig"}\]. Noncontrast CT of the abdomen was characteristic of EPN of right kidney which showed renal and perirenal fluid collections with gas in the collecting system, intraparenchymal gas, and extension of gas into the perinephric space \[[Figure 3](#F3){ref-type="fig"}\]. The left kidney was normal. The patient was managed by a combined medical treatment and PCD. Urine culture showed a growth of *Escherichia coli*. The patient improved and was followed up with serial ultrasound. Contrast enhanced CT scan at discharge revealed complete disappearance of the gas.
{#F1}
{#F2}
{#F3}
Discussion {#sec1-3}
==========
EPN is a rare condition. The diagnosis is often delayed because symptoms and signs are vague and nonspecific. A high index of suspicion is important. Common modes of EPN presentations include fever, abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, impaired consciousness level, shock, and acute renal failure. The most common finding on clinical examination is renal angle tenderness.\[[@ref5]\] Thrombocytopenia, acute renal failure, disturbed consciousness, and shock are the factors associated with poor outcome, and definitive treatment is influenced by their presence.\[[@ref5][@ref6]\] Diabetics comprise 95% of the patients with a higher frequency in females. Nondiabetic risk factors include obstructive uropathy, chronic renal failure, polycystic kidney, renal transplant, alcoholism, and AIDS.\[[@ref5]\]
EPN is caused by gas-producing coliform bacteria that are able to ferment glucose to lactate and carbon dioxide. *E. coli* is the commonest organism. The other organisms are *Klebsiella, Proteus mirabilis, Pseudomonas, Streptococcus* spp., and mixed organisms. Rare organisms reported are *Clostridium, Candida* spp., *Entamoeba histolytica*, and *Aspergillus*.\[[@ref5]\] The factors that may be involved in the pathogenesis of EPN are a high level of tissue glucose, the presence of gas-forming bacteria, impaired tissue perfusion, and impaired host immunity with a defective host defense mechanism.\[[@ref5][@ref6][@ref7]\] It is postulated that the gas accumulates because the ischemic kidney cannot remove it.\[[@ref5]\] Histopathological examination of kidneys removed from patients with EPN reveals vasculopathy as the main feature.\[[@ref5]\]
Diagnostic sensitivities of plain X-ray of the abdomen and ultrasonography (USG) of the abdomen for the diagnosis of EPN are 33--47% and 80--85%, respectively.\[[@ref3][@ref4][@ref8]\] CT is the most reliable diagnostic tool with an accuracy of 100%. Based on CT scan findings, EPN is classified by Wan *et al*. (1996) as type I: Renal necrosis with the presence of gas but no fluid and type II: Parenchymal gas associated with fluid in renal parenchyma, perinephric space, or in the collecting system.\[[@ref9]\] Huang *et al*.\[[@ref6]\] classified EPN into:
Class I: Gas in the collecting system only.Class II: Gas in renal parenchyma only.Class III a: Extension of gas or abscess to perinephric space.Class III b: Extension of gas or abscess to pararenal space.Class IV: bilateral EPN or solitary kidney with EPN.\[[@ref6]\]
These classifications are useful in decision making regarding treatment and prognostication.
Initial management involves care with fluid and electrolytes, hemodynamic status, diabetic control, and appropriate antibiotic therapy. The conventional treatment of EPN has historically been emergency nephrectomy and/or open surgical drainage along with antibiotic therapy with a mortality rate of 40--50%. Advances in catheter technology have made PCD feasible in the treatment of EPN. Increasingly, PCD is used for the treatment of EPN with a view to nephron preservation and recovery of renal function.\[[@ref1]\] This strategy is associated with a lower mortality than medical management or emergency nephrectomy.\[[@ref1][@ref10]\] PCD is optimally CT guided and ultrasound guidance may not be successful.
Nephrectomy should be limited to the presence of a nonfunctioning kidney, presentation of gross renal parenchymal destruction, display of class IIIa or IIIb gas pattern, or the existence of two or more risk factors.\[[@ref5][@ref7]\] Conservative medical treatment with antibiotics alone is not a recommended management approach for EPN.\[[@ref4][@ref5]\] However, successful conservative medical management is also rarely reported.\[[@ref11][@ref12]\] PCD is the treatment of choice for patients with bilateral disease and solitary kidney with EPN.
CT scan of the abdomen is the investigation of choice for the diagnosis, treatment options, and prognostication of EPN. A diabetic patient with fever, renal angle pain, and pyuria attending emergency should be subjected to immediate CT scan to rule out EPN. In hospitals where CT scan is not available, these patients should be subjected to X-ray KUB (KUB: kidney, ureters, and bladder)/USG, and if renal gas is detected, referred for a CT scan.\[[@ref5]\]
**Source of Support:** Nil
**Conflict of Interest:** None declared.
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Just one day out of life
Hot bannocks for breakfast before the one we all look forward to, Zipwiring! This is the activity that seems to be everyone's favourite. Maybe its cos we never grow out of
loving the thrill of it. For the parents of disabled children I know its a hugely emotional experience especially the first time, not because you are scared for them but because you never
dreamed you would ever see your child do something like this.
This was Miss A at the age of 4 trying out the Zipwire for the first time.
I couldn't hold back in my tears, back then she was fearless and if I remember correctly she went first. She was beaming at the bottom and over the moon with what she had just done.
She likes to go down with an adult now that she is a bit older but she loves the experience not least of all because she is doing what everyone else is.
One of my own most cherished memories as a kid were the activity holidays we went on every year with another family. There was a zipwire open one evening a week and we loved it. This
was basically a wire attached to a tree with a platform we climbed up to where the least drunk Dad lifted you up to hold a handle and launched you down toward the campsite owner, referred to
always, as 'small brain' (long standing joke after our first meeting when he used this term about himself) The only thing stopping you ploughing into the massive tree the zipwire was anchored to
was Small brain crouched with arms open ready to catch you. I seem to remember a sleeping bag being tied round the tree so at least if you did splat into it they could bag you up and
continue with the fun, not sure what else that could have been for. He caught you, put you down to the side and would quickly face back up to the tower shouting 'GO' to the next one as you
ran off back up for another turn until the least drunk Dad and Small Brain got knackered and said it was finished.
As a parent you have a yearning to share the best experiences from your childhood with your children. When you have a child with a disability, sometimes you have to accept the fact that is
just not possible. I'm not sure how much whisky it would take for me to be willing to throw my kid down toward Small Brain (we are a far more fearful society now a days) but I do know
that if my husband did managed to persuade me to let the dude have a turn, Miss A would miss out. We don't really ever like that to happen so if we can't all do it together we tend not to
do it at all meaning I didn't think I would be able to take my family on an activity holiday.
Kielder activity park run by the Calvert trust is a really special place. Its full of fun and excitement but its really safe and relaxed at the same time. I mean you wouldn't imagine
that in this day and age of Health and safety you would ever be allowed to just hoist a wheel chair to the top of a tower and fling a kid who can't walk down a really long zipwire over a river
but YOU CAN and its totally safe (a lot bloody safer than Small Brain's version that's for sure). Iv'e never worried about safety when there, mainly because the staff are amazing. Now
amazing is an over used word, I use it all the time time but these guys really really are AMAZING. They are always calm, always friendly and ready to join a joke. They are gentle,
respectful, professional and thoughtful they are flippin fan freekin tastic! With loads of activities to try that everyone can join in its just ideal. Its no secret that Miss A
doesn't travel well, she thrives on routine and familiarity but with this place being so accessible for her and comfortable my hope is that as the years go by she will become more and more
comfortable here and eventually partake in the independent holidays one day with her friends.
I love meeting other families although there is never much time to chat because its such a jam packed holiday! I also really enjoy meeting the residents, chatting to adults with
disabilities and watching them enjoy themselves and be independent makes me far less scared for our daughter's future. I also think its really important for Miss A to see adults with a
disability like her, its not something that she bumps into very often but she met a man in a power chair like hers and asked him to peep his horn. She was utterly delighted, I love that she
gets to see role models she can relate to. So the beauty of this place goes far beyond just the activities and scenery in my mind.
This picture was taken on our first Kielder Trip, the dude was 1 the day we arrived had only just learned to toddle and during boating activities I put him down on the floor of the boat for a
nap. We have always managed to go at the same time as these families which makes it a little bit extra special. This first trip felt life changing for us.
This year, the dude absolutely LOVED his zipwire experience and said it was the best part of the holiday! Natalie and her colleagues looked after us all including catching eager little boys
who weren't so willing to wait their turn! During the wait for turns I noticed that The dude and his sister were chatting to each other and cuddling I heard him say to her 'I really like
you' this is his way of saying, 'I love you' its what he says to me and his dad. He never says love but he will kiss our faces and tell us that he 'just can't stop liking you!' I have
never hear him say that to his sister before and it made my day. They had a cuddle and she pulled his hair, normality was resumed but just for that second it was beautiful!
In the afternoon the kids were less tired than usual and a few arguments were happening, so a big home made pot of broth followed by a bath was the answer. Worked a treat, I love the saying
that when a kid misbehaves put it in water (Miss A spent most of my pregnancy with her brother in the bath or a paddling pool!)
I wasn't so impressed by my son using his 2 year advantage against his pal though. He kept telling him, 'no no you have to share!' I stuck my head in the door to catch him saying it whilst
holding 5 out of 6 minions, eh him sharing isn't him giving you all of them dude! Give him back his ones and don't let me catch you at that again young man - not cool!
Howdy...
I'm L-J co creator of Miss A and the Dude. Boris is the man of the house and my fellow co creator of small people. You can read more about us all in the 'about the madhouse'
section.
I live in 'The Mad House' which is located up in Aberdeenshire, Scotland.
There is a fair bit of crazy goes on up here, generally I blame the kids/husband but to be honest I have hand picked a fair few daftys as friends so I am absolutely not blameless. I also
added a few creatures in to liven things up - you know, I'd just hate to get bored here!
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Electronic Arts' EA Access is now available for Windows PC games as Origin Access, a subscription for EA's Origin digital distribution platform, the company announced today.
Origin Access costs $4.99 per month, the same as EA Access, and gives subscribers the same kinds of benefits. Perks include pre-release trials of upcoming EA games and access to The Vault, an ever-growing collection of free full-game downloads. There are 15 games in The Vault at launch, including Dragon Age: Inquisition, Battlefield 4 and Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare; EA said it will add more titles over time. Origin Access also offers a 10 percent discount on all Origin purchases, including full games.
EA launched EA Access on Xbox One in August 2014; the service remains exclusive to that platform. The main difference between Origin Access and EA Access is that EA only offers month-by-month payments for Origin Access; customers don't have the option of a $29.99 annual subscription — half the price of the monthly payments added up over the course of a year — like they do with EA Access. There doesn't currently appear to be any package deal for a discounted subscription to both EA Access and Origin Access.
On Origin Access, The Vault won't be limited to EA-published games; it will also offer third-party titles, with 11 bit Studios' This War of Mine being the first one available at launch. And EA also notes that Origin Access is available only for Windows PC, not Mac games.
Origin Access is currently available in Canada, Germany (€3.99 per month), the U.K. (£3.99 per month) and the U.S.; EA said it will launch the service in more countries soon. For additional details, check out EA's Origin Access FAQ.
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Netflix has released a new trailer for The Last Days of American Crime. This may not look like it on the surface, as it doesn't involve superpowered beings saving the world. But this serves as the latest comic book adaptation that the streaming service has taken on, inspired by the graphic novel of the same name by Rick Remender and Greg Tocchini. As we can see from the trailer, this is poised to be a rather unique take on a heist movie.
The trailer for this Netflix original kicks off by showing us a world in the not-too-distant future. One that is ravaged by crime, where lawbreakers run rampant. That is, until the government begins using a unique method to stop these criminals dead in their tracks. A ragtag group of people on the wrong side of the law then bands together, for various reasons, to use this technology against the government to try and pull off one major heist, perhaps the last crime in the history of America. Hence, the title. Lots of action. Lots of money. Plenty of R-rated goods.
The movie is directed by Olivier Megaton, working from a screenplay by Karl Gajdusek. Megaton previously directed action flicks such as Transporter 3 and Taken 2. The cast includes Edgar Ramírez (Joy, Hands of Stone), Michael C. Pitt (Boardwalk Empire, Funny Games), Anna Brewster (Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Only Human), Patrick Bergin (Patriot Games, Sleeping With the Enemy) and Sharlto Copley (District 9, Free Fire). Jesse Berger, Jason Michael Berman and Barry Levine serve as producers. The graphic novel it is based on was released in 2009 by Radical Publishing and was met with a great deal of acclaim.
The Last Days of American Crime centers on the U.S. government which, as a final response to terrorism and crime, intends to broadcast a signal that makes it impossible for anyone to knowingly break the law. Graham Bricke (Edgar Ramírez), a lifelong criminal who was never able to take down a big score, teams up with the son of a famous crime family, Kevin Cash (Michael C. Pitt), and black market hacker Shelby Dupree (Anna Brewster). Together, they aim to commit the heist of the century. And perhaps the final crime in American history before the signal goes off.
In a summer that has largely been absent of big movies, mostly due to the massive theater shutdown that has been in place since mid-March, Netflix has stepped up to help fill the void. Chris Hemsworth's action flick Extraction managed to become a huge hit as a result following its release in late April. The company also has Spike Lee's Da 5 Bloods coming next month. As well as Charlize Theron's The Old Guard in July. The Last Days of American Crime is set to arrive on June 5 via the Netflix streaming service. Be sure to check out the new trailer for yourself.
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Source: Barron Trump Thought His Father Was Dead After Seeing Beheading Photo on TV
Barron Trump reportedly thought the photo of Kathy Griffin holding up a mock severed head of his father Donald Trump was real.
According to TMZ Trump family sources told them: “Barron Trump was watching television Tuesday at home with his mother Melania Trump when Kathy Griffin’s photo appeared on the screen, and his initial reaction was that something terrible happened to his father.”
TMZ sources claim Barron panicked at the sight of the images and screamed “Mommy, Mommy!”
President Trump trashed Kathy Griffin’s tasteless publicity stunt early this morning in a Tweet:
Kathy Griffin should be ashamed of herself. My children, especially my 11 year old son, Barron, are having a hard time with this. Sick!
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The few hours that the assault lasted are serving the Turkish president very well. Without any trial, without evidence, without elements of judgment, without international observers, Erdogan continues with his purge … without limits.
A state Emergency Decree, has served, to detain 195,000 opponents, dissidents or simply unconnected people. The figures have been compiled by the Istanbul Human Rights Association (İHD) which has presented them in front of Bakırköy women’s prison.
The report stressed that women prisoners are ‘being killed by solitary confinement’, it demanded the release of the women prisoners with illnesses and denounced the defenceless situation of the children who are incarcerated with their mothers.
In total there are 510 children prisoners under 6 years old.
The association has estimated that there are 5,971 minors in Erdogan’s prisons and 79 LGBT prisoners.
The main problems faced by prisoners of Erdogan are poor nutrition and unhealthy food that cause stomach upsets and poor hygiene in cells of 6-7 people.
However, the worst situation is for political prisoners: they are subjected to torture in jail and forced nudity.
information from: La Asociación de Derechos Humanos ( İHD)
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Trump’s week of dithering over Iran makes America look weak and foolish - sorokod
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/sep/21/donald-trump-iran-saudi-arabia-attacks
======
tomohawk
Trump ran on keeping the US out of dumb wars. That said, there's no hurry in
pursuing this matter. Sometimes its better to wait and see how events play
out. The Saudis and Israelis have already bombed Iran's military complexes in
the Abu Kamal region of Syria.
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Q:
Regex for matching a string until the first occurrence of a delimiter
I have a string and I need to match a pattern and discard the rest of the string after the first occurrence of a delimiter after the patter matched
sample string :
_fw_xx_app_id=xxxxx&adobe_id=59742375247590810332565440942222920249&krux_user=yyyyyyy&User_Agent=zzzzzz&_fw_did_idfa=aaaaaaa&_fw_dpr=2.00&_fw_ae=nonauthenticated&_fwu%3A386123%3Atqxqle5of=1&_fwu%3A386123%3Atshc3wdb8=1
I want to extract only the value that is after key '_fw_ae=' until the first occurrence of &
I tried this
regexp_substr(all_request_kv,'_fw_ae=(.+?)&|$',1,1,'e')
but this is bringing everything after the _fw_ae=
like below
_fw_ae=nonauthenticated&_fwu%3A386123%3Atqxqle5of=1&_fwu%3A386123%3Atshc3wdb8=1
where as i only want nonauthenticated in this example
A:
Instead of a non greedy quantifier, you could use a negated character class [^&] matching not an & inside a capturing group:
_fw_ae=([^&]+)
Regex demo
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The IRS has released new guidelines for HSA and HDHP health plans for 2017. Aside from an increase of $50 in the amount individuals may contribute annually to their HSA account, all other limits remained the same. Please see below:
Single - $3,400(increase of $50 from 2016)
Family - $6,750(same as 2016)
Catch Up (55 & older) - $1,000(same as 2016)
HDHP limits have all remained the same for 2017. Please see below:
Single Deductible - $1,300
Family Deductible - $2,600
Single MOOP - $6,550 (max out of pocket)
Family MOOP - $13,100 (max out of pocket)
If consumers have questions about their HSA policy or are interested in participating in an HSA policy, please contact MCC today. We can provide you or your business with the expert guidance that is needed in today’s employee benefits climate.
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Off Panel #176: Freezer Pizza with Brenden Fletcher
By David Harper
October 8, 2018
In this week’s episode of Off Panel, writer Brenden Fletcher joins the show to talk the comic industry and his Image series with artist Karl Kerschl, Isola. Fletcher discusses what he was doing before comics, the language of fandom, the musicality of language, how Gotham Academy and Batgirl came together, why he co-writes so often, balancing abstraction with narrative, fitting the comic marketplace, the impact of continuity, the first volume’s cover, long distance collaboration, the Motor Crush format change, the evolution of the comic market, and more.
You can find Fletcher on Twitter, on his website and his work in Motor Crush and Isola, which sees its first volume drop on October 24th.
Off Panel now has a Patreon! Support the show and earn some rewards by backing the podcast on there.
Thanks to this episode’s sponsor, AHOY Comics. They’re looking to shake up the publishing industry with a bold new format: comic book magazines! What are those? Comic book magazines will feature traditional, full length comic stories plus extra material, like prose fiction from Grant Morrison, cartoons from Shannon Wheeler, and more!
Also, thanks to the show’s other sponsor, Radio vs. the Martians! Mike Gillis and Casey Doran host the Radio vs. the Martians! podcast, a show that gathers their funniest, smartest friends once a month for a deep dive into science fiction, video games, horror, comics, movies, and everything in-between. So far, they’ve dissected topics like Superman, Steven Spielberg, Akira, George Lucas, Zombies, Twin Peaks, Hiyao Miyazaki, James Bond, Watchmen, and whether drivers are required to pull over for the Ghostbusters. Find this podcast and its spin-off show, Podcasta la Vista, Baby! a celebration of the films of thespian and statesman Arnold Schwarzenegger, on iTunes, Stitcher and their website.
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Q:
Pandas rolling weighted average
I want to apply a weighted rolling average to a large timeseries, set up as a pandas dataframe, where the weights are different for each day. Here's a subset of the dataframe
DF:
Date v_std vertical
2010-10-01 1.909 545.231
2010-10-02 1.890 538.610
2010-10-03 1.887 542.759
2010-10-04 1.942 545.221
2010-10-05 1.847 536.832
2010-10-06 1.884 538.858
2010-10-07 1.864 538.017
2010-10-08 1.833 540.737
2010-10-09 1.847 537.906
2010-10-10 1.881 538.210
2010-10-11 1.868 544.238
2010-10-12 1.856 534.878
I want to take a rolling average of the vertical column using the v_std as the weights. I've been using the weighted average function:
def wavg(group, avg_name, weight_name):
d = group[avg_name]
w = group[weight_name]
try:
return (d * w).sum() / w.sum()
except ZeroDivisionError:
return d.mean()
But I can't figure out how to implement this for a rolling weighted average. I assume it is similar to
df.rolling(window = 7).apply(wavg, "vertical", "v_std")
or utilizing rolling_apply? Or will I have to write a new function all together?
Thank you!
A:
This is how I implemented weighted mean. Would be nice if there was a pairwise_apply for this sort of thing.
from pandas.core.window import _flex_binary_moment, _Rolling_and_Expanding
def weighted_mean(self, weights, **kwargs):
weights = self._shallow_copy(weights)
window = self._get_window(weights)
def _get_weighted_mean(X, Y):
X = X.astype('float64')
Y = Y.astype('float64')
sum_f = lambda x: x.rolling(window, self.min_periods, center=self.center).sum(**kwargs)
return sum_f(X * Y) / sum_f(Y)
return _flex_binary_moment(self._selected_obj, weights._selected_obj,
_get_weighted_mean, pairwise=True)
_Rolling_and_Expanding.weighted_mean = weighted_mean
df['mean'] = df['vertical'].rolling(window = 7).weighted_mean(df['v_std'])
A:
Here is my solution for rolling weighted average, using pandas _Rolling_and_Expanding:
First, I've added new column for the multiplication:
df['mul'] = df['value'] * df['weight']
Then write the function you would like to apply:
from pandas.core.window.rolling import _Rolling_and_Expanding
def weighted_average(x):
d = []
d.append(x['mul'].sum()/x['weight'].sum())
return pd.Series(d, index=['wavg'])
_Rolling_and_Expanding.weighted_average = weighted_average
Apply the function by the following line:
result = mean_per_group.rolling(window=7).weighted_average()
Then you can get the series you wanted by:
result['wavg']
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Q:
How to render specular highlights as a separate image with alpha channel?
I'm using the Blender Cycles engine to create graphics for a game; specifically, I want to display a grid of coloured ellipsoid counters for the player to move around. To avoid creating a separate image for each colour, I want to store a single greyscale image in the resources, and apply a colour tint at runtime:
However, with this approach, the specular highlights would also be tinted; so I would like to store the highlights as a separate image with an alpha channel, and overlay it on top of the tinted image.
I've tried Googling for ways to do this in Blender, and cannot find anything. The best solution I can think of is to set the glossy BSDF colour to red (1.0, 0.0, 0.0) and the diffuse BSDF colour to green (0.0, 1.0, 0.0):
I would then need to create a mask from the red channel, and create base and overlay greyscale images from the green and red channels respectively, either as a manual step in Gimp, or (better) store a single image in the resources and do the channel operations in code:
While I realise that I'm probably subverting the properties of light for the sake of coding simplicity, I am concerned that I may not be getting the most believable results. Given that the rendering engine knows more about the light paths than I do from the final image, is there a way to do this in Blender?
Thanks!
UPDATE
For posterity, these are the material nodes I ended up with:
With a further change to adjust the alpha channel on the highlight image, these are the compositing nodes I created:
Finally, this is the end result, after tinting and overlaying in the game source code:
A:
You should add in the specular with color, not mix shaders. In that way you will get a white highlight.
Here I'm using color ramps to make a mask for transparency and removing some of the gray on the specular before adding it to a solid color.
You can also render out Diffuse and Glossy and use the Compositor to choose color.
You need to add light passes for gloss direct and diffuse direct
The new passes can be then be exported from the Compositor via Image editor (set the image to be "Viewer Node") and then saved from there Image->Save As...
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10 First Date Ideas That *Aren’t* Dinner and a Movie
While Starbucks and Chipotle might be the top two date locations for first dates, we don’t think you need to resort to casual dining (or expensive cocktails) to have a good time. Don’t get us wrong — we love drinking and burritos as much as you do — but sometimes you need something a little more creative and fun to spice up that getting-to-know you phase. We’ve come up with 10 awesome first date ideas that are flirty, low-stress and won’t leave you bored or hungover.
1. Cook a Meal Together: Eating a well-cooked meal is a classic date option, but why not forgo the fancy dinner and try cooking together? Even if neither of you are very good at cooking, the laughter will definitely dispel any first-date awkwardness. Worst case scenario, you have something to giggle about and you can order a pizza instead.
2. DIY Wine Tasting: Obviously wine tasting is fun, but it can be expensive and maybe a little intimidating. Instead, have each person bring their two favorite types of wine (or make some sangria) and pretend to write the flavor description for each one. Not a wine connoisseur? Even better, since the made-up descriptions will have you both laughing.
3. Have Breakfast for Dinner: Craving something a little more casual? Maybe it’s time to choose a big stack of fluffy pancakes instead of that ribeye steak. And even though late-night diners might not be the candlelit dinner you’re used to, they are perfect for a more relaxed, fun setting.
4. Pretend to be a Tourist: It doesn’t matter where you live — we’ll bet there are some places in your town that you’ve never visited before. Instead of sitting in a coffee shop, take your coffee (and a baked goodie) to go and spend time wandering around a neighborhood you’ve never explored before.
5. Go to the Zoo: There is no better place to get to know someone and relive some childhood memories than at the zoo. Plus it’s a great excuse to eat “kid” food like snow cones and cotton candy. Extra points if you go wearing animal masks. Daytime dates like the zoo or an aquarium are great in case you need to bail early because you have “things to do.”
6. Take a Painting Class: Calling all artists and non-artists: Head to the easels instead of the bar this time. Find a painting class that serves wine or DIY your own painting class and you’re bound to come up with something fun.
7. Netflix Date: Depending on how cozy you want to get, a home movie night could be much more romantic than eating stale popcorn at the theater. Plus, Netflix has a plethora of ridiculous old movies that are bound to get a good laugh.
8. Go the Farmers’ Market: Take the date outside and spend time wandering through the stalls of beautiful produce, enjoying the weather and, of course, each other. And if everything goes well, you can enjoy picking out ingredients for an outdoor picnic or to take home and make dinner together.
9. Do Some Volunteer Work: Get some exercise and do something good for the soul like walking dogs at an animal shelter. Because they need the love, and there won’t be any awkward conversation lapses when you’re laughing at doggy antics. You could also combine two date ideas by baking up some doggy treats beforehand for extra kisses…. from the dogs of course ;)
10. Get Active: If you’re both the outdoorsy, sporty type, skip the movie theater and go for something more active like miniature golf, renting bikes or even trying something you’ve never tried before like rock climbing or a dance class. A little friendly competition encourages witty interaction, laughing and touching. It’s a win-win, right?
What have been some of your favorite first dates? Tell us your date ideas in the comments below!
Kate Thorn is an illustrator, foodie, photographer, and blogger at Create & Kate. She loves creating art, traveling, and all things chocolate. A native to the Great Northwest, she is currently living in London and pretending to be a mature grad student.
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Case: 18-10639 Date Filed: 12/21/2018 Page: 1 of 23
[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
________________________
No. 18-10639
Non-Argument Calendar
________________________
D.C. Docket No. 1:15-cv-01230-TCB
WAYNE LOWE, SR.,
MONETTE LOWE,
Plaintiffs - Appellants,
versus
CHARLENE SMITH,
JOHN BRUCE,
PAUL BERNICHON,
JUSTIN LYKINS,
Defendants - Appellees.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Northern District of Georgia
________________________
(December 21, 2018)
Before JILL PRYOR, HULL and JULIE CARNES, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Case: 18-10639 Date Filed: 12/21/2018 Page: 2 of 23
This case is about a regrettable incident likely caused by a
misunderstanding. Wayne Lowe, Sr. and Monette Lowe sued officers of the City
of Conyers, Georgia Police Department for unlawful arrest, excessive use of force,
and illegal search under federal law, as well as related state law claims. The
district court granted summary judgment to the defendant officers on the federal
law claims and dismissed the state law claims without prejudice. The Lowes
appeal the district court’s order. After careful review of the entire record, we
affirm.
I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
We construe the facts in the light most favorable to the Lowes, Tolan v.
Cotton, 572 U.S. 650, 657 (2014), and set them out in detail because they are
crucial to our later legal analysis. The Lowes’ ten-year-old son N.L. called 911
and, according to an audio recording of the call, informed the dispatcher, “My dad
is killing my brother.” Doc. 91, Ex. 3, 3:24-3:26.1 On the phone, N.L. sounded
hysterical, and the dispatcher mistook the word “brother” for “mother.” As a
result, the officers dispatched to the Lowes’ home believed they were going there
to investigate a possible homicide of N.L.’s mother, Monette Lowe. As it turned
out, Ms. Lowe was away at work during this entire episode. N.L.’s older brother
and sister had been inside the house during the 911 call, but they left before any of
1
Citations in the form “Doc. #” refer to entries on the district court docket.
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the police officers arrived, leaving only Mr. Lowe and N.L. in the house for what
transpired after the officers arrived.
Cameras and microphones in the vehicles driven by Conyers Police
Department Officers Charlene Smith, John Bruce, and Justin Lykins recorded the
events described below. Although the camera footage does not reveal a visual
picture of what happened at the Lowes’ door or inside their home, the recordings
do include audio of the incident.
Officer Smith arrived on the scene first and found the house “relatively
quiet.” Doc. 78 at 8. She knocked on the Lowes’ door, stated that she was with
the Conyers Police Department, and ordered Mr. Lowe to open the door. Mr.
Lowe opened the door, not all the way, but enough to show his entire body.
Officer Smith observed that he appeared sweaty.
Officer Smith commanded, “Have your wife come out.” Doc. 91, Ex. 5
(Officer Smith Video), 16:49:22-16:49:23. Mr. Lowe informed her that his wife
was at work. Officer Smith then ordered Mr. Lowe to step outside, but Mr. Lowe
refused, stating, “Why? I didn’t call you, and I don’t have to. Tell me what you
want.” Id. at 16:49:30-16:49:33. Officer Smith answered that the police had
“received a 911 call from this location.” Id. at 16:49:34-16:49:35. She inquired,
“Is there a young person here?”, id. at 16:49:37-16:49:38, at which point Mr. Lowe
opened the door all the way and informed her, “I got kids,” id. at 16:49:39.
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Through the doorway, Officer Smith was able to see N.L., who appeared
uninjured. Officer Smith twice commanded Mr. Lowe, “I need you to step out,”
but Mr. Lowe refused to do so and argued with Officer Smith, saying, “I don’t
have to step out, because I didn’t call you, I own this house, and you can’t make
me do that.” Id. at 16:49:44-16:49:53.
Officer John Bruce arrived at the Lowes’ door about one minute after
Officer Smith knocked on it. Three times, Officer Bruce ordered Mr. Lowe to
“[c]ome outside.” Id. at 16:50:19-16:50:22. After Mr. Lowe refused, Officer
Bruce told him, “You’re out here fighting with your wife. You’re going to get
Tased.” Id. at 16:50:23-16:50:24. Mr. Lowe yelled in response, “My wife is at
work, motherfuckers!” Id. at 16:50:24-16:50:26. During much of his interaction
with Officers Smith and Bruce leading up to this point, Mr. Lowe was, in his own
words, “[a]ggravated,” Doc. 81 at 125, and he spoke to the officers in a belligerent
manner.
Mr. Lowe contends that he never made any move toward the officers. Yet
immediately after he swore at them, a scuffle ensued in which Officer Bruce
violently pushed the front door even farther open, elbowed Mr. Lowe in the side of
the head, and grabbed his shoulders. Officer Smith reached under Officer Bruce’s
arm and discharged her Taser once onto Mr. Lowe’s abdomen. The scuffle lasted
about thirty seconds and ended with Officer Bruce handcuffing Mr. Lowe.
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During the scuffle, Mr. Lowe yelled a couple of times, “I didn’t do
anything!” Doc. 91, Ex. 5 (Officer Bruce Video), 16:50:34-16:50:37. N.L., who
witnessed the entire scene from inside the house, also yelled, “He didn’t do
anything!” Id. at 16:50:37-16:50:38, 16:50:43-16:50:44. Officer Bruce responded,
“That’s what you get for pushing me,” id. at 16:50:43-16:50:44, and “That’s what
you get for jumping up—bumping up to a police officer,” id. at 16:51:12-16:51:14.
After handcuffing Mr. Lowe, Officer Bruce immediately searched the first floor of
the house but found no other person.
Immediately after Mr. Lowe was handcuffed, Officer Paul Bernichon arrived
on the scene and entered the Lowes’ home. For the next five minutes, Officers
Smith, Bruce, and Bernichon attended to Mr. Lowe, while Officer Bruce argued
with Mr. Lowe over what had just taken place. In addition, either Officer Bruce or
Officer Bernichon radioed that there had been a Taser deployment, and Officer
Bruce read Mr. Lowe his Miranda warnings.
About five minutes after the scuffle ended, Officer Justin Lykins, the
supervising officer, arrived and also entered the home. Officer Bruce continued
arguing with Mr. Lowe. About a minute later, Officers Bernichon and Lykins
escorted Mr. Lowe, who was still handcuffed, out of the house to one of the police
vehicles.
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While Officers Bernichon and Lykins were outside with Mr. Lowe, Officer
Bruce asked Officer Smith and N.L. about the 911 call and Officer Smith’s
interaction with Mr. Lowe before he arrived. Officer Lykins reentered about a
minute later and then spoke with Officers Smith and Bruce and N.L. for about four
and half minutes about the circumstances of the 911 call and what had happened
before he arrived.2 N.L. informed the officers that he had reported to the 911
dispatcher that “someone was being killed.” Doc. 91, Ex. 7 (Officer Lykins
Video), 16:58:59-16:59:00.3 Officer Bruce replied, “But you told us that it was—
he was beating up your mom.” Id. at 16:59:02-16:59:05. Then N.L. explained,
“Not my mom; you probably heard me wrong.” Id. at 16:59:05-16:59:07.
Toward the end of the officers’ conversation with N.L., which was
approximately 12 minutes after Mr. Lowe was Tased, Officer Lykins said, “Let me
check upstairs to see if there’s any signs of violence or something upstairs.” Id. at
17:01:13-17:01:17. Officer Lykins proceeded to check the upstairs of the house,
where he found no one and no signs of violence.
The Lowes filed a complaint alleging three Fourth Amendment claims under
42 U.S.C. § 1983. Mr. Lowe claimed that (1) Officers Smith and Bruce unlawfully
arrested him and (2) used excessive force against him. Together, Mr. and Ms.
2
Officer Bernichon stayed with Mr. Lowe near one of the police vehicles until an
ambulance arrived.
3
The timestamps in Officer Lykins’s video appear to be approximately one minute and
forty-five seconds behind the timestamps in Officer Smith’s and Officer Bruce’s videos.
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Lowe claimed that (3) Officers Smith, Bruce, Bernichon, and Lykins conducted an
illegal search of their home. Mr. Lowe also alleged two Georgia state law claims
for false imprisonment and battery against Officers Smith and Bruce.4 The officers
moved for summary judgment on the grounds that they are entitled to qualified
immunity from suit on the federal claims and official immunity from suit on the
state law claims. The district court granted summary judgment to the defendants
on the federal law claims based on qualified immunity and declined to exercise
supplemental jurisdiction over the state law claims, dismissing them without
prejudice. The Lowes timely appealed.
II. STANDARDS OF REVIEW
We review de novo a district court’s entry of summary judgment based on
qualified immunity. Bashir v. Rockdale Cty., 445 F.3d 1323, 1326 (11th Cir.
2006). We review for abuse of discretion a district court’s dismissal without
prejudice of pendent state law claims. L.A. Draper & Son v. Wheelabrator-Frye,
Inc., 735 F.2d 414, 420 (11th Cir. 1984).
We view the facts in the light most favorable to the nonmoving parties, the
Lowes, and we also draw all reasonable inferences in their favor. Glasscox v. City
of Argo, 903 F.3d 1207, 1212 (11th Cir. 2018). That is, “[e]ven where the parties
agree on the facts, if reasonable minds might differ on the inferences arising from
4
Ms. Lowe later was added as a party-plaintiff, and six original defendant-officers have
been dismissed from the case.
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undisputed facts,” we must draw those inferences in favor of the Lowes and deny
summary judgment. Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). In contrast, when the
record reveals no genuine dispute of material fact, the movant is entitled to
judgment as a matter of law, and we must grant summary judgment. Id. at 1212-
13; see also Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a).
III. DISCUSSION
We address first the Lowes’ federal law claims and then Mr. Lowe’s state
law claims. Regarding Mr. Lowe’s unlawful arrest claim, we affirm the district
court’s grant of summary judgment to Officers Smith and Bruce based on qualified
immunity, although on a different ground. See Bonanni Ship Supply, Inc., v.
United States, 959 F.2d 1558, 1561 (11th Cir. 1992). Regarding Mr. Lowe’s
excessive force claim, we conclude that Mr. Lowe has abandoned any discrete
excessive force claim, so we affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment
to Officers Smith and Bruce, again on a different ground. See id. Regarding the
Lowes’ illegal search claim, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary
judgment to Officers Smith, Bruce, Bernichon, and Lykins based on qualified
immunity. Lastly, we affirm the district court’s dismissal without prejudice of Mr.
Lowe’s state law claims.
We begin with the Lowes’ federal law claims, on which the defendants
assert qualified immunity. Government officials asserting qualified immunity bear
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the initial burden of showing they were “acting within [their] discretionary
authority.” Glasscox, 903 F.3d at 1213 (internal quotation marks omitted). The
Lowes do not dispute that the officers were acting under their discretionary
authority. The burden therefore shifts to the Lowes to demonstrate that “(1) the
defendant[s] violated a constitutional right, and (2) this right was clearly
established at the time of the alleged violation.” Id. (internal quotation marks
omitted).
A. Officers Smith and Bruce Did Not Violate Mr. Lowe’s Fourth
Amendment Right Against Unlawful Arrest, and Even If They Did,
the Violation Was Not Clearly Established.
Under the Fourth Amendment, officers may make warrantless arrests if they
have probable cause to believe that the person to be arrested has committed a
crime. Atwater v. City of Lago Vista, 532 U.S. 318, 354 (2001). Even when the
officer has probable cause to believe a person has committed a crime, however,
warrantless arrests inside a home are “presumptively unreasonable.” Payton v.
New York, 445 U.S. 573, 586 (1980). Nevertheless, an in-home warrantless arrest
may still be reasonable under the Fourth Amendment if it comes within an
exception to the warrant requirement. See Brigham City v. Stuart, 547 U.S. 398,
403 (2006). One such exception is for “exigencies of the situation [that] make the
needs of law enforcement so compelling that the warrantless [entry] is objectively
reasonable under the Fourth Amendment.” Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385, 393-
9
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94 (1978) (internal quotation marks omitted). More specifically, to invoke the
exigent circumstances exception, officers must have “probable cause to believe
that exigent circumstances exist.” Smith v. LePage, 834 F.3d 1285, 1293 (11th Cir.
2016). Here, we conclude that Officers Smith and Bruce had probable cause to
believe that Mr. Lowe had committed a crime and that exigent circumstances
justified their entry into his home to make a warrantless arrest. Therefore, we hold
that their actions did not violate the Fourth Amendment. But even if their actions
did violate the Fourth Amendment, they did not violate clearly established law.
Officers Smith and Bruce argue that they had probable cause to arrest Mr.
Lowe for obstructing their investigation into a possible homicide. We agree.
Georgia’s obstruction statute makes it a crime to “knowingly and willfully
obstruct[] or hinder[] any law enforcement officer . . . in the lawful discharge of his
or her official duties.” O.C.G.A. § 16-10-24(a). Mr. Lowe thrice refused to step
outside the home so that the officers could investigate the circumstances of a 911
call that a child’s father was “killing” his “mother.” Doc. 91, Ex. 3, 3:24-3:26.
These facts, viewed in the light most favorable to Mr. Lowe, are sufficient to
support probable cause for the officers to believe that Mr. Lowe was committing
the crime of obstruction by preventing the officers from looking for the victim.
We also conclude that the exigent circumstances exception to the Fourth
Amendment’s warrant requirement applied here. “[E]mergency situations
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involving endangerment to life fall squarely within the exigent circumstances
exception.” United States v. Holloway, 290 F.3d 1331, 1337 (11th Cir. 2002). The
substance of the 911 call conveyed to Officers Smith and Bruce gave them
“probable cause to believe that exigent circumstances exist[ed],” that they needed
to enter the Lowes’ home immediately to ascertain Ms. Lowe’s safety, and that
they could do so only if they arrested Mr. Lowe, who was obstructing their entry
into the home. Smith, 834 F.3d at 1293. With probable cause that Mr. Lowe was
committing a crime and that an emergency was at hand inside the Lowes’ home,
Officers Smith and Bruce did not violate the Fourth Amendment in making an in-
home warrantless arrest of Mr. Lowe.5
5
The district court elided the distinction between probable cause supporting a warrantless
arrest and exigent circumstances supporting a warrantless entry into a home that precedes an
arrest. The district court quoted from Holloway, in which we stated that, “in an emergency, the
probable cause element may be satisfied where officers reasonably believe a person is in
danger.” Holloway, 290 F.3d at 1338; see also Roberts v. Spielman, 643 F.3d 899, 905 (11th
Cir. 2011) (quoting Holloway). But Holloway’s statement refers to the probable cause necessary
to support a warrantless search, not a warrantless arrest. In an emergency situation, the whole
purpose of the search is to locate victims and prevent further injury at the address to which the
911 caller refers the police. Thus, as long as the officer has probable cause to believe an
emergency is at hand, a warrantless entry and search of reasonable scope are allowed. Smith,
834 F.3d at 1293.
The purpose of the warrantless arrest is different: the arrest incapacitates a person
committing a crime. If Mr. Lowe had cooperated with the officers’ commands to step outside,
they would have lacked probable cause that he was committing the crime of obstruction, and
therefore they would have lacked authority to arrest him for that crime. But the emergency still
would have given rise to an exigent circumstance justifying a warrantless entry into his home
(and a subsequent search to locate the exact site of the emergency and any victims).
Reading Holloway incorrectly, the district court undertook only half of the probable
cause analysis in concluding that the officers had probable cause to arrest Mr. Lowe (or that they
were at least entitled to qualified immunity on this claim). The district court determined that
“the officers had probable cause to believe that Monette Lowe was in serious danger inside the
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Mr. Lowe cites United States v. Timmann, in which we observed that our
Court and the Supreme Court usually point to “indicia of an urgent, ongoing
emergency, in which officers have received emergency reports of an ongoing
disturbance, arrived to find a chaotic scene, and observed violent behavior, or at
least evidence of violent behavior” in holding that the exigent circumstances
exception applied. 741 F.3d 1170, 1179-80 (11th Cir. 2013) (discussing cases,
including Stuart, 547 U.S. at 398, and Michigan v. Fisher, 558 U.S. 45 (2009)); see
also Smith, 834 F.3d at 1293. In contrast, upon Officer Smith’s arrival, she
observed that the scene was, in her words, “relatively quiet,” Doc. 78 at 8, a far cry
from “chaotic,” Timmann, 741 F.3d at 1179.
Nevertheless, Officers Smith and Bruce were responding to a 911 call about
someone being killed, and the situation still presented “the need for a prompt
assessment” of, at best, “hurried and incomplete” and “ambiguous information
concerning potentially serious consequences”—a homicide. Holloway, 290 F.3d at
1339 (internal quotation marks omitted). The ambiguous information included
house.” Doc. 98 at 21. Having identified the emergency, the district court apparently concluded
that the probable cause element was “satisfied.” Holloway, 290 F.3d at 1338. Yet the probable
cause to believe Ms. Lowe was in serious danger supported only a warrantless entry into the
Lowes’ home to search for Ms. Lowe (or another injured person). The district court failed to
evaluate whether the officers had probable cause to believe that Mr. Lowe had committed or was
committing a crime (or whether “arguable probable cause” existed to support a grant of qualified
immunity, Montoute v. Carr, 114 F.3d 181, 184 (11th Cir. 1997)). Without that second half of
the analysis, the district court erred in granting summary judgment to the defendants on Mr.
Lowe’s unlawful arrest claim. The district court’s error is of no moment, however, because our
de novo review leads us to the same outcome. Bonanni, 959 F.2d at 1561.
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uncertainty about Ms. Lowe’s safety, Mr. Lowe’s refusal to follow the officers’
orders to step outside, his sweaty appearance, and his belligerent and
“[a]ggravated” demeanor. Doc. 81 at 125. Moreover, “[o]fficers do not need
ironclad proof of a likely serious, life-threatening injury to invoke the emergency
aid exception.” Fisher, 558 U.S. at 49 (internal quotation marks omitted). Based
on their understanding of the substance of the 911 call, Mr. Lowe’s refusal to step
outside,6 and the ambiguous information they found at the scene, Officers Smith
and Bruce had “probable cause to believe that exigent circumstances exist[ed]” and
that they needed to arrest Mr. Lowe to remove him from the entryway to determine
whether Ms. Lowe was hurt inside the house. Smith, 834 F.3d at 1293.7
Mr. Lowe also argues that, after he informed Officer Smith that his wife was
at work, Officer Smith or Officer Bruce should have asked the dispatcher to call
Ms. Lowe to check whether she was all right. Yet doing so would defeat the
6
To be clear, without a warrant or an exception to the warrant requirement—for example,
consent or exigent circumstances—police may not compel people to permit entry to their homes
or to step out of their homes. See Payton, 445 U.S. at 586. When an officer explicitly states that
she is responding to a 911 emergency call, however, the right of privacy must yield to the
officer’s need to locate and assist the person believed to be seriously injured or threatened with
serious injury—which is the very reason for the exigent circumstances exception. See Stuart,
547 U.S. at 403.
7
Mr. Lowe also cites the nonbinding case of Rainwater v. City of Hogansville, in which
the district court concluded that police officers responding to a 911 call violated the plaintiff’s
Fourth Amendment rights by forcing their way into her home, knocking her down, and
handcuffing her. Order at 4, 9, Rainwater v. City of Hogansville, No. 3:10-cv-35-TCB (N.D. Ga.
Mar. 29, 2013). But one of the key differences between Rainwater and this case is that Ms.
Rainwater “indicated her willingness to come outside and speak with” the officers, id. at 10,
whereas Mr. Lowe repeatedly refused the officers’ commands for him to step outside. Rainwater
therefore fails to lend even persuasive authority to this case.
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purpose of the 911 system: “[i]f law enforcement could not rely on information
conveyed by . . . 911 callers, their ability to respond effectively to emergency
situations would be significantly curtailed.” Holloway, 290 F.3d at 1339; see also
Smith, 834 F.3d at 1293 (declining to impose duty to investigate further whether
“circumstances were exigent before entering . . . because it would be contrary to
the core purpose of the exigent circumstances exception,” i.e., “to allow swift
police action during an emergency”). The “business of policemen . . . is to act, not
to speculate or meditate on whether the report is correct.” Holloway, 290 F.3d at
1340 (internal quotation marks omitted). “The Fourth Amendment does not
require police officers to delay in the course of an investigation if to do so would
gravely endanger . . . the lives of others. Speed here was essential . . . .” Warden
v. Hayden, 387 U.S. 294, 298-99 (1967). Just as officers need not seek out
“ironclad” proof that an emergency really does exist when they receive a 911 call
about a homicide in progress, Fisher, 558 U.S. at 49, they need not affirmatively
seek out evidence to disprove that an emergency is ongoing. 8
In addition, Mr. Lowe argues that the officers could not reasonably have
believed that Ms. Lowe was injured inside the house because they were able to
observe through the doorway that N.L. was uninjured and relatively calm. But this
8
Of course, not all 911 calls are created equal. We do not decide what duties police have
in responding to 911 calls that suggest no emergency. What matters is that the substance of the
call bears indicia of an emergency, not the fact that the police received the information through
the 911 dispatch system.
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argument fails because a reasonable officer could have believed that Mr. Lowe had
more than one child. Indeed, Mr. Lowe had informed Officer Smith that he had
“kids,” plural. Doc 91, Ex. 5 (Officer Smith Video), 16:49:39. Officers Smith and
Bruce did not know at the time they arrested Mr. Lowe that N.L. was the child who
had called 911. It would have been reasonable for them to believe that another
child had called 911 because someone was hurt inside the home, unbeknownst to
N.L.
We have already concluded that Officers Smith and Bruce did not violate
Mr. Lowe’s Fourth Amendment right to be free from an unlawful arrest because
the officers had probable cause to believe that he was committing a crime and that
an emergency justified their warrantless entry to effect his arrest. Even if Officers
Smith and Bruce did violate Mr. Lowe’s Fourth Amendment right, though, we hold
that they are entitled to qualified immunity on this claim.
To receive qualified immunity, “an officer need not have actual probable
cause but only ‘arguable probable cause,’ i.e., the facts and circumstances must be
such that the officer reasonably could have believed that probable cause existed.”
Montoute v. Carr, 114 F.3d 181, 184 (11th Cir. 1997). Officers Smith and Bruce
had arguable probable cause that Mr. Lowe was committing the crime of
obstruction: reasonable officers in their positions could have believed that they
needed to determine whether Ms. Lowe was hurt inside the house and that Mr.
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Lowe’s refusal to step outside gave rise to probable cause that he was obstructing
them from investigating the emergency. Likewise, reasonable officers could have
believed that the urgency and gravity of investigating whether Ms. Lowe was in
danger created probable cause that exigent circumstances necessitated their entry
to the Lowes’ home. Lastly, reasonable officers could have believed that Mr.
Lowe’s refusal to exit the house generated probable cause that his arrest was the
only way to ensure that they could enter and locate the source of the emergency.
At the time of this incident, it was not clearly established that, in responding
to a 911 call that a man was killing a woman, the Fourth Amendment bars officers
from making an in-home warrantless arrest of a man they believe is preventing
them from entering the house to investigate a possible homicide. No precedent of
which we are aware “squarely governs the case here” to give the officers notice
that their conduct was illegal (assuming that it was illegal). Brosseau v. Haugen,
543 U.S. 194, 201 (2004). Officers Smith and Bruce are entitled to qualified
immunity on Mr. Lowe’s unlawful arrest claim. For the foregoing reasons, we
affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment to the defendants on this
claim, even though we do so on a slightly different ground than the one adopted by
the district court. Bonanni, 959 F.2d at 1561.
B. Mr. Lowe Has Abandoned Any Discrete Excessive Force Claim, and
His Non-Discrete Claim That the Force Used Was Excessive Because
the Arrest Was Unlawful Fails As a Matter of Law.
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The district court concluded that the use of force by Officers Smith and
Bruce did not violate clearly established law. We affirm the district court’s
rejection of Mr. Lowe’s excessive force claim, again on a different ground. Id.
“Under this Circuit’s law, . . . a claim that any force in an illegal stop or
arrest is excessive is subsumed in the illegal stop or arrest claim and is not a
discrete excessive force claim.” Jackson v. Sauls, 206 F.3d 1156, 1171 (11th Cir.
2000). The damages for an unlawful arrest include “damages suffered because of
the use of force in effecting the arrest.” Williamson v. Mills, 65 F.3d 155, 158
(11th Cir. 1995). Even if the initial stop or arrest was lawful, a plaintiff may still
allege “a discrete excessive force claim” that the amount of force used to effect that
stop or arrest was excessive. Jackson, 206 F.3d at 1171. Here, it is unclear from
the Lowes’ amended complaint whether Mr. Lowe alleges a non-discrete or a
discrete excessive force claim.
We need not decipher the amended complaint, however. The Lowes
explicitly state in their brief on appeal that they “do not argue that Mr. Lowe was
subjected to excessive force per se.” Appellants’ Br. at 23. Thus Mr. Lowe
knowingly has abandoned on appeal any discrete claim he may have made in the
district court that the amount of force used was excessive even if the arrest was
lawful. Rather, Mr. Lowe makes the non-discrete claim that any force used against
him was excessive because his arrest was unlawful. But because we have already
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determined that Mr. Lowe’s arrest was lawful or that a reasonable officer would
have thought it was lawful given the clearly established law at the time, this non-
discrete claim fails as a matter of law. See Bashir, 445 F.3d at 1331-33. Officers
Smith and Bruce are entitled to summary judgment on Mr. Lowe’s excessive force
claim.
C. The Officers’ Entries Into the Lowes’ Home and Officers Bruce’s
and Lykins’s Searches Did Not Violate the Lowes’ Fourth
Amendment Rights To Be Free From Unreasonable Searches and,
Even If They Did, These Violations Were Not Clearly Established.
As with warrantless in-home arrests, warrantless in-home searches require
both probable cause and exigent circumstances. Holloway, 290 F.3d at 1337.
Although ordinarily the purpose of a search is to recover evidence of a crime, the
purpose of a search in an emergency situation is to “locate victims and . . . ensure
[the officers’] safety and that of the public.” Id. “Thus, in an emergency, the
probable cause element may be satisfied where officers reasonably believe a
person is in danger.” Id. at 1338. In other words, if the police have probable cause
to believe that an emergency is going on inside the home, the police may conduct a
warrantless search inside the home to locate the source of the emergency. See
Smith, 834 F.3d at 1293. We conclude that the four officers’ entries into the front
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room of the Lowes’ home, Officer Bruce’s search of the downstairs, and Officer
Lykins’s search of the upstairs did not run afoul of the Fourth Amendment. 9
The Supreme Court has long recognized threats to life as the sort of
emergency that satisfies the exigent circumstances exception to the search warrant
requirement. “[T]he Fourth Amendment does not bar police officers from making
warrantless entries and searches when they reasonably believe that a person within
is in need of immediate aid.” Mincey, 437 U.S. at 392. Based on the substance of
the 911 call, as they understood it, Officers Smith and Bruce had probable cause to
believe there could be a person in need of immediate aid inside the Lowes’ home,
justifying their entry into the downstairs of the home. Officer Bruce’s search of
the downstairs for victims remained “strictly circumscribed by the exigenc[y]” of
investigating a possible homicide, id. at 393 (internal quotation marks omitted); the
Lowes have not alleged that Officer Bruce opened or searched in compartments
where a victim could not reasonably be found. Therefore, in searching the first
floor of the Lowes’ home, Officer Bruce did not violate the Fourth Amendment’s
prohibition on unreasonable searches.
9
Although Officers Smith’s and Bernichon’s entries into the Lowes’ home qualify as
“searches” under the Fourth Amendment, see O’Rourke v. Hayes, 378 F.3d 1201, 1207 (11th Cir.
2004), nothing in the record indicates that they went anywhere other than the front room of the
Lowes’ home or opened any compartments in it. Therefore, in this section, we determine only
whether their limited entries into the front room of the Lowes’ home were illegal.
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This still leaves the issues of Officer Bernichon’s entry and Officer Lykins’s
entry and search of the upstairs. Our precedent provides that, after a person’s
Fourth Amendment interest “is invaded legally by an official of the State, the
citizen has lost his reasonable expectation of privacy to the extent of the
invasion. . . . [A]dditional investigators or officials may therefore enter a
citizen’s property after one official has already intruded legally.” United States v.
Brand, 556 F.2d 1312, 1317 (5th Cir. 1977). 10 That said, “later officials must
confine their intrusion to the scope of the original invasion.” Id. at 1317 n.9, 1318
(holding that officers’ entry into and search of a bedroom exceeded the scope of
the emergency, which was confined to the living room). And the “scope of the
original invasion” is defined by the “scope of the exigency justifying the original
warrantless entry.” United States v. Parr, 716 F.2d 796, 801, 812-13 (11th Cir.
1983) (holding that a firefighter’s search of a sugar bowl exceeded the scope of the
emergency, which was to fight the fire and locate its source).
Officers Bernichon’s and Lykins’s entries into the downstairs of the Lowes’
home came within the “scope of the original invasion” that Officers Smith and
Bruce had already lawfully made to investigate whether anyone was hurt inside the
house. Brand, 556 F.2d at 1317 & n.9. Mr. Lowe does not allege that Officers
10
Decisions of the former Fifth Circuit rendered prior to the close of business on
September 30, 1981 are binding on this Court. See Bonner v. City of Prichard, 661 F.2d 1206,
1209 (11th Cir. 1981) (en banc).
20
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Bernichon and Lykins entered any downstairs area that Officer Bruce had not
already searched or that they opened compartments that could not reasonably be
expected to contain a person. Therefore, these officers’ entries into the downstairs
of the Lowes’ home did not violate the Fourth Amendment.
The Lowes argue that Officer Lykins’s search of the upstairs exceeded the
scope of the exigency that justified Officer Bruce’s search of the downstairs.
Given the subject of the 911 call—a possible homicide—it is curious that the
officers allowed approximately 12 minutes to lapse between handcuffing Mr. Lowe
and Officer Lykins initiating the search of the upstairs.
Nevertheless, the specific facts of this case indicate that the exigent
circumstances exception to the warrant requirement justified Officer Lykins’s
search of the upstairs. During these intervening 12 minutes, Officers Smith, Bruce,
and Bernichon attended to Mr. Lowe; Officer Bruce argued with him over what
had happened and read him his Miranda warnings; once Officer Lykins arrived, he
and Officer Bernichon escorted Mr. Lowe outside; and Officers Smith, Bruce, and
Lykins discussed amongst themselves and with N.L. the circumstances of the 911
call and the altercation with Mr. Lowe.
The officers may have displayed a lack of diligence in letting 12 minutes
pass before Officer Lykins checked the upstairs. Yet we cannot say that they acted
unreasonably in attending to Mr. Lowe or inquiring with N.L. about the
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circumstances of the 911 call and the sequence of events that resulted in Mr. Lowe
getting Tased and arrested. Based on the information Officer Lykins had gleaned
from speaking with Officers Smith, Bruce, and N.L., Officer Lykins had probable
cause to believe that there might be a person hurt upstairs. The Lowes do not
allege that Officer Lykins searched in places that could not be expected to contain
a person. For these reasons, Officer Lykins’s search did not violate the Fourth
Amendment. See Smith, 834 F.3d at 1293; Holloway, 290 F.3d at 1337-38. 11
Even assuming Officers Smith’s, Bruce’s, Bernichon’s, and Lykins’s entries
and Officers Bruce’s and Lykins’s searches violated the Fourth Amendment, the
officers are entitled to qualified immunity because such violations were not clearly
established at the time of the incident. Each officer had arguable probable cause to
believe there was an ongoing emergency—a possible homicide—that required
them to enter the Lowes’ home and search it for victims. Montoute, 114 F.3d at
184. Stated in the negative, the need to investigate the source of the 911 call meant
that the “contours” of the Lowes’ rights not to have their home searched were not
11
Officer Lykins relies on Montanez v. Carvajal, in which we held that officers’
subsequent entries into a home “were justified even though the exigency that underlay the first
two searches had almost surely passed.” 889 F.3d 1202, 1212 (11th Cir. 2018). Yet neither
Montanez nor Brand, the case Montanez cites, stand for the proposition that an officer arriving
after the exigency has already passed may search in rooms that earlier-arriving officers had not
already searched when the exigency was ongoing. In Brand, our predecessor court held that
officers’ entry into and search of a bedroom violated the Fourth Amendment because the
exigency was limited to the living room. 556 F.2d at 1318. No officer had searched the upstairs
of the Lowes’ home before Officer Lykins did, so he cannot rely on the “subsequent entries”
justification from Montanez and Brand to justify his search. Montanez, 889 F.3d at 1212.
22
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“sufficiently clear” such that “a reasonable official would understand that what he
[wa]s doing violate[d] th[ose] right[s].” Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 202 (2001).
All four officers are entitled to qualified immunity—and summary judgment—on
the Lowes’ illegal search claim.
D. We Affirm the Dismissal of Mr. Lowe’s State Law Claims Without
Prejudice.
Because we affirm the grant of summary judgment to the defendants on the
federal claims, we also conclude that it was not an abuse of discretion for the
district court to decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over Mr. Lowe’s state
law false imprisonment and battery claims and to dismiss those claims without
prejudice. See Carnegie-Mellon Univ. v. Cohill, 484 U.S. 343, 350 (1988). We
affirm the district court’s nonprejudicial dismissal of those claims. See Starship
Enters. of Atlanta, Inc. v. Coweta Cty., 708 F.3d 1243, 1252 (11th Cir. 2013).
IV. CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary
judgment to the defendants on the federal claims and dismissal of the state law
claims without prejudice.
AFFIRMED.
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1989 FINA Men's Water Polo World Cup
The 1989 FINA Men's Water Polo World Cup was the sixth edition of the event, organised by the world's governing body in aquatics, the International Swimming Federation (FINA). The event took place in Berlin, West Germany. Eight teams participated to decide the winner of what would be a bi-annual event until 1999.
Final ranking
References
FINA History p. 23
1989
F
W
1989
Category:1989 in West Berlin
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Endovascular repair of para-anastomotic aortic aneurysms.
Para-anastomotic aneurysms involving the aorta and iliac arteries can occur years after aortic surgery and are at risk for rupture and erosion into surrounding structures. We report on our continued experience with patients who have been treated for these lesions with endovascular management as an alternative to traditional open repair. Patients who underwent endovascular repair of para-anastomotic aneurysms involving the distal aortic arch, descending thoracic aorta, abdominal aorta, or iliac arteries were prospectively followed up in a database. Patient comorbidities, initial aortic pathology, initial graft configuration, aneurysm characteristics, evidence of infection, type and configuration of endograft used, and follow-up were analyzed. From 1997 to 2006, 53 patients with 65 para-anastomotic aneurysms were treated with endovascular stent grafts. Patients who were originally treated for aortoiliac occlusive disease presented significantly later than those treated for aneurysmal disease (15.8 vs 8.9 years, P < .01) The initial technical success rate was 98%. Endoleaks were identified in six patients (11%) < or =1 month of surgery, and three required reintervention, including open conversions. Endoleak complications were significantly associated with patients who had symptomatic para-anastomotic aneurysms (P = .01). Perioperative mortality after endovascular repair was 3.8%. Overall mortality within a mean follow-up of 18 months was 49% and was significantly associated with older age at the time of endovascular treatment (P = .03). Endovascular repair of para-anastomotic aneurysms involving the aorta and iliac arteries is technically feasible and is associated with a low perioperative morbidity and mortality. Close follow-up is required to identify endoleaks. Long-term survival is limited in older patients. We recommend endovascular stent graft repair for para-anastomotic aneurysms in anatomically suitable patients.
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Viral infections are one of the main causes of upper respiratory tract infections as these can be spread easily from one person to another via contact with an infected person. This also means that it becomes difficult for one to regulate a child’s interaction especially during day care as they often come into direct contact with other children. There is no definite cure currently available for viral infections.
Bacterial Infections
Staphylococcus Areaus is a common bacterium known to cause sinus infections. Bacterial infections are usually treatable with antibiotics.
Gastro Oesophageal Reflux (GERD)
Any reflux of stomach acids from a child’s stomach rising up the oesophagus can cause severe irritation of the tube linings close to the throat or naso-pharynx. This can result in the development of more mucus flowing down the posterior nares and increases the incidence of mucus production and post-nasal drip.
Certain environmental items
Tobacco smoke and pollutants in the air can increase a child’s susceptibility to developing sinusitis.
Immune Deficiency
A child’s immune system is immature up until the age of seven. This makes a child more susceptible to developing sinus infections.
Cystic Fibrosis
Cystic fibrosis is a hereditary condition. Children born with cystic fibrosis experience thick, mucus secretions that are sticky and difficult to dislodge. This thick nasal mucus can build-up in the digestive tract and lungs. Cystic fibrosis is a life threatening condition in young children and can lead to chronic lung disease. Children with cystic fibrosis are also more likely to develop multiple sinus conditions over their lifetime.
A deviated nasal septum
A child can be born with a deviated nasal septum. This is an anatomical defect which in most cases does not cause further problems. In some cases the deviation can be so pronounced that it prevents effective mucus drainage.
Diseased Haller cells
Haller cells can occur in the maxillary sinus cavities and are a variant of ethmoidal air cells. When these become diseased, they grow causing an obstruction in the sinus cavities as well as cause a narrowing of the exit ways for mucus to drain from the sinus cavities.
Cilia Disorders or damage
Disorders affecting the cilia result in impaired mucus transportation and removal from the nasal passages and sinus cavities. The mucus that is not removed from the sinus cavities and nasal passages is allowed to stagnant and dry-out resulting in the development of acute sinus infections. One such disorder is known as immotile cilia syndrome.
Immunoglobulin levels
Tests for Immunoglobulin-E are not performed on children younger than three years of age due to them not being reliable at this age. Immunoglobulin tests are performed to determine if allergies are present.
Nasal Polyp Formation
The development of a non-cancerous growths or nasal polyps is very rare in children. Should your child develop a nasal polyp please have him or her tested for Cystic Fibrosis.
Allergic Rhinitis / Asthma
Allergic Rhinitis causes an increase in mucus production by the mucus membrane linings in the nasal passages and sinus cavities. Rhinitis is very common in children suffering with asthma (allergic or non-allergic). This can lead to post nasal drip and upper respiratory tract infections in children if not treated in a timely manner.
Allergic Fungal Sinusitis
Studies have found that there is a higher incidence of allergic fungal sinusitis in children when compared to adults. Allergic fungal sinusitis is an allergic reaction caused by fungi or mold. Fungi and mold are airborne and are therefore easily able to enter the sinus cavities and nasal passages. Fungal allergies are highly resilient and are why treatment should be sought immediately to prevent a further spread of fungal spores. Aspergillus is one of the main culprits of allergic fungal sinusitis in children. Blocked nasal passages, post nasal drip, headaches, excessive rhinorrhoea and a foul smell emanating from the nasal passages may be experienced. A combination of antihistamines, immunotherapy, corticosteroids and antifungal medications may be prescribed.
Rhino-Sinusitis
Any inflammation or swelling of the sinus cavities (may be caused by an allergy, infection or even an autoimmune disease) and can result in an irritation or swelling of the membrane linings. Any increase in membrane swelling results in a decrease in drainage space, allowing for the accumulation and build-up of excess nasal mucus.
Concha bullosa, (aerated middle turbinate)
Concha bullosa is an air filled cavity within the middle turbinate. In certain circumstances, a large air pocket may form within the turbinate causing it to bulge to one side. This can in turn result in a smaller nasal passage through which mucus can drain resulting in an accumulation and build-up of nasal mucus.
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Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu has compared his Israeli counterpart to the assailants who murdered 17 people in Paris last week, in the latest scene of war of words between the leaders of the two countries.
Davutoglu said that Israel's military operations on Gaza and its raiding in 2010 of an aid flotilla ship in international waters were on par with the attacks in Paris.
"Netanyahu has committed crimes against humanity like the terrorists who performed the Paris massacre," he told a press conference televised by Turkish media in the capital Ankara on Thursday.
Netanyahu has committed crimes against humanity the same as those terrorists who carried out the Paris massacre. - Ahmet Davutoglu, Turkish PM,
Victims including journalists and police officers were killed in the assault on the office of the Charlie Hebdo office last Wednesday and in a bloody hostage situation at a kosher supermarket two days later.
Relations between Turkey and Israel remain in crisis since May 2010 when Israeli troops raided the Mavi Marmara flotilla ship sailing in international waters and heading to the Gaza Strip to break the Israeli blockade there.
The incident left nine pro-Palestinian activists, eight Turks and one American citizen with Turkish origin dead onboard the ship.
Israel fought a 1,5-month war with armed groups in the Gaza Strip in the summer of 2014.
More than 2,300 Palestinians, mostly civilians, died by Israeli attacks that caused massive devastation in the tiny Palestinian territory, according to Gazan medical officials, while the Israeli reported 73 deaths, mostly soldiers.
Soli Ozel, a professor of International Relations at Istanbul's Kadir Has University, said that before the war, Israel and Turkey were getting ready to exchange ambassadors.
"Israel bought Kurdish oil that was loaded to a tanker in Turkey and deposited the money in Halkbank [a Turkish state-owned bank] as Turkey wanted," he told Al Jazeera.
The sale in question took place in June 2014.
New row
Last weekend's solidarity march in Paris after the attacks has escalated a new row between the two formerly allied countries.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s conservative president, condemned Benjamin Netanyahu for "daring" to attend the march on Monday and was countered by Israel's far-right foreign minister, Avigdor Lieberman, who called Erdogan an "anti-Semitic bully" on Wednesday.
The Turkish government condemned the Paris attacks, but has also warned of the risk of rising Islamophobia.
Davutoglu also attended the Paris memorial rally, saying that it was a "march against terrorism".
"Netanyahu, as the head of the government that kills children playing on the beach with the bombardment of Gaza, destroys thousands of homes ... and that massacred our citizens on an aid ship in international waters, has committed crimes against humanity," the prime minister said on Thursday in the televised press conference.
"If Israel is looking for a bully, it needs to look in the mirror," he said.
In a separate statement on Thursday, Erdogan's spokesman called Netanyahu "Islamophobic".
"The fact that Netanyahu attended the march after Paris attacks is regrettable and it should be condemned," Ibrahim Kalin said on the presidential website. He also blamed the Israeli leader for directly linking Islam to terror.
According to Israeli media, at a speech in a synagogue in Paris last week, Netanyahu said: "A direct line leads between the attacks of extremist Islam around the world to the attack that took place here at a kosher supermarket in the heart of Paris."
Hamas 'not terrorist'
On Tuesday, Davutoglu said that his country did not regard Hamas a terrorist group.
"If their land was not occupied, there would be no need for the existence of Hamas and that is the reason why we do not see them as a terrorist movement," he said.
Israeli politicians have various times blamed Turkey for "sponsoring terrorism", saying the country is a base for Hamas.
"For five years now, cozy commercial relations and domestically useful mutual bashing go together," Ozel told Al Jazeera.
"Harsh rhetoric against one another pays for both sides. One can also add the immense dislike between the leaders [Netanyahu and Erdogan] as another reason for current tense relations."
The trade relations between Turkey and Israel remain strong, growing steadily amid harsh diplomatic rhetoric between leaders.
In 2013, in a phone call facilitated by US President Barack Obama, Netanyahu apologised to Erdogan, prime minister of the time, over loss of lives aboard Mavi Marmara.
Follow Umut Uras on Twitter: @Um_Uras
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Q:
How do I get code coverage of AWS Device Farm tests with Android?
I am running instrumentation tests on AWS Device Farm and can download the results of the tests but do not see any *.exec or *.ec files in the results. This is what I typically see when running tests locally with an attached device/emulator using Gradle.
Does AWS Device Farm support code coverage?
A:
I work for the AWS Device Farm team.
Unfortunately, that artifact isn't exposed yet on device farm.
I have made a note of it in our product backlog.
I am curious if you can obtain the same thing if you were not running from Android studio at all.
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Q:
could not find class exception facebook on android app.how?
i am doing facebook app in my project.
i followed this step the sample app in this link.
http://code.google.com/p/fbconnect-android/downloads/list
now i got this exception in my Logcat.
02-20 22:02:29.020: INFO/ActivityManager(58): Starting activity: Intent { cmp=com.example.brown/.Brown_FaceBook }
02-20 22:02:29.409: ERROR/dalvikvm(236): Could not find class 'com.codecarpet.fbconnect.FBPermissionActivity', referenced from method com.example.brown.Brown_FaceBook.askPermission
02-20 22:02:29.418: WARN/dalvikvm(236): VFY: unable to resolve const-class 78 (Lcom/codecarpet/fbconnect/FBPermissionActivity;) in Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook;
02-20 22:02:29.418: DEBUG/dalvikvm(236): VFY: replacing opcode 0x1c at 0x0002
02-20 22:02:29.428: DEBUG/dalvikvm(236): Making a copy of Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook;.askPermission code (125 bytes)
02-20 22:02:29.438: INFO/dalvikvm(236): Could not find method com.codecarpet.fbconnect.FBSession.getUid, referenced from method com.example.brown.Brown_FaceBook.checkPermission
02-20 22:02:29.448: WARN/dalvikvm(236): VFY: unable to resolve virtual method 124: Lcom/codecarpet/fbconnect/FBSession;.getUid ()Ljava/lang/Long;
02-20 22:02:29.448: DEBUG/dalvikvm(236): VFY: replacing opcode 0x6e at 0x0009
02-20 22:02:29.457: DEBUG/dalvikvm(236): Making a copy of Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook;.checkPermission code (112 bytes)
02-20 22:02:29.469: ERROR/dalvikvm(236): Could not find class 'com.codecarpet.fbconnect.FBFeedActivity', referenced from method com.example.brown.Brown_FaceBook.publishFeed
02-20 22:02:29.469: WARN/dalvikvm(236): VFY: unable to resolve const-class 75 (Lcom/codecarpet/fbconnect/FBFeedActivity;) in Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook;
02-20 22:02:29.478: DEBUG/dalvikvm(236): VFY: replacing opcode 0x1c at 0x0002
02-20 22:02:29.478: DEBUG/dalvikvm(236): Making a copy of Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook;.publishFeed code (68 bytes)
02-20 22:02:29.497: WARN/dalvikvm(236): Unable to resolve superclass of Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook$FBSessionDelegateImpl; (81)
02-20 22:02:29.497: WARN/dalvikvm(236): Link of class 'Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook$FBSessionDelegateImpl;' failed
02-20 22:02:29.507: ERROR/dalvikvm(236): Could not find class 'com.example.brown.Brown_FaceBook$FBSessionDelegateImpl', referenced from method com.example.brown.Brown_FaceBook.onCreate
02-20 22:02:29.521: WARN/dalvikvm(236): VFY: unable to resolve new-instance 95 (Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook$FBSessionDelegateImpl;) in Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook;
02-20 22:02:29.528: DEBUG/dalvikvm(236): VFY: replacing opcode 0x22 at 0x0015
02-20 22:02:29.528: DEBUG/dalvikvm(236): Making a copy of Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook;.onCreate code (292 bytes)
02-20 22:02:29.537: WARN/dalvikvm(236): Unable to resolve superclass of Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook$FBSessionDelegateImpl; (81)
02-20 22:02:29.537: WARN/dalvikvm(236): Link of class 'Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook$FBSessionDelegateImpl;' failed
02-20 22:02:29.547: ERROR/dalvikvm(236): Could not find class 'com.example.brown.Brown_FaceBook$FBSessionDelegateImpl', referenced from method com.example.brown.Brown_FaceBook.onCreate
02-20 22:02:29.558: WARN/dalvikvm(236): VFY: unable to resolve new-instance 95 (Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook$FBSessionDelegateImpl;) in Lcom/example/brown/Brown_FaceBook;
02-20 22:02:29.558: DEBUG/dalvikvm(236): VFY: replacing opcode 0x22 at 0x007e
02-20 22:02:29.570: DEBUG/AndroidRuntime(236): Shutting down VM
02-20 22:02:29.577: WARN/dalvikvm(236): threadid=3: thread exiting with uncaught exception (group=0x4001b188)
02-20 22:02:29.587: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): Uncaught handler: thread main exiting due to uncaught exception
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: com.example.brown.Brown_FaceBook$FBSessionDelegateImpl
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at com.example.brown.Brown_FaceBook.onCreate(Brown_FaceBook.java:80)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at android.app.Instrumentation.callActivityOnCreate(Instrumentation.java:1047)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at android.app.ActivityThread.performLaunchActivity(ActivityThread.java:2459)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at android.app.ActivityThread.handleLaunchActivity(ActivityThread.java:2512)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at android.app.ActivityThread.access$2200(ActivityThread.java:119)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at android.app.ActivityThread$H.handleMessage(ActivityThread.java:1863)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at android.os.Handler.dispatchMessage(Handler.java:99)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at android.os.Looper.loop(Looper.java:123)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at android.app.ActivityThread.main(ActivityThread.java:4363)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at java.lang.reflect.Method.invokeNative(Native Method)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:521)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit$MethodAndArgsCaller.run(ZygoteInit.java:860)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at com.android.internal.os.ZygoteInit.main(ZygoteInit.java:618)
02-20 22:02:29.597: ERROR/AndroidRuntime(236): at dalvik.system.NativeStart.main(Native Method)
thanks.
A:
I've seen similar errors before where Eclipse seems to forget to include the classes from another project that you depend on inside your Android app. Somehow it can get in a state where it can see the classes for compiling and checking there are no problems with the manifest, etc. and yet not package them. Sometimes it is fixable by removing the dependency and putting it back.
From the download from that site you should have two projects. The Android project is called fbconnect-sample. The Java project is called fbconnect-android. First make sure you have both projects and that neither is showing any build problems in the Eclipse Problems view. Project menu, then Build Automatically should be checked. Package Explorer should list "fbconnect-android" and "fbconnect-sample". Window menu -> Show View -> Problems should show no build problems.
If you don't have both projects, they are created by going to the File menu, then Import..., then Import Existing Projects into Workspace, then choosing the fbconn directory extracted from the fbconnect-android.zip download. Both projects should show under the Projects: heading in the dialog, then hit Finish. The fbconnect-android project needs an ANDROID_JAR classpath variable set to the android.jar from the SDK in order to build without problems.
Now, to try the removing the dependency and putting it back workaround, right click on the fbconnect-sample project in the Project Explorer, choose Properties, then Java Build Path, then Projects, then fbconnect-android, then Remove, then OK. Now right click on fbconnect-sample again, then Java Build Path, then Projects, then Add, then fbconnect-android, then OK, then OK. Sometimes after doing that Eclipse starts packaging the classes from the project you are depending on in the APK again. In my case, for this download, the sample ran fine on my Droid phone without that. Just importing the existing projects and setting the classpath variable in order to remove all the build problems was enough.
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Nevers is a quiet town, capital of the department of Nièvre. The streets are along the Loire. Among its points of interest include the Palais Ducal, the Cathedral Saint-Cyr Sainte-Julitte and the Church of St. Bernadette of Banlay. In
The Nevers Magny Cours is the big prize of the French Formula 1 which has been held every year for decades.
It is an unpretentious international circuit, as Magny-Cours suffers from a lack of funds to place them among the greats. The
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Quick Country 96.5 » FUNNYhttp://quickcountry.com
Rochester's New Country LeaderThu, 24 May 2018 19:09:57 +0000en-UShourly1http://quickcountry.com/files/2017/01/logo.pngQuick Country 96.5http://quickcountry.com
Guess What Caused This Freeborn County Cat Traffic Jam – [WATCH]http://quickcountry.com/guess-what-caused-this-freeborn-county-cat-traffic-jam-watch/
http://quickcountry.com/guess-what-caused-this-freeborn-county-cat-traffic-jam-watch/#commentsTue, 08 May 2018 15:17:24 +0000http://quickcountry.com/?p=181805Continue reading…]]>Okay, I totally expected them to go nuts for this - but this is ANOTHER LEVEL.
]]>http://quickcountry.com/rochester-dog-refuses-to-let-go-of-winter/feed/0Faye Marie via FacebookWe Failed At The Invisible Box Challenge – [WATCH]http://quickcountry.com/we-failed-at-the-invisible-box-challenge-watch/
http://quickcountry.com/we-failed-at-the-invisible-box-challenge-watch/#commentsTue, 05 Dec 2017 17:54:47 +0000http://quickcountry.com/?p=166065Continue reading…]]>It's not everyday that a new viral video reaches our eyes... or is it? This one is truly a special form of sorcery that is unheard of!
]]>http://quickcountry.com/is-this-wedding-rsvp-rude-or-real-pic/feed/0Getty ImagesSome Humans think it is a good idea to make their dogs wear boots.http://quickcountry.com/some-humans-think-it-is-a-good-idea-to-make-their-dogs-wear-boots/
http://quickcountry.com/some-humans-think-it-is-a-good-idea-to-make-their-dogs-wear-boots/#commentsSat, 15 Mar 2014 15:32:48 +0000http://quickcountry.com/?p=25984Continue reading…]]>Some humans think it is a good idea to make their dogs wear boots.
This is 'Steve' talking now, but....if somebody tried to make me wear 'cute-lil-boots' like those......
READ MORE: Some Humans think it is a good idea to make their dogs wear boots | http://quickcountry...
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Israel: Home of Next Gen Internet
Silicon Israel: How market capitalism saved the Jewish state
George Gilder, City Journal
Posted on Oct. 6, 2009 at 3:09 pm
The most precious resource in the world economy is human genius, which we may define as the ability to devise significant inventions that enhance survival and prosperity. At any one time, genius is embodied in just a few score thousand people, a creative minority that accounts for most human accomplishment and wealth. Cities and nations rise and thrive when they welcome entrepreneurial and technical genius; when they overtax, criminalize, or ostracize it, they wither.
During the twentieth century, an astounding proportion of geniuses have been Jewish, and the fate of nations from Russia westward has largely reflected how they have treated their Jews. When Jews lived in Vienna and Budapest early in the century, these cities of the Hapsburg Empire were world centers of intellectual activity and economic growth; then the Nazis came to power, the Jews fled or were killed, and growth and culture disappeared with them. When Jews came to New York and Los Angeles, those cities towered over the global economy and culture. When Jews escaped Europe for Los Alamos and, more recently, for Silicon Valley, the world’s economy and military balance shifted decisively. Thus many nations have faced a crucial moral test: Will they admire, reward, and emulate a minority that has achieved towering accomplishments? Or will they writhe in resentment and plot its destruction?
The test has assumed a global face today, when a large proportion of the world’s genius resides in Israel. Israel has very recently become a center of innovation, second in absolute achievement only to the United States, and on a per-capita basis dwarfing the contributions of all other nations, America included. How Israel is treated by the rest of the world thus represents a crucial test for civilization. Will we pass it?
My interest in Israeli innovation began in 1998, when I invited an Israeli physicist named David Medved to speak at the Gilder/Forbes Telecosm conference. Medved described the promise of “free-space optics”—what most of us call “light”—for high-end communications among corporate buildings and campuses. He also spoke of air force experiments in Israel that used the still-higher frequencies and shorter waves of ultraviolet light for battlefield communications. Some of the most important explorations of electromagnetic technology, I realized, were happening in Israel.
Nearly a decade later, Medved introduced me to his son Jonathan, a pioneering Israeli venture capitalist. In his offices high over Jerusalem, the younger Medved told me the startling tale of Israel’s rapid rise to worldwide preeminence in high technology. I had long known that Israel held laboratories and design centers for American microchip companies. I knew that, in a real sense, much American technology could reasonably bear the label israel inside. I was familiar with a few prominent Israeli start-ups, such as the electric-car company launched by Wired cover boy Shai Agassi, which boldly bypassed the entire auto industry in redesigning the automobile from scratch, and Gavriel Iddan’s company Given Imaging, with its digestible camera in a capsule for endoscopies and colonoscopies.
But what I learned in Jerusalem was that Israel was not only a site for research and outsourcing and the occasional conceptual coup, but the emerging world leader, outside the United States, in launching new companies and technologies. This tiny embattled country, smaller than most American states, is outperforming European and Asian Goliaths ten to 100 times larger. In a watershed moment for the country, Israel in 2007 passed Canada as the home of the most foreign companies on the technology-heavy NASDAQ index; it is now launching far more high-tech companies per year than any country in Europe.
To take one example among many, Israel is a prime source not only of free-space optics but also of another form of hidden light: ultra-wideband technology. This technology features wireless transmissions that are not, like cell-phone signals, millions of hertz wide at relatively high power, but billions of hertz wide—gigahertz—at power too low to be detected by ordinary antennas. The technology is typically used for mundane purposes, such as connecting personal computers and televisions wirelessly. But a firm called Camero, in Netanya, Israel, has invented an ingenious ultra-wideband device that enables counterterrorist fighters and police to see through walls and identify armed men and other threats within. An easily portable box about the size and weight of a laptop computer, Camero’s Xaver 400 could suffuse an urban battlefield with hidden light that would penetrate walls and bunkers and be detectable only by its users. Such inventions are changing the balance of power in urban guerrilla warfare, to the advantage of the civilized and the dismay of the barbarians.
As I investigated companies like Camero, it became clear to me that Israel had achieved an economic miracle that was important to the United States and to the world. As late as the mid-1980s, Israel was a basket case, with inflation rates spiking from 400 percent to nearly 1,000 percent by early 1985. As recently as 1990, Israel was a relatively insignificant technology force, aside from a few military and agricultural initiatives. Yet in little more than a decade, the country has become an engine of global technology progress. Still more important, Israel’s technology leadership has made it a vital ally of the United States against a global movement of jihadist terror. How did it make such an astonishing leap?
With the history of twentieth-century science and technology largely a saga of Jewish accomplishment, it might seem to have been foreordained that after World War II, the rising Jewish nation would emerge as a scientific and technological leader. Yet for all the talk of deserts in bloom, the miracle did not occur quickly. For many decades after Israel achieved independence in 1948, the Jews assembled there generated few significant companies or technologies, no significant financial institutions to fund them, and little important science. Accomplishments made in American states like California, New York, and even New Jersey exceeded those of Israeli enterprise, and Jews outside Israel far outperformed Jews in Israel.
In the country’s early years, its research activities were mostly public, devoted to defense, and paltry by any standard. As late as 1965, the ratio of research-and-development spending in Israel to its gross domestic product was under 1 percent, nearly the lowest in the entire Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, behind only Italy. Just one-tenth of 1 percent of Israel’s employees were engineers, putting it far behind the United States and even Sweden. Michael Porter’s definitive 1990 tome The Competitive Advantage of Nations mentioned Israel only once.
All this despite the presence of the Technion, one of the world’s supreme institutions of practical science and the chief contribution of Israel’s founders to its eventual preeminence in technology. Located atop a hill overlooking Haifa, the institute sprawls over its spectacular site with a massive maze of concrete institutional architecture as formidable as MIT’s: labs, auditoriums, nuclear facilities, giant telescopes, and research monoliths, mostly named for American Jewish tycoons. But nearly 80 years passed after the Technion’s opening in 1924, with Jews around the world forging the science of the age in an intellectual efflorescence unparalleled in human history, without any exceptional contributions from Israel.
How to explain this lassitude? For much of Israel’s short history, the country has been a reactionary force, upholding a philosophy of victimization and socialist redistribution that could only impede its progress. In 1957, a team of American economic consultants found that Israel’s “high labor costs . . . reflected the high degree of job security . . . [and] the absence of adequate incentive to or rewards for superior efficiency or performance.” This was partly a result, they added, of “virtually complete protection from foreign competition.” Two years later, A. J. Meyer of the Harvard Center for Middle Eastern Studies noted “uncertainty in the minds of many [Israeli] industrial producers that theirs is the ‘good’ occupation or that society really gives them credit—financially and in status—for their efforts.” He also cited “welfare state concepts [that] often dictate that incompetent workers stay on payrolls.”
Many of Israel’s Jews, as the writer Midge Decter described them, “were coming into the country armed with their socialism and their ideologies of labor and a Jewish return to the soil.” Imagine it: urban socialists trying to reclaim their past glory and save themselves in a hostile world by returning to the soil in a desert! They created communal experiments—kibbutzim—and put intellectuals to work with hoes and shovels, for all the world like a voluntary version of Chairman Mao’s Cultural Revolution. In a truly menacing démarche of ideological madness, they attempted to abolish the family and private property.
Panicked, moreover, by the Jewish caricatures and stereotypes wielded by their enemies, they resolved to become mendicant nebbishes—touring the centers of Western money and industry with tin cups in hand—rather than bankers and financiers. They assigned close to a third of the economy to the ownership of Histadrut, a socialist workers’ organization prone to threatening nationwide strikes. Under Histadrut pressure, they instituted minimum wages that stifled employment and propelled inflation. Then they imposed more controls on wages, prices, and rents, making everything scarce.
In a general enthusiasm for public ownership of the means of production and finance, the government through the 1990s owned four major banks, 200 corporations, and much of the land. Israel’s taxes rose to a confiscatory 56 percent of total earnings, close to the highest in the world, stifling even those private initiatives that managed to pass through the country’s sieves of socialism. Erecting barriers of bureaucracy, sentiment, and culture, Israeli leaders balked the entrepreneurs and inventors who gathered there, creating a country inhospitable to Jewish genius.
Far more welcoming of Jewish and Israeli talent in those days were American companies, particularly Intel. It was an Israeli engineer, Dov Frohman, who invented electrically programmable read-only memory (EPROM), a chip-based permanent memory that could retain a personal computer’s core programming even when the power was off. EPROM would contribute some 80 percent of Intel’s profits over the next decade and sustain the company’s growth to become the world’s leading semiconductor company. (With the help of a company called Xicor, started by Israeli Raffi Klein, EPROM soon evolved into the flash memories that today dominate the industry. Today, flash memories are a forte of the Israeli microchip industry and lie behind many American miracles of miniaturization, from so-called thumb drives to Apple’s newer iPods to Hewlett-Packard’s Mini netbooks.)
After leaving Intel in 1974 for a charitable sojourn teaching electrical engineering in Ghana, Frohman returned to Israel to establish an Intel design center in Haifa. This laboratory soon conceived the so-called 8088 microprocessor, which was incorporated into the first IBM personal computer. In 1979, also in Haifa, Frohman supervised the development of Intel’s first mathematical floating-point coprocessor, a critical element in most subsequent personal computers and workstations.
As a guest in the country, albeit an imposing one, Intel could tap the genius of Jews while bypassing the rules, tolls, and taxes that frustrated Israeli companies. Following the Haifa design center, Frohman wanted Intel Israel to establish a semiconductor “fab,” or factory, in Jerusalem, together with the necessary chemical and engineering support services. After a battle with Intel executive Andrew Grove—himself a Hungarian Jew who became a legendary figure in Silicon Valley—over the costs of training Israelis to run the fab, Frohman managed to enlist $60 million in subsidies from the Israeli government and led the project to completion in three and a half years. By the late 1980s, the Jerusalem fab, Intel’s first outside the United States, was producing some 75 percent of the global output of Intel’s flagship 386 microprocessor and was gearing up to produce the 486 as well. Frohman later persuaded Grove to open production plants in Kiryat Gat in the Negev, Israel’s desert. Meanwhile, from Intel’s Israeli design centers—by now, there were several—emerged several generations of the Pentium microprocessor, as well as the Centrino low-power processor that integrated Wi-Fi wireless capabilities into portable PCs.
For all the achievements of Israelis working for Intel and other foreign firms, Israel’s native technology sector languished. Redemption came in unexpected forms. One was an infusion of genius: nearly a million immigrants, chiefly from the Soviet Union, whom Israel absorbed in the late 1980s and the 1990s. Impelled by constant harassment from the U.S. government—including Senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson’s emancipation amendment, which for a decade was attached to any American legislation of interest to the USSR—the Soviet government finally agreed to a frontal lobotomy of its economy. Under Gorbachev, it released the bulk of the Soviet Jews, who had continued, despite constant oppression, to supply many of the technical skills that kept the USSR afloat as a superpower.
The influx of Soviet Jews into Israel represented a 25 percent population increase in ten years, a tsunami of new arrivals that would be equivalent to the entire population of France being accepted into the United States. Largely barred in the USSR from owning land or businesses, many of these Jews had honed their minds into keen instruments of algorithmic science, engineering, and mathematics. Most had wanted to come to America but were diverted to Israel by an agreement between Israel and the United States. Few knew Hebrew or saw a need for it. At best, they were ambivalent Zionists. But many were ferociously smart, fervently anti-Communist, and disdainful of their new country’s bizarre commitment to a socialist ethos that punished achievement.
At the same time as the flood of Soviet immigrants, a smaller but seminal wave of Americans arrived in Israel from such companies as IBM and Bell Laboratories, with a knowledge of Silicon Valley and an interest in opportunities in Israel. Capping off and funding these catalytic outsiders was a generation of eminent American retirees who arrived in Israel with billions of dollars of available capital, petawatts of imperious brainpower, a practiced disdain for bureaucratic pettifogs, and Olympian confidence in their own judgment and capabilities.
Mix the leadership of these dynamic capitalists with a million restive and insurgent Soviets, and the reaction was economically incandescent. Throw in natural leadership from the irrepressible Natan Sharansky, who had faced down confinement in the Gulag and formed a new conservative political party in Israel to mobilize his Russian compatriots, and the impact reverberated through the social and political order as well. Such an influx could not be clamped or channeled, tapered or intimidated into the existing economic framework, and, as Israeli financier Tal Keinan remarks of the Russian newcomers, “they could not all work for Intel.” Today, immigrants from the former Soviet Union constitute fully half of Israel’s high-tech workers.
Despite the dramatic progress of the 1990s, at the dawn of this century, Israel still lacked a financial sector capable of propelling the nation into the globally dominant role it stands poised to fill today. To get there would take one more great reform.
The successful allocation of capital, like the launch of a new technology, is an elegant expression of the capitalist law that mind rules and matter serves. Jews throughout history have excelled in this most intellectual of capitalist endeavors. And yet Israel until recently had virtually no investment houses, deep capital markets, or venture capital. With performance fees barred, hedge funds were essentially illegal. “All my Jewish friends were making their money at Goldman Sachs, while Israel’s finance was dominated by a heavily subsidized labor union,” remembers Keinan. “The Zionist Rothschilds dominated European banking, but the only significant Rothschild presence in Israel was a winery.”
In the mid-1980s, Yitzhak Shamir’s Likud government, with Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu as its United Nations ambassador, did cut taxes—increasing the rewards of work and investment by some 30 percent, dramatically boosting economic growth, and reducing inflation. As prime minister in the 1990s, Netanyahu also ushered in dramatic deregulation, along with tax cuts that brought in floods of new revenue. Further spurring local entrepreneurs was the Yozma program in 1993, which waived double taxation on foreign venture-capital investments in Israel and put up a matching fund of $100 million from the government. Demand for the money became so intense that the government hiked the amount and doubled the matching-funds requirement. Nevertheless, throughout the 1990s, most of the money powering Israel’s technological ascent came from the Israeli government or from American technology companies. As the millennium dawned, Israel had failed to create a financial-services industry or to wrest control of much of Israel’s capital from the hands of Histadrut.
The force driving the Israelis decisively out of their socialist slough into the modern world of finance was once again the ingenuity of Netanyahu. As finance minister, Netanyahu used the financial crisis of 2003 and 2004, precipitated by the latest campaign of Palestinian terror, as a lever to transform Israel’s economy from a largely socialized domain dependent on foreign finance into one of the world’s most open and flourishing financial systems. In the process, he created what occasional advisor Keinan today calls “the greatest opportunity in our lifetimes.”
An Israeli supply-sider, Netanyahu faced the adamant opposition of Histadrut and its allies in the Knesset. To overcome the hostility to finance capitalism that had long hobbled the Israeli economy, Netanyahu enlisted vital help from President George W. Bush and his treasury secretary, John Snow. Netanyahu sought a sovereign loan guarantee that would give Israeli bonds the full faith and credit of the United States Treasury, so that despite intifadas and other perils, Israel could issue bonds on the same terms as the world’s leading economy. Not wanting the U.S. to appear a patsy, Snow refused to do the deal without a significant quid pro quo, stipulating that Netanyahu secure from the Knesset a series of major financial reforms.
First, Histadrut, which dominates the pension system in Israel, had to give up its direct line to the Israeli treasury, which had guaranteed it an inflation-adjusted 6 percent annual yield. This special arrangement would be phased out over a period of 20 years. Starting immediately with the first 5 percent of its holdings, Histadrut would need to begin finding other ways to invest its $300 million per month of cash flow. Somehow a financial industry would have to arise in Israel to handle this huge trove of funds. A second briar-patch reform demanded by Snow was the immediate privatization of Israel’s state-owned industries, reducing the government’s stake in these companies from an average of 60 percent ownership to minority ownerships of about 20 percent. Among the privatized ventures were oil refineries, nearly all the banks, the Bezeq telephone monopoly, and the national airline, El Al. The third key reform was the emancipation of the financial-services industry, complete with legalization of investment banks, international private equity funds, and performance fees for hedge funds. Eliminated were double taxes not merely on investments in Israel but also on international investment activities by Israelis. The Netanyahu-Snow agenda went into effect on January 1, 2005.
In under 25 years—starting from those first modest tax reforms of the mid-1980s—Israel has accomplished the most overwhelming transformation in the history of economics, from a nondescript laggard in the industrial world to a luminous first. Today, on a per-capita basis, Israel far leads the world in research and technological creativity. Between 1991 and 2000, even before the big reform of 2005, Israel’s annual venture-capital outlays, nearly all private, rose nearly 60-fold, from $58 million to $3.3 billion; companies launched by Israeli venture funds rose from 100 to 800; and Israel’s information-technology revenues rose from $1.6 billion to $12.5 billion. By 1999, Israel ranked second only to the United States in invested private-equity capital as a share of GDP. And it led the world in the share of its growth attributable to high-tech ventures: 70 percent.
Even a year or two later—while the rest of the world slumped after the millennial telecom and dot-com crash and Israel suffered an acute recession—its venture capitalists strengthened its lead in technological enterprise. During the first five years of the twenty-first century, venture-capital outlays in Israel rivaled venture-capital outlays in all of the United States outside California, long the world’s paramount source of entrepreneurial activity in high technology.
Today, Israel’s tech supremacy is even greater. A 2008 survey of the world’s venture capitalists by Deloitte & Touche showed that in six key fields—telecom, microchips, software, biopharmaceuticals, medical devices, and clean energy—Israel ranked second only to the United States in technological innovation. Germany, ten times larger, roughly tied Israel. In 2008, Israel produced 483 venture-backed companies with just over $2 billion invested; Germany produces approximately 100 venture-backed companies annually. The rankings registered absolute performance, but adjusted for its population, Israel comes in far ahead of all other countries, including the United States.
Venture capital is the most catalytic force in the world economy. In the United States, venture-backed companies produced nearly one-fifth of GDP in 2007. At a time when American venture capital is flagging under the financial crisis, the emergence of a comparable venture scene in Israel, linked closely to Silicon Valley, is providential for both the American economy and its military defense.
This development makes Israel one of America’s most important economic allies. Israel’s creativity now pervades many of the most powerful and popular new technologies, from personal computers to iPods, from the Internet to the medical center.
Early in 2009, for example, Intel launched a massive new advertising campaign to celebrate what it described as its most important advance since its initial invention of the microprocessor chip some 40 years ago: the new Core i7 device, code-named “Nehalem,” which combined leading-edge computing power with unprecedented economy of energy use. Like many of the inventions that have made Intel the world’s leading microchip company, the Core i7 was designed in Israel.
Israelis are also leaders in arguably the most important technology arena today, particularly for military uses. This is the ability of computers using parallelism to sense, accept, and process information as quickly as modern transmission techniques—especially fiber-optics lines—can deliver it. A representative device in this effort, and a powerful symbol of Israel’s leading position in Internet technology, is the “network processor.” Just as a Pentium microchip is the microprocessor that makes most PCs work, the network processor is the device that makes the next-generation Internet work, doing the vital routing and switching at network nodes. The next-generation Internet will allow “petaflops” (1015 floating-point operations per second) of real-time computational power to be deployed to virtually any point on the earth. The network processor will let any desktop computer access data and processing power exponentially greater than that incorporated in any PC or any single corporate data center.
The next-generation Internet and its associated technologies will be both the next great machine of capitalism and the next great weapon in its defense. Only by accepting and processing sensory data as fast as or faster than the human brain registering a glimpse of a known terrorist’s face buried beneath $100,000 worth of plastic surgery will computers make the leap from glorified adding machines to indispensable allies against the forces of chaos and terror. Leading the field are companies like Eli Fruchter’s EZchip (in which I have long been an investor), launched in the late 1990s with a few dollars, no customers, and a compelling PowerPoint presentation in lieu of any actual products. In less than a decade, EZchip drove most of its rivals—firms like Intel, Motorola, and IBM—to the sidelines, and welcomed the rest, like Cisco and Juniper, to its list of major customers.
During a trip to Israel in 2008, Fruchter, Amir Eyal, and Guy Koren of EZchip took me out to dinner in Caesarea. The restaurant was on the Mediterranean beach. Above the beach stood the ruins of Roman temples and terraces, theaters and arches, all surfaced with golden sandstone and carefully refurbished and illuminated. Shops and restaurants were decorously arrayed along the beach. The rush of water on the sand, the scent of fish in the air, the glow of sunset, and the lights on the Roman stone all lent the area a magical feeling of peace and prosperity.
I thought of Gaza, under 100 miles to the south, with similar beaches and balmy weather, and similar possibilities of human advance. Could the Gazans join the Israelis to create a Riviera on their exquisite beaches, their glowing sands? To do so, they would have to leave behind a world of zero-sum chimeras and fantasies of jihadist revenge. And they would discover that their greatest ally is a man long portrayed as their most feared enemy, a man who, having led for decades the fight to liberate Israeli Jews from self-destructive socialist resentment, now offers to bring all of Palestine and perhaps all of Arabia on the same journey.
Netanyahu’s vision is an Israel that, as a global financial center, could transform the economics of the Middle East. Israel could become a Hong Kong of the desert. Just as Hong Kong ultimately reshaped the Chinese economy in its own image when Deng Xiaoping mimicked its free economy, Israel could become a force for economic liberation in the Middle East, reaching out to Palestinians and other Arabs with the blandishments of commercial opportunity. After all, it has long been Israeli enterprise that has attracted Arabs to Palestine. Between 1967, when Israel took over the West Bank and Gaza Strip, and 1987, when the first intifada erupted, those two territories were one of the fastest-growing economies on earth. GDP surged 30 percent a year for a decade, the Arab population nearly tripled, six new universities were launched, and Arab longevity jumped from 43 years to 74.
Netanyahu has long believed that the peace process as we know it is irrelevant, focused on a handful of issues that breed anger and perpetuate conflict. Meanwhile, true peace—and the promise of a decent life—lies waiting to be picked up by those Palestinians and Israelis who are willing, and now increasingly able, to invest in creation over destruction.
George Gilder is the founding director of Gilder Technology Associates, a venture capital fund, and a contributing editor of Forbes. His books have sold more than 2 million copies worldwide. The newest is The Israel Test. This article originally appeared on City Journal
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Shoe factory fire kills 17 in Vietnam
A fire at a Vietnamese shoe factory killed 17 people and seriously injured 21 others in the northern port city of Hai Phong, state-controlled media reported on Saturday.
Thanh Nien newspaper quoted Bui Thi Them, one of the survivors, as saying the fire broke out on Friday afternoon when welding sparks ignited roofing insulation. The welder was installing a lightening rod on the factory's tin roof in preparation for a tropical storm that is expected to hit northern Vietnam later Saturday.
The insulation fell to the factory floor in a fireball, blocking the 150-square-yard (meter) workshop's only entrance before quickly engulfing piles of shoemaking materials, it said.
"The fireball blocked the factory's main entrance and there is no exit on the back," Them told the paper. "Many people in the middle of the factory which was engulfed with fire and smoke could not escape and were burned to death."
Vietnam Television reported that 13 people were killed of burns and suffocation on Friday and four others who were seriously burned died on Saturday morning.
Eight other people who were in critical condition were transferred to a hospital in capital, Hanoi, it said.
The newspaper reported on Saturday that police have detained six people, including the Vietnamese owner of the factory, her Chinese husband and the welder, for questioning.
Tuoi Tre newspaper said six workers managed to escape unhurt. It said the factory has been in operation for nearly a month.
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The leaders of General Mills Inc., one of the Minnesota’s largest companies, announced they are opposing a proposed constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage.
“We do not believe the proposed constitutional amendment is in the best interests of our employees or our state economy – and as a Minnesota-based company we oppose it,” Ken Charles, vice president of global diversity and inclusion for General Mills, wrote in a letter to employees and the public. “We value diversity. We value inclusion. We always have … and we always will.”
The lead group fighting the amendment praised the decision.
“The business case against this amendment is straightforward and powerful,” said Richard Carlbom, campaign manager for Minnesotans United for All Families. “General Mills’ decision to publicly oppose this hurtful, freedom-limiting amendment sends a clear message that neutrality on this amendment is simply not in Minnesota’s best interest.”
To reinforce the company’s decision, Minnesotans United also launched an online petition to thank General Mills for taking the position.
Charles said company CEO Ken Powell addressed 400 local gay and lesbian professionals Wednesday and announced the company would oppose the amendment, which will be on the November ballot.
“While General Mills doesn’t normally take positions on ballot measures, this is a business issue that impacts our employees,” Charles said. “I am proud to see our company join the ranks of local and national employers speaking out for inclusion.”
General Mills is one of the first large Minnesota-based companies to come out against the amendment. St. Jude Medical was the first large company to oppose the amendment.
The announcement already caused some backlash for General Mills.
“It is very disappointing that General Mills has decided to play PC politics by pandering to a small but powerful interest group that is bent on redefining marriage, the core institution of society,” said John Helmberger, chairman of Minnesota for Marriage, the group pushing the amendment.
“Marriage is in the interest of children, because it is society’s best way to help children experience the ideal environment where they are raised by their mother and father,” Helmberger said. “It’s ironic and regrettable that a corporation that makes billions marketing cereal to parents of children would take the position that marriage should be redefined.”
The National Organization for Marriage, a key group supporting the marriage amendment, sent letters to 50 of the state's largest companies urging them to remain neutral on the measure.
Charles acknowledged the company’s decision could stir opponents in what is an already intensely passionate and controversial issue.
“Obviously, there are strongly held views on both sides. We acknowledge those views, including those on religious grounds,” he said. “We respect and defend the right of others to disagree. But we truly value diversity and inclusion – and that makes our choice clear.”
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Bronx River Road
Bronx River Road is a major street and neighborhood in Yonkers, New York. It runs alongside the Bronx River, Bronx River Parkway, and Metro-North railroad tracks in south-eastern Yonkers. On the other side of the Bronx River is the City of Mount Vernon, New York as well as the Bronx. Bronx River Road runs down to McLean Avenue at the city line with New York City where it becomes Webster Avenue in the Woodlawn section of the Bronx. To the north, when it reaches the Cross County Parkway, Bronx River Road merges into Midland Avenue which leads to the Village of Bronxville, New York.
Bronx River Road is lined with many older, large apartment houses along with several residential blocks with small corner stores. The area could be described as middle class. Though the area is sometimes referred to as Sherwood Park, or Fleetwood, most area residents refer to their neighborhood simply as "Bronx River Road".
On March 16, 2003, there was a major fire at the Wakefield Towers apartment building at 85 Bronx River Road. Though there were no serious injuries, the building suffered massive damage, leaving over 300 people homeless. Since then, Wakefield Towers has been gutted, renovated, and rehabilitated, with all its architectural detail (turrets, minarets, etc.) having been restored by February 2007.
This neighborhood is one of the most populated in eastern Yonkers.
References
Category:Roads in New York (state)
Category:Transportation in Yonkers, New York
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Stefan O’Connor has returned to Arsenal (Picture: Getty)
Arsenal ace Stefan O’Connor is back at the club after having his loan spell with Dutch side MVV Maastricht terminated.
The 20-year-old joined the second-tier club last summer on a season-long loan deal but he’s failed to impress.
Bayern Munich confirm Thiago Alcantara will join Liverpool
The defender made just four appearances in the Netherlands and watched on as fellow Arsenal loanee Kelechi Nwakali thrived at the club.
O’Connor will now rejoin the club’s U23s for the remainder of the season, though he’s expected to be released at the end of the campaign when his contract is up.
MORE: Eden Hazard tells Chelsea teammate Michy Batshuayi to leave the club
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McGuinness set to make his mark at Oliver’s Mount
Emma Spencer
The second most successful TT rider of all time will be making his mark at the first Scarborough round of the road racing season.
With 23 wins and 44 podium places under his belt at the Isle of Man, John McGuinness has confirmed he will be attending the Bob Smith Spring Cup Road Races at Oliver’s Mount this weekend.
It is 21 years since the crowd favourite first raced at Scarborough and McGuiness will also be bringing two of his most prized bikes for display in the paddock.
They are his Honda Fireblade, which took him to his first ever 130mph lap, and his Mugen electric bike. Both will be ridden for a lap each day.
There are some 20 races throughout the two-day programme including juniors, sidecars, super and ultra lightweights, classic superbike and seniors.
The weekend’s flagship race, the Bob Smith Spring Cup will be run on the Sunday.
Silicone Kawasaki’s Dean Harrison will be looking to continue his domination of the Scarborough rounds but there will be plenty of opposition, notably in the form of TT winner Ivan Lintin backed by his Devitts RC Express team and team-mate Steve Mercer while Daley Mathison will be showing off his new colours, competing on Ian Hutchinson’s ex-BMW S100RRs in Eddie Stobart colours.
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Details
The sense of sophistication is unparalleled in this pair of classical diamond stud earrings. A must-item in any jewelry trove that is the ideal addition to any outfit or event. While it lacks the radiance of diamonds cut with triangular and kite-shaped facets, it more than makes up for it in intense clarity. It's like looking into glacier-pure ice. These ageless studs will definitely bring years of lasting memoirs. These gorgeous earrings are set in your choice of 14 and 18ct White/Yellow Gold, and Platinum. It also feature a screw back closure for maximum security.
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St. Paul – Similar to its first two Class AA state tournament games, the NRHEG girls basketball team was in a one possession game midway through the first quarter.
Then Betsy Schoenrock delivered the block that set the tone for the Panthers and they never looked back.
Four different Panthers reached double digits as NRHEG (27-6) downed the Rochester Lourdes Eagles (22-11) Friday afternoon at the Gangelhoff Center on the campus of Concordia University-St. Paul, earning a fifth place finish at the Class AA state tournament.
“I can’t say enough about this group,” commented NRHEG head coach Onika Peterson. “They work extremely hard, they have a great attitude and they play with a lot of heart which is great to see.”
The opening minutes of the game were similar to Thursday’s contest against Esko. The Panthers quickly jumped out to 13-8 lead after a pair of Marnie Wagner treys from the corner. Wagner, who scored nearly 17 points in each of NRHEG’s tournament games, made all three of her attempts from deep in the first half for 11 points.
The senior finished with 15 points as well as being named to the Class AA All-Tournament team. The lead was short lasted as the Eagles surged back to generate a 20-19 lead late in the half.
Enter Schoenrock.
Scoring 13 of her 20 points in the first half, the junior’s block midway through the first half shifted momentum into the Panthers favor. Generating a 9-0 run – six points coming for Schoenrock – the Panthers appeared to heat up as Rachel Collins and Kayley Camerer hit back-to-back three-pointers before the half. Collins and Camerer each had their best game of the postseason, scoring 11 and 12 points respectively.
While the Panthers were rolling heading into the half, the Eagles were ice cold.
Adding insult to injury, after missing its final four shots of the first half, Rochester Lourdes missed its first six shots of the second half as the Panthers raced out to a 41-29 lead. For a span of roughly seven minutes between the two halves, nothing seemed to go right for the Eagles and NRHEG would increase the lead to 49-29 after a pair of baskets from Maddie Wagner. Wagner, who reached double digits in the win over Esko, recorded a double-double after scoring 15 points and grabbing 13 rebounds.
After Rochester Lourdes' Megan Hobday was sent to the line, the Eagles started to generate some life. In fact, a 12-3 run that cut the lead to 52-42 was generated from Hobday and Alyssa Ustby. The two combined for 10 points during the span to include a pair of three-pointers from Ustby. Hobday finished with 14 while Ustby finished with a team-high 18 points.
“Even though we were up by 15 or so, it was ‘you still got to be there and got to be focus,” Peterson added. “ It took a felt like it took forever, it’s like ‘ c’mon clock get going' because all they have to do is hit however many threes to be back in the game.”
After a three from Marnie Wagner, the Eagles lapsed back into a cold streak, missing nine of their final 15 attempts. As for the Panthers, the final 16 points of the contest from the line as the Eagles attempted to slow final two minutes of the contest. For the game, NRHEG was able to connect on 22-of-28 for the charity stripe.
See full story in this week’s print edition or subscribe online. Please subscribe here or current subscribers can login here.
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Gastric Band Weight Loss Using Hypnotherapy
Completely Effortless
Session 1 - £100Session 2 - £100Session 3 - £100 Session 4 - £75
Gastric band with Hypnosis is a revolutionary hypnotherapy treatment designed for people who desperately want to lose weight. It has all the results of gastric band surgery – you will eat smaller portions and feel full – but is completely safe and pain free.Your first session normally last up to 90 minutes and is excellent for those who want to start their weight loss programme with a good kick! Seeing effects straight away after just one session. All further sessions are around 60 minutes long, During the programme not only will you eat less but Hypnotherapy will also be used to turn you away from unhealthy foods and move you towards healthy foods, eating slowly, eating when hungry, not bored!
Putting you back in control
The system is a long term solution to your weight problems.
Gastric band hypnotherapy allows the client to retain a subconscious belief that a real band has been fitted, leaving the stomach unable to cope with large meals.
By using the Virtual Gastric Band you will discover that you can eat less, feeling full more quickly and satisfied with smaller amounts of food. Gastric Band Hypnotherapy convinces your mind that your stomach size has been reduced to the size of a golf ball, allowing you to eat less and feel full at the same time.
Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
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It’s not uncommon for a nickname to grace a line of forwards that bring excitement, success, and character to a team. A special trio is needed to grace a custom moniker, though, and of course with help from the creativity of the fan base.
The play of Jeff Carter, Tanner Pearson, and Tyler Toffoli has caught not only the attention of hockey fans in Los Angeles, but fans and media across the entire league.
Carter, Toffoli, and Pearson have started the season on a tear, are the top three scorers on the Kings roster, have combined for 34 points through the first nine games of the season, and have accounted for 17 of the team’s 23 goals scored so far.
Those numbers alone deserve some sort of labeling, but it’s their uniform numbers that provide the perfect touch to what has become a wildly popular nickname for the group.
When Jeff Carter was traded to the Kings on February 23, 2012, Carter scrapped the ‘7’ he wore in his time with the Philadelphia Flyers and Columbus Blue Jackets, upping to the rather flashy ‘77’ numeral.
As in the case with youngsters Tyler Toffoli and Tanner Pearson, who wear ‘73’ and ’70’ respectively, they’re simply playing with the numbers they were given upon reporting to training camp. Assigned numbers to rookies are usually odd, high in number, and are usually changed by the player once they've solidified a roster spot.
The two, who had the option to choose their own number at the beginning of this season, have chosen to don the numbers they were handed when they started with the organization, the numbers that have helped create the league’s most popular line nickname.
This isn’t the first time, though, that the Kings have had a trio of forwards who have earned a byname from the team’s media and fan base.
L.A.P.D LINE (2001-'02)
During the 2001-2002 season, forwards Jason Allison, Ziggy Palffy, and Adam Deadmarsh were tabbed as the “L.A.P.D.” line, combining “L” with the players’ last name initials (APD) in reference to the Los Angeles Police Department.
The group would combine for 195 points during the 2001-’02 season, scoring 80 goals and registering 115 assists.
Like Carter, Toffoli, and Pearson now 10 games into the season, Allison, Palffy, and Deadmarsh led the Kings in scoring that year; Allison with 74 points (19G, 55A), Deadmarsh with 62 points (29G, 33A), and Palffy with 59 points (32G, 27A).
The Kings, who finished third in the Pacific Division that season with a 40-27-11-4 record for 95 points, lost in seven games to the Colorado Avalanche in the Western Conference Quarterfinals.
Jason Allison only played 26 games the following season, while Adam Deadmarsh only played 20 games. Both players suffered from concussion symptoms, breaking up the chemistry the line worked with during the 2001-'02 campaign.
TRIPLE CROWN LINE (1979 - 1984)
Playing together from 1979 to '84, Marcel Dionne, Charlie Simmer, and Dave Taylor were anointed the “Triple Crown Line”, hitting the league by storm when put together as a line by Kings head coach Bob Berry midway through the 1979-'80 season, combining for 269 points.
The following season, their first full year together, they combined for an astounding 328 points, but the Kings finished fourth-worst in the NHL in defense that season, and the Kings were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs by the New York Islanders.
During the 1980-'81 season, the trio erupted, becoming the first line in NHL history to have all three members record at least 100 points in a single season. Dionne registered 135 points (58G, 77A), Taylor with 112 points (47G, 65A), and Simmer with 105 points (56G, 49A).
The Kings made the playoffs once again on the backs of this tremendous line, but were eliminated in the first round by the New York Rangers when Kings goaltender Mario Lessard finished the series with a 5.45 GAA.
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Medical Office Building
The Medical Office Building is home for the Internal Medicine Team at the lower level of the building. At the rear entrance, all clinics can be accessed. The Board Room, a large conference room, can also be accessed at the rear of the building.
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CAIRO/BERLIN (Reuters) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel urged Egypt's Islamist president on Wednesday to open a dialogue with all political forces in the crisis-ridden Arab country after a week of violence that has killed more than 50 people.
President Mohamed Mursi flew to Germany to try to convince Europe of his democratic credentials, but in a sign of the political tensions back home, he restricted his trip to a few hours and canceled a planned Paris leg.
"One thing that is important for us is that the line for dialogue is always open to all political forces in Egypt, that the different political forces can make their contribution, that human rights are adhered to in Egypt and that of course religious freedom can be experienced," Merkel told Mursi at a joint news conference.
The Egyptian leader, who has faced months of protests by liberal and youth groups opposed to a new Islamic constitution, replied that dialogue was possible and that Egypt would be a state based on the rule of law, not run by the military.
But he refused to give a commitment sought by the opposition to form a national unity government, saying that would be for the new parliament to decide after elections expected in April.
Two more protesters were shot dead before dawn near Cairo's central Tahrir Square on the seventh day of what has become the deadliest wave of unrest since Mursi took power in June.
The army chief warned on Tuesday that the state was on the brink of collapse if Mursi's opponents and supporters did not end street battles that have marked the two-year anniversary of the revolt that toppled autocrat Hosni Mubarak.
Mursi is due to return to Cairo later in the day.
Near Tahrir Square on Wednesday morning, dozens of protesters threw stones at police who fired back teargas, although the scuffles were brief.
"Our demand is simply that Mursi goes, and leaves the country alone. He is just like Mubarak and his crowd who are now in prison," said Ahmed Mustafa, 28, a youth who had goggles on his head to protect his eyes from teargas.
Opposition politician Mohamed ElBaradei called for a meeting of the president, ministers, the ruling party and the opposition to halt the violence. But he also restated the opposition's precondition that Mursi first commit to seeking a national unity government.
Mursi's critics accuse him of betraying the spirit of the revolution by keeping too much power in his own hands and those of his Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist movement banned under Mubarak which won repeated elections since the 2011 uprising.
Mursi's supporters say the protesters want to overthrow Egypt's first democratically elected leader. The unrest has prevented a return to stability ahead of parliamentary elections due within months, and worsened an economic crisis that has seen the pound currency tumble in recent weeks.
The worst violence has been in the Suez Canal city of Port Said, where rage was fuelled by death sentences passed against soccer fans for deadly riots last year. Mursi responded by announcing on Sunday a month-long state of emergency and curfew in Port Said and two other Suez Canal cities.
Protesters have ignored the curfew and returned to the streets. Human Rights Watch called for Mursi to lift the decree.
Mursi was keen to allay the West's fears over the future of the most populous Arab country in his meetings with Merkel and powerful industry groups in Berlin.
"DISTURBING IMAGES"
"We have seen worrying images in recent days, images of violence and destruction, and I appeal to both sides to engage in dialogue," German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said in a radio interview on Wednesday ahead of Mursi's arrival.
Germany's "offer to help with Egypt's transformation clearly depends on it sticking to democratic reforms", he added.
Germany has praised Mursi's efforts in mediating a ceasefire between Israel and Palestinians in Gaza after a conflict last year, but became concerned at Mursi's efforts to expand his powers and fast-track a constitution last year.
Berlin was also alarmed by video that emerged in recent weeks showing Mursi making vitriolic remarks against Jews and Zionists in 2010 when he was a senior Brotherhood official. Germany's Nazi past and strong support of Israel make it highly sensitive to anti-Semitism.
Mursi's past anti-Jewish remarks were "unacceptable", Westerwelle said. "But at the same time President Mursi has played a very constructive role mediating in the Gaza conflict."
Asked about those remarks at the news conference with Merkel, Mursi said they had been taken out of context and he was not against the Jewish faith.
Egypt's main liberal and secularist bloc, the National Salvation Front, has so far refused talks with Mursi unless he promises a unity government including opposition figures.
"Stopping the violence is the priority, and starting a serious dialogue requires committing to guarantees demanded by the National Salvation Front, at the forefront of which are a national salvation government and a committee to amend the constitution," ElBaradei said on Twitter.
Those calls have also been backed by the hardline Islamist Nour party - rivals of Mursi's Brotherhood. Nour and the Front were due to meet on Wednesday, signaling an unlikely alliance of Mursi's critics from opposite ends of the political spectrum.
Brotherhood leader Mohamed El-Beltagy dismissed the unity government proposal as a ploy for the Front to take power despite having lost elections. On his Facebook page he ridiculed "the leaders of the Salvation Front, who seem to know more about the people's interests than the people themselves".
German industry leaders see potential in Egypt but are concerned about political instability.
"At the moment many firms are waiting on political developments and are cautious on any big investments," said Hans Heinrich Driftmann, head of Germany's Chamber of Industry and Commerce.
Mursi's supporters blame the opposition for preventing an economic recovery by halting efforts to restore stability. The opposition says an inclusive government is needed to bring calm.
(Additional reporting by Yasmine Saleh and Marwa Awad in Cairo, Stephen Brown and Gernot Heller in Berlin and Arshad Mohammed in Washington; Writing by Peter Graff; Editing by Giles Elgood and Paul Taylor)
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Russell Simmons Apologizes For "Harriet Tubman Sex Tape"
On second thought, Def Jam founder Russell Simmons no longer thinks a parody Harriet Tubman "sex-tape" sketch released on his new YouTube channel is the "funniest thing" he's ever seen. Hours after the video—which depicts the legendary abolitionist recording a sex tape with a white slave owner to use to blackmail him—began trending on Twitter for all the wrong reasons, Simmons released a public apology and the clip was taken down from his All Def Digital YouTube channel. In a post titled "I Get It And I Respect It... The Harriet Tubman Video Has Been Removed" that was published on the GlobalGrind this morning, Simmons writes:
"In the whole history of Def Comedy Jam, I’ve never taken down a controversial comedian. When my buddies from the NAACP called and asked me to take down the Harriet Tubman video from the All Def Digital YouTube channel and apologize, I agreed.
"I’m a very liberal person with thick skin. My first impression of the Harriet Tubman piece was that it was about what one of actors said in the video, that 162 years later, there’s still tremendous injustice. And with Harriet Tubman outwitting the slave master? I thought it was politically correct. Silly me. I can now understand why so many people are upset. I have taken down the video. Lastly, I would never condone violence against women in any form, and for all of those I offended, I am sincerely sorry."
The apology came amid swift criticism from the NAACP and others that called for the video to be yanked. A Change.org petition that began to gain some traction as news of the video began to spread via social media last night read, in part: "Rape is not a joke, nor is the sexual violation of African American women by enslavers a punchline."
The video is reportedly the first in a series of history-themed sketches planned for the channel. According to the Kansas City Star, set for release later this week is B-ROCK, an animated series that promises an "outrageous, irreverent, and hilarious spin on the Obama White House" that "chronicles the adventures of our 44th President’s eponymously-named super-alter ego."
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Taxi TechBlog 1: Data Prep and Backend
A week ago, I published NYC Taxis: A Day in the Life and it went a little bit viral. This seems to be the perfect mix of some brand new (for me) techniques that were a huge hit, along with subject matter that seemingly everyone can relate to. This is part 1 of 2 of a techblog about how I built this visualization, and will cover data munging and building the backend. The next post will talk about the frontend, including animations and charts.
On Monday afternoon, someone from Heroku (where the app is hosted) noticed the spike in traffic and the subsequent failed page loads, and contacted me to recommend turning on more dynos (I am not very experienced with heroku and had no idea what that meant, but it literally came down to dragging a slider, and the traffic became much more manageable.) Heroku also generously added me to their beta program to help cover the costs of the additional dynos.
Concerned about almost $1000 in overages on my Mapbox account in the first 12 hours, I took to the twittersphere asking the civic hacker community for some advice on how to deal with the situation. Monetize with ads? Add a paypal donate button? Switch to Open Street Maps’ free tile solutions? The chatter caught the attention of Mapbox, who got in touch with me within an hour and offered to sponsor the app! (I had already switched out the mapbox maps and put up a OSM tileset, but not having a dark, subdued basemap was suboptimal for the visualization. In any case, OSM rules and deserves a shoutout for making hosted, leaflet-compatible tiles available for the world to use)
At the time of this posting, the visualization has been shared over 4700 times on Facebook, 3700 times on Twitter, had 300,000 pageviews from 216,000 visitors.
Querying the Data
I’d FOILed the 2013 taxi trip data a few months ago. The blog post I wrote about it had gotten some attention, and resulted in dozens of requests to share the data. Many people came to the BetaNYC hacknights, hard disk in hand, to transfer the data on the spot. About a month ago, some of the requesters urged me enough to create a couple of torrents. At the same time, Andrés Moroy (someone I don’t know except via twitter) offered to host it so I finally got all 50GB zipped and uploaded.
Over the next couple of weeks, data scientists all over the world started publishing lots of interesting analyses of the data, and after someone loaded the data into Google BigQuery, a rather interesting thread erupted where people were showing off all sorts of ways to slice up the 173 Million Rows quickly. This would prove to remove a huge barrier to entry for me.
I’m not sure when the idea of “a day in the life” of a taxi came to mind, but it came directly from the simple question: “How much does a single taxi/driver earn in a single day/shift?” I’d heard that many drivers rent their shifts and need to earn back enough to break even before they take anything home. I’ve done similar static “Day in the life” map projects using the twitter API as well. Because the time and start/end location of each taxi trip was available, it just made sense to follow along to see when/how/where they earned their money over the course of he day.
I set out trying to figure out how to use BigQuery to get the data I wanted: A full day’s trips for a single medallion. With a hard-coded medallion and date, I was able to slap together a query that worked, but I had no idea how to pull all trips from a random cab on a random date, let alone man random cab/days. Reddit to the rescue! u/fhoffa, who started the Taxi Data BigQuery thread, helped me out in an hour with the exact query I needed:
The combination of having the data in BigQuery and a rather awesome community on Reddit already working on the data probably saved dozens of hours if I had tried to do all of this on my own. I can’t stress enough how important the community is to civic hacking projects like this.
So, data in hand, I see that there are around 30-60 trips a day for most of these vehicles. We have a time succession of geographic points, which is enough to string together into a line. This can be animated, as I’ve done in this animation of twitter user’s movements, simply moving a dot “as the crow flies” between the start and end points, and keeping accurate time with an accelerated clock. However, simply moving a dot between start and end points wasn’t going to cut it for this visualization. I wanted to show something that resembles a car actually driving, so I needed a way to trace out a reasonable driving path for each trip. Enter the Google Directions API.
The route is our overall trip, which is divided into legs. This API call included only an origin and destination, so there’s only 1 leg. If we had added waypoints to our API call, we could have up to 9 legs returned.
Each leg has steps, which are basically chunks of the trip that don’t require some instruction to the driver, such as turning or merging onto a highway. Each step has its own html_instructions that are the same thing Google would show you for turn instructions if you got directions via google maps. Neato.
But wait, how does this help us map the step/leg/route? Here’s where it gets interesting. Each step includes a polyline, which looks like this:
"polyline" : {
"points" : "az~vF|jmbMzJiA"
}
What the heck does az~vF|jmbMzJiA mean? It turns out that this is google’s super-compressed format for encoding polylines. This string can be decoded into a series of latitude/longitude coordinates representing the path to be followed for this step! There’s a handy widget for decoding/encoding these and mapping them on the fly here. Give it a try. Copy az~vF|jmbMzJiA and paste it in, see what you get.
Further down in the JSON response from our API call, there’s an overview_polyline that shows the entire route strung together:
Go ahead, try that one in the decoder widget too. You’ll see that the results don’t seem to make sense, as the polyline starts on the roads and then wanders off in seemingly wild directions. This is because there are escape characters in the encoded string. Look above, every place you see “\\” is really meant to represent a single backslash. Try the encoder tool again, you should see a more sensible path.
Use BigQuery to get a bunch of random trip/days Download them as a CSV
Write a node script to build out API calls for each series of 4 trips (Each API call can handle and origin/destination and up to 8 waypoints, meaning 9 total legs per call. Each taxi trip consists of two legs, the trip itself and the “downtime” between this trip and the next trip. So, we can efficiently handle 4 trips/8 legs per API call)
Append the polylines to the raw data, also append the start time of the next trip as a value for the current trip (so we know how long the “downtime” lasts)
Move everything into a sqlite database
Build a node server with a single endpoint, /trip, that will query the sqlite db for all trips for a random medallion, convert the results to geoJSON, and send the response to the browser.
getDirections.js opens our bigQuery results CSV, builds out API calls, and appends the appropriate polylines to the raw data. You can check out the code in my github repo. I won’t go into too much detail here, but I basically slice the number of trips for each taxi into groups of 4 or less, use the start point of the first trip as my origin, and the start point of the next group of 4 or the last stretch of downtime as my destination. The rest of the start and end points are waypoints. Once everything is stored in the appropriate strings/arrays, I build out my API call like this:
I store all of the fullApiCall strings in an Array that I use later to actually make the calls and process the results.
There’s also a step to combine all of the polylines for the steps into a large polyline for each trip or downtime. This is done using the Mapbox package I talked about before, getting the encoded latitude and longitude coordinates, linking all of the steps together for a single trip, and then re-encoding them.
Next a function called createGeojson() decodes the polyline for each trip and downtime, and creates a properly formatted geoJSON LineString. These are pushed to a featureCollection, and that featureCollection is sent back to the browser as a response.
It weighs in at 131kb for this trip. It would have been more efficient to decode the polylines client-side, but I really wanted to just have geoJSON ready to go for d3. Give it a try, copy the geoJSON result and paste it into GeoJSONLint and you’ll see a taxi’s trips for one day:
So there you have it, I combined raw taxi trip data with google directions API results, put them in a database and built a simple API endpoint to grab one random, and serve it up as proper geoJSON. Done-zo.
In the next post, I’ll detail how I built the frontend, designed the visualization and made the timing, animations, and charts work. Stay tuned, and thanks for reading!
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Once poised for a revival and a mixed-use makeover, the landmark Westlake Theatre is now for sale.
The seller? CRA/LA, the successor agency to the defunct Community Redevelopment Agency of Los Angeles, which was dissolved under a 2011 state law. CRA/LA is tasked with winding down the business of the former redevelopment agency, and it’s looking to unload the historic venue—recognizable for its steel-framed rooftop neon sign—after failing to find a developer willing to partner on the redevelopment.
In 2016, it issued a request for proposals to rehab the theater and possibly build affordable housing and retail on four neighboring parcels. The goal was to make the area “an attractive regional arts and culture and entertainment destination ... while offering employment, housing, education / institutional use and other services.”
But the request for proposals went unanswered, says Jimmy Chai, a broker with the real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield, which is marketing the property for CRA/LA.
“No one wanted it. There were too many covenants,” he says. “Now the CRA is just outright selling [the theater] just the way it is.”
The listing highlights the theater’s location next to a subway station, and advertises its potential to become a retail hub, creative office, or night club. It also notes its proximity to Downtown LA: “With over $25 billion in redevelopment transforming Downtown Los Angeles, many of Downtown’s and the Wilshire Corridor’s former theaters are now home to popular venues and retailers such as the Theatre at Ace Hotel, Urban Outfitters, COS (H&M), and CVS.”
The venue fronts MacArthur Park, an area that prior to WWII, had been quite posh. Born to show live vaudeville acts and big-screen films, it opened in 1926 and operated as a theater for 65 years. More recently, it hosted a neighborhood swap meet.
Westlake has been on everyone’s gentrification watch list for years. The sale of the theater, and whatever it’s turned into, could very well direct the neighborhood’s future.
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Mutually exclusive interaction of the CCAAT-binding factor and of a displacement protein with overlapping sequences of a histone gene promoter.
The sperm histone H2B-1 gene of the sea urchin Psammechinus miliaris contains two octamer sequences (ATTTGCAT) and two CCAAT motifs upstream of its TATA box. The CCAAT-binding factors present in nuclear extracts from testis and from blastula and gastrula embryos are indistinguishable by mobility shift and methylation interference analysis. However, there is a testis-specific octamer-binding factor in addition to the ubiquitous form. In DNAase I protection experiments, the CCAAT-binding factor of only the testis extract is able to interact with the sperm H2B promoter. In the two embryonic extracts a novel factor binds with high affinity to sequences overlapping the proximal CCAAT element, thus preventing the DNA interaction of the CCAAT-binding factor in the embryo where the sperm H2B gene is not expressed. This CCAAT displacement protein may therefore act as a repressor of sperm H2B gene transcription.
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Recouping accidental overpayments to employees
Let’s imagine a scenario where someone in payroll accidentally pays an employee $1100 when they should only have been paid $1000 or maybe the automated pay system paid someone for time they took as leave without pay. Is the employer able to retrieve the overpayment, and if so, how do they go about it?
Provided the error is discovered before the following payday, an employer is entitled pursuant to Section 6 of the Wages Protection Act 1983 to deduct the overpayment from subsequent payments, but only if the overpayment could not have been reasonably avoided, the employer gives notice to the employee that the employer intends to recover that overpayment and that the overpayment is recovered within the following two months.
All well and good—but what if the employer does not realise the overpayment has been made until after the next payday, or in fact, it becomes apparent that the employee was being accidentally overpaid for an extended period of time?
First, try the reasonable approach of writing to the employee, explaining how and when the specified overpayment was made, and seeking their written consent to deduct the amount from their next pay(s). If the employee agrees to the deduction(s) in writing, then the problem is solved, and it would be a good time for the employer to audit their payroll system to ensure the error doesn’t happen again.
However, if the employee refuses to provide consent to the employer to deduct an overpayment from future payments, things can become a little trickier and the factual matrix in which the overpayment occurred can become very important. Two interesting cases demonstrate the two different paths recouping overpayments can take.
In the 2012 Employment Court case of Foai v Air New Zealand, Mr Foai was promoted from a part-time baggage handler to a temporary full-time administrative role, anticipated to last for three months. Because the new role was only temporary, the terms were only evidenced in a letter, and the rate of pay was vaguely worded as being his average hourly pay for his usual (part-time) role as a baggage handler. Mr Foai’s new role was extended numerous times over a 16-month period, each time via the same vague letter regarding his pay.
Mr Foai started to notice that his pay had become very erratic, yo-yoing up and down and in many cases, well in excess of what he had been expecting. Over the 16 months of his temporary role Mr Foai variously raised this issue with his manager, HR and a person in payroll. He repeatedly queried whether the pay he was receiving was correct. Commitments were made to investigate the matter, but no-one took it seriously until he had been in the role for 16 months. By that time, it became apparent that Mr Foai had been overpaid more than $42,000. Understandably, his employer wanted Mr Foai to pay this money back.
Unfortunately, Mr Foai had come to believe that his pay must have actually been correct, and with his new position involving him in regular interaction with managers and even the CEO, he rationalised that this must be what happens when you rise up through the ranks. He was also required to travel frequently and had no idea what payments he received as a result of this. Consequently, he adjusted his lifestyle to his improved position, shouting his parents a long-overdue trip back to Samoa, a trip for himself to Hawaii and even his child support payments were increased by IRD as a result of his increased remuneration. Mr Foai relied on the equitable defence of change of position (in reliance on the employer’s error in this case) to argue why the overpayments should not be repaid.
The Employment Court held that the employer had the responsibility to ensure they paid employees correctly and that Mr Foai’s repeated questioning as to whether his pay was correct should have led them to investigate the matter. Further, this failure to investigate in conjunction with the vague references in the renewal letters as to what Mr Foai should actually be paid, were sufficient to lead Mr Foai to believe he was on the correct remuneration and to alter his lifestyle in reliance on that. The Employment Court declined to order Mr Foai to repay the overpayments.
However, in a matter before the Authority in January 2018 (Evolve Education Group Limited v Hobbs) the opposite outcome resulted. The employee, Ms Hobbs, reduced her hours from 25 hours per week to five hours per week. She informed her employer of this and her employer asked her to complete weekly timesheets, which she failed to do. Two months later, in September 2016, Ms Hobbs informed the employer they were still paying her for 25 hours per week when she was only working five, and asked for a new employment agreement. A new agreement was emailed to her incorporating the changes, but she failed to sign and return it. It was not until April 2017 that a new payroll administrator picked up the error that Ms Hobbs was still being paid for 25 hours per week, and that the overpayments amounted to $14,750.
The Authority held that the employer had the right to restitution in this case and that Ms Hobbs must pay the money back, given she had been unjustly enriched by the employer’s error. Ms Hobbs tried to use the same defence as Mr Foai (the equitable defence of change of position) however, it failed in this case given Ms Hobbs had clearly known all along she was being overpaid (unlike Mr Foai) and it was therefore not reasonable for her to have altered her position, knowing the ongoing overpayments were an error.
The take-home tip from these cases is that, on the rare occasion when an employee informs an employer they may be being overpaid, investigate it – immediately!
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Subsets and Splits
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