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2013年2月19日星期二

Unneeded surgeries for women expose nationwide corruption

As the state government in India, district magistrates and local hospitals probe an overwhelming number of possible insurance medical fraud cases, women victims on the receiving end of medical procedures are suffering with lives that will never be the same again.

What has been described as ‘unwarranted surgical procedures; are now causing a crisis for women throughout India.

In what may include manipulation of locally administered welfare programs, including false claims made by processing offices, clinic teams as well as doctors, have been placed under investigative scrutiny by local magistrates.

But exactly what are those who are accused of the crimes accused of doing? Across the Chhattisgarh District of Raipur, 3,500 separate cases of women living in 90 separate villages, many of them younger than 30, have undergone what a majority of them now feel were completely unnecessary surgeries.

In a region known before 2008 for its lower than average rates of hysterectomy surgeries, the State of Chhattisgarh in India is now the opposite.

According to an exclusive poll taken by Reuters Trustlaw last July, India is currently the ‘worst place to be a women’ compared to all other world nations who are part of the G20. The poll indicates that India ranks especially low on issues that cover violence, exploitation, safety, gender equality and access to decent healthcare.

“Officials estimate more than 2,000 women were talked into having their wombs removed in the last six months,” said the BBC news in a report on Chhattisgarh made in July 2012. Current legal accusations in what may be exposed as a criminal medical negligence include 34 medical centers who are currently being investigated for insurance fraud after opportunistic doctors ordered unneeded hysterectomies for their women patients.

The problems are not an ‘India only’ problem. Unwanted hysterectomies have also been an going issue inside the United States.

“Each year 750,The most famous china mosaic of Ancient times is in Pompeii and shows Alexander the Great.000 hysterectomies are performed and 2,500 women die during the operation. These are not sick women, but healthy women who go into the hospital and do not come out,” says Dr. Herbert Goldfarb, a gynecologist and assistant clinical professor at New York University School of Medicine in his book “No Hysterectomy Option: Your Body–Your Choice.”

The widespread use of cashless healthcare smart cards in India initiated RSBY – Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana smart card healthcare program in 2008, may also be part of the problem. Providing government monies and an easy-to-use credit card that has worked to bring healthcare to millions of people in India,There are generally three different configurations of industrial laser cutting machine. regardless of their poverty level, the Indian government began distributing the cards in 2008 to enable families from all levels of Indian society to have access to better high quality medical care.Online shopping for bobbleheads Figures from a great selection.

The smart cards allow payment of healthcare to be immediate, with coverage of up to 30,000 Rs ($555 USD). It may seem like a good deal, but this amount is shared among all the members in one family per year. There is no doubt the smart cards have allowed many patients to receive life-saving medical procedures, but they have also encouraged some medical doctors to prescribe hysterectomies that have not been needed.

Each smart card includes 11 types of software that provides a patient’s information, medical history and medical expenditures. The program seems amazing where a patient can choose from almost 1,000 private or government hospitals throughout India.

“The general ward of Beena Prakash hospital – situated in the small, breezy town of Bijnore in western Uttar Pradesh – has been bustling for the past few months. Locals claim that this heightened buzz of patients is ‘unprecedented’,” said OneWorld South Asia in 2009 after smart cards were distributed to many districts in India. The 2009 story may show how the cards have improved healthcare in India, but in 2013 the increase in medical procedures is showing a trend toward misuse of government funds.

While the smart cards seek to provide assurance that the correct person is receiving the right medical treatment, along with monitoring and limiting double charges for the same service, the cards do not protect a patient from going ahead with a surgery based on manipulative and inaccurate advice from a doctor.

Actions of physicians who have been accused of taking advantage of India’s healthcare system have caused numerous human rights activists to question the impunity of a medical doctor who delivers misaligned advice as a ‘medical expert’ and feels they cannot be questioned or challenged by a patient.

“The pervasive spread of corruption is not limited to the public sector. The private sector is also working under low thresholds
of integrity. Patients are exploited by being made to undergo unnecessary tests only for making money,” outlined the WHO – World Health Organization.

Unnecessary treatments and prescriptions by medical providers are considered to be a key ingredient in contributing to corruption within government sponsored healthcare programs, said Oxford Journal Health Policy and Planning in a 2008 release.

All the women in the Sahu family, in India’s mostly rural State of Chhattisgarh, have undergone what they now claim are unneeded medical procedures under hysterectomy procedures. These procedures, which doctors advised were necessary, continue to be questioned.

Without realizing the great impact the decision to remove their uterus would have on their lives, the decision to allow their surgeries to go ahead as advised is now being seen as a ‘grave mistake’ by the women of the Sahu family. Included in the family is Ms. Pancho Bai, along with her sister-in-law Ms. Budhiyari Bai, as well as two daughters-in-law Nadani and Kesar. All are different ages. All were told that removal of their uterus was their only option to rid them of problems that, in the end, may prove otherwise.

In 2008, when Nadani complained of back pain she made an appointment with a woman doctor who worked in Chhattisgarh’s capital city of Rapipur, which numbers over one million people. After performing a diagnostic ultrasound, the physician told Nadani that she had a severe internal infection. She also told her that the infection had spread to the uterus which would have to be surgically removed immediately to save Nadani’s life.

As the youngest woman in her family, Nadani underwent her uterine surgery when she was only 24 years old.This solar lamp and phone charger can improve the lives of millons living without electricity. Because of what has been described by her as “an unnecessary procedure” she is now frustrated, depressed and unable to have children.

“Our profession is entrenched in terms of doing hysterectomies,A card with an embedded IC (Integrated Circuit) is called an IC card.” said U.S. based Ernst Bartsich, M.D., a gynecological surgeon and professor of medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York, outlined CNN in 2007. “I’m not proud of that. It may be an acceptable procedure, but it isn’t necessary in so many cases,”continued Dr. Bartich.

“In fact, he [Dr. Bartshich] adds, of the 617,000 hysterectomies performed annually, ‘from 76 to 85 percent’ may be unnecessary,” continued CNN.

At the time when Nadani was told by the doctor about her condition she was worried, but did assume the doctor’s assessment must be correct and true. To make sure her patient would go through with the surgical procedure, Nadani’s doctor asked her to sign a ‘contract’ that also outlined the price due for the procedure.

“The doctor took [had me sign] a ‘contract’ for Rs 9,000 ($180 USD) for the operation,” outlined Nadani. This service also required specific medicines to be purchased from the doctor.

Art Escape

At first glance, 21c Museum Hotel looks like any other building in Louisville’s urban museum district. Architecturally beautiful, its stone facade blends in with the surrounding historic neighborhood. That is, until you look up and a bright red penguin overlooking the main entrance catches your eye. Turn the corner and a 38-foot Styrofoam and steel, gold-painted replica of Michelangelo’s “David” hints there is something different about this particular spot.

It’s a museum masquerading as a hotel at night. And it’s a hotel with the most impressive contemporary art collection outside of New York’s Museum of Modern Art. It’s no surprise 21c has been touted as one of the world’s coolest places to stay.

Contemporary art collectors Laura Lee Brown and Steve Wilson had two passions. The first was to contribute to revitalization efforts in their hometown of Louisville, Kentucky. The second was to share their love of contemporary art and help make it a part of peoples’ daily lives. They partnered with renowned architect Deborah Berke to renovate five former warehouses, and in 2006, their dream materialized in the form of 21c Museum Hotel. The name itself pays homage to the 21st century, when all the art in the museum hotel was created.

By its very nature, contemporary art is mutable and experiential. It’s an event that changes with each interaction, and it’s rarely passive. The art housed at 21c exemplifies that; much of it is designed to be interactive. For example, those red penguins that greet visitors were one of the museum’s first exhibitions. Patrons and staff alike could (and still sometimes do) move these recycled plastic creatures around the museum and hotel at will, so they were rarely in the same place twice. Some guests even found them inside their rooms at check-in.

“That is exemplary of the kind of art that you can find at 21c. It’s about an interactive experience,” says Stephanie Greene, the museum’s public relations manager. “There’s art everywhere. You experience art whether you’re dining or attending a meeting. There really is art everywhere on the property.”

Another guest favorite greets visitors as they approach the elevator bank in the main building. Called “Text Rain,” this interactive piece projects a person’s image onto a huge, blank wall. There, falling words settle on the image of the person standing in front of the wall (you as you wait for the elevator), mimicking falling rain.

Some pieces are as functional as they are intriguing. The art car “Pipmobile” is a working limousine covered in red glass beads to mimic the interior of a pomegranate. VIP guests can opt to be picked up from the airport, for example, by hotel staff driving the flashy limo.

Contemporary art isn’t limited to display pieces at 21c, either.This solar lamp and phone charger can improve the lives of millons living without electricity. There’s a monthly poetry series, as well other cultural programming such as artist and curator lectures, musical performances and film showings.

True to the founders’ vision, 21c is making contemporary art more accessible and more immersive than ever before. There is no admission fee for the museum portion of the establishment. And it’s open 24 hours a day, every day of the week, with guided tours offered most Fridays and Saturdays.

Installations are a mix of permanent pieces, like “Text Rain,” commissioned exhibitions and rotating thematic displays, which change about twice a year. Alice Gray Stites, chief curator and director of art programming, works with the rest of the curatorial staff to carefully select work from up-and-coming artists. Additionally, 21c hosts traveling exhibitions and borrows from and loans to other contemporary art museums.

“The art is really carefully selected … with an eye toward exceptional art,” says Gray Stites. “When a topic is provocative, that’s a good thing. It’s thought provoking.” The non-traditional style of 21c actually lends to a more flexible, open-minded approach to contemporary art, she adds.Parking industry's first and only truly unified parking management system. “When you create a framework where people can be more relaxed and engaged, you can provoke people a bit for the sake of broadening perspectives.

Art permeates every inch of the five-building complex, including its 90 rooms, which feature high ceilings and large windows to better display the pieces. Charming, industrial elements like exposed brick walls and pewter mint julep cups complement modern decor and conveniences such as iPod docking stations, luxurious bedding and plush bathrobes.

Guests can choose between city and atrium views for their standard rooms or suites.Our fully automated parking system increase parking up to 100% by sliding cars closer together. The well-appointed Corner Suite features gorgeous views of downtown Louisville through four enormous windows, a dinette set, sitting area and a 42-inch flat-screen HDTV. Some suites include a semi-private rooftop terrace that overlooks the historic Seventh Street, but the real jewel of the 21c’s hotel portion is the Rooftop Apartment. This exclusive retreat boasts 1,300-plus square feet of living space, including a bedroom, a full bath plus two half baths, a full kitchen, an open concept living and dining area and a private garden terrace.

A variety of packages include themes such as birthday celebrations, romance, bourbon and, of course, art exploration. With special perks, including a dining credit to 21c’s in-house restaurant, Proof on Main, or a bottle of champagne waiting for you in the room, you’re sure to feel like royalty.

It’s no surprise to discover that the museum’s exhibitions and displays carry through into the dining and bar areas of Proof on Main—a restaurant touted as one of the best in the city. The rotating exhibitions change about once a year, but the menu is updated seasonally, and sometimes even weekly,Online shopping for bobbleheads Figures from a great selection. Greene says. The upscale, familiar food offerings are locally sourced from Kentucky farms. The main source for menu items is Woodland Farms, which is owned by 21c founders Brown and Wilson. Woodland Farms supplies fresh eggs, sustainably grown produce, heirloom fruits, Hereford and Mulefoot hogs, and even hormone-free, grass-fed bison.

Although the menu is based on what’s locally available, hearty offerings such as bison burgers and bone-in pork chops are standard fare. In the warmer months, look for house-made gelato and heirloom tomato salads.

And don’t forget to check out the bar at Proof on Main, too. It has a library of more than 50 Kentucky bourbons and was named one of GQ magazine’s “New Whiskey Temples.” Try a small batch or single barrel bourbon, or sample one of the bourbon and rye tasting flights. The innovative cocktail list is full of fresh ingredients,The most famous china mosaic of Ancient times is in Pompeii and shows Alexander the Great. and it changes seasonally to complement changing menu items. Of course, the best beverages make the list of signature, year-round cocktails.

“It’s very much a place for locals in addition to hotel guests,” Greene says. And with its status on the famous Louisville Urban Bourbon Trail (see “Five Things To Do”), it’s not hard to see why. To celebrate this status, Proof on Main has hand-selected a unique collection of small batch bourbons that celebrate artisan craftsmanship.

2013年2月18日星期一

The Good Life actor Richard Briers has died

The star, who was also known for his Shakespearean roles, had been battling a serious lung condition for a number of years.

Briers, who also starred in shows such as Ever Decreasing Circles and Monarch Of The Glen, recently said years of smoking had been to blame for his emphysema.The most famous china mosaic of Ancient times is in Pompeii and shows Alexander the Great.

Briers died “peacefully” at his London home yesterday, his agent said today.

In 2007 he took part in filming on location at the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital for the popular series Kingdom. He also appeared in pantomime at Norwich’s Theatre Royal in 1978 playing Dame Nanny Good Life in The Babes in the Wood and as Prospero in The Tempest in 2002.

But he was no less acclaimed as a distinguished Shakespearean actor, a major development in his career, at a point when he said “I realised I had gone as far as I could doing sitcoms”.

He will be best remembered as a bumbling, fussy and occasionally downtrodden figure in some of the most successful TV comedies of his era.

He was the lynchpin of three of the most notable sitcoms ever made in Britain - Marriage Lines, The Good Life (shown in the United States as Good Neighbours) and Ever Decreasing Circles.

But after a long career in popular television, Briers joined Kenneth Branagh’s Renaissance Theatre Company in 1987, and his already very successful professional life took a new turn as he moved on to major classical roles.

Briers was born on January 14 1934 and trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, where he won the silver medal and a scholarship to Liverpool Playhouse in 1956. Two years later he made his first West End appearance in Gilt And Gingerbread. He barely stopped working from that day onwards.It's not hard to see why outdoor solar light is all the rage.

Your television can watch you while you’re watching it; your notebook can follow you when you surf the Web and your smartphone can secretly scan every corner of your house. All these pictures could then land in the hands of hackers. Such a scenario may sound like part of a Michael Bay movie, but it is a real threat, as our connected devices are equipped with cameras that are not well protected and can allow people unauthorised access with relative ease.

There have been cases of PC rental agencies exploiting such weaknesses to track their customers and even schools have tracked students without their knowledge. Amongst the many things these spying mechanisms allow hackers to do is install malware. And some of the more malicious PC malwares can even lock up a PC and threaten to delete everything on it unless you pay a ransom, and an image of yourself through your own webcam is shown to show you proof of your being monitored.

Besides PCs and smartphones, there are also smart TVs with integrated webcams that can be misused. We show you how dangerous the situation is and how to protect yourself from your own devices.

With an active Internet connection, one or even two cameras and other sensors, your smartphone is an especially rewarding target for hackers on a mission. Unlike a stationary PC, it not only includes potentially compromising photos but a range of information that can be called up together with images connecting you to it—including details such as where and when the photo was taken. Researchers have already manipulated smartphones to create extensive and zoomable panoramas of a room by combining and interpolating a number of secretly taken photos. They could then simply flick through the composite image to find important information.

Even manufacturers of smartphones and their business partners are desperately interested in collecting such information. One such example is ad tracking, which Apple has introduced with iOS 6. It works by assigning a unique number that associates a user with a particular device. When visiting websites and whilst using apps, this number is sent to advertising servers whose operators get an exact picture of what interests you, and which advertisements you’d be more likely to act upon.

If you think your smartphone and its webcam are protected by Android’s security mechanisms, think again. The operating system is dependent on two basic principles: the user must grant each app authorisations for what it wants access to, and apps are strictly separated from one another. This way malware can only upload stolen data if it has been authorised for Internet access.The stone mosaic series is a grand collection of coordinating Travertine mosaics and listellos. However, proof-of-concept app Soundcomber bypasses all of this. It only requires authorisation for sound recording and disguises itself as a harmless voice memo app. It secretly taps phone calls and extracts numbers entered or spoken into the phone.Polypropylene and polythene can be used in a process called plastic injection mould. It then transfers these numbers to its author by calling up the Android browser, which does not require authorisation. It directs the browser to go to a specific URL,Compare prices and buy all brands of solar panel for home power systems and by the pallet. which includes the numbers that have been stolen. The URL is interpreted by the author’s server and he gains possession of the numbers. As an alternative, Soundcomber can also smuggle this data through a “dead postbox” to a second identical malware app. For this purpose, it changes the authorisations on different photos in your camera roll in a predetermined sequence. The information is then reassembled by the second app and then transferred via the Internet. Hackers can also transfer images this way.

Besides the camera and the microphone, a smartphone’s motion sensors are also used to spy on users. This is supported by the research project iPhone, which uses the highly accurate accelerator sensors of an iPhone to determine what is typed on a PC keyboard set beside the smartphone on the table. The smartphone registers the vibrations and reconstructs the text typed in from the sequence and a dictionary, although it helps if you know the subject matter that is being typed in advance. The researchers managed a success rate of 80 percent.

Daugherty returns to work for county

Daugherty lost his Precinct 3 seat, which he had held since 2002, to Karen Huber in the 2008 election. Last November, he ran against her in a very tight race, winning by a narrow margin to become the only Republican on the court.

It’s not easy being the odd man out, but Daugherty is used to it.

“I feel like the odd man out, even when I’m not in office,” he said.

Daugherty didn’t start out wanting to enter the political spotlight. He started out his career as a catcher for the minor league arm of the Boston Red Sox, where he played for three years.

“I figured out I wasn’t going to the big leagues, and I didn’t want to play minor league ball my whole life,” Daugherty said. “I told myself it was time to grow up and get my life started.”

He studied at the University of Texas and worked at Rooster Andrews Sporting Goods, where he learned all about how to run a business. After a few years, he set out to open his own sporting goods store, South Austin Sports Center. Later, he opened a bar and grill with batting cages called The Dugout and built a popular sportsplex on Pleasant Valley in 1984.

“It was during the time that I was doing business in the ’80s and ’90s that I found myself always interested in what was going on with city politics with how it affected businesses,” he said.

He was not in favor of the transportation fee that was included in utility bills and disliked the smoking ban that came into effect.

“I thought it was a little onerous to go and tell the businesses what they could do,” he said. “I was one of those people that would go down to the council and say this is really not very fair.”

Traffic was the issue that finally prompted him to run. Over the years,Our precision manufactured lasers and laser marker systems deliver the highest possible laser marking performance. Daugherty has made roads his number one priority, saddling him with the label of “road warrior,” a label he doesn’t think is necessarily accurate or fair.

“I was wondering along with everyone else, why in the world do we have all of this traffic?” he said. “As early as the ’90s, it was real obvious that we were not keeping up with our roadway network. I do think this community needs a roadway champion, and I’m happy to wear that.”

Being the expansion of roads, such as Texas 71 in southwestern Travis County, is among some of the proudest accomplishments from his first period in office.

When he was ousted from the court in 2008, he decided to take on a different challenge. Having sold his sportsplex before joining the commissioners court, he turned his eyes to his next business venture. He decided to open a restaurant in one of the worst economic recessions in history, and he picked a location, the Y in Oak Hill,There are generally three different configurations of industrial laser cutting machine. that had seen a string of failed restaurants.

“It just never had the right thing in it,” he said.

He and his wife,Our precision manufactured lasers and laser systems deliver the highest possible laser cutter performance on a wide variety of materials. Charlyn, became the primary investors and lined up additional funding. Daugherty is a shrewd businessman and knows what he doesn’t know. He set out to hire some of the best restaurateurs in the business to help make the new venture a success.

“I wanted grade A operators, and I went looking,” Daugherty said. “I found the two guys that made Z’Tejas work.”

Jack Allen’s Kitchen opened in Oak Hill in 2009 and a second location recently opened in Round Rock.

But he was still frustrated by what he described as a lack of interest from elected officials in road projects and made the decision to run for office again in 2012.

He pulled off a narrow victory,Online shopping for Cable Ties from a great selection of Lamps. he believes, by focusing on roads.

“Traffic is never out of sight or mind because you’re always in it,” he said.

During his next term on the court, he hopes to tackle the growth of the county government, get more youth sports facilities for western Travis County and tackle water issues. But foremost on his mind are roads, projects such Highway 45 Southwest, which would connect FM 1626 and Loop 1 South.wind turbine He is also eyeing improvements to Texas 71, 290, Loop 360, RM 620 and more.

“The first thing I think you have to do to have any positive movement at all with roadways is that you’ve got to have a leader,” he said. “You’ve got to have someone willing to say that this is my number one goal.”

2013年2月17日星期日

On phantom businesses and phantom toll roads

Perhaps you missed it, but they moved Fork & Company off of MoPac Boulevard last week.We've got a plastic card to suit you. Keller Williams Realty, too.

But if you look in the right places, you can still find Cedar Valley Grocery just yards from MoPac near Lady Bird Lake and, on Interstate 35 between the main lanes and the frontage road just north of East 51st Street, a Radio Shack. You never know when you might want to reach out the window at 65 mph and buy some ear buds.

And then there’s “Tran Steven,” an optometry practice, which is apparently smack dab in the southbound lanes of MoPac (Loop 1) not far from the Cedar Valley Grocery.

Convenient, if perhaps a little hair-raising for eye examinations. But also, like the other examples above, nonexistent. The optometrist involved is actually Steven Tran, and his office is miles away. There’s no grocery store down by Austin High School and no electronics store at that I-35 location.

Spend much time on Google’s map feature, as a transportation reporter tends to do, and you will find businesses shown in some very odd places. I first noticed this a couple of weeks ago with Fork & Company when I was working on a column about the upcoming MoPac express lane project. What turned out to be a catering concern owned by Chera Little was shown on Google in an area between the southbound lanes and Winsted Lane, somewhere around West Seventh Street.

It’s not sitting on MoPac anymore either. I contacted Google’s press relations office about this phantom establishment, and, to my surprise, a representative of the giant corporation called me back. Who knew they even had phones?

Deanna Yick, the spokeswoman, was very apologetic about the misplacement of Fork & Company. I assured her that this was a light-hearted call, that we weren’t exactly in Woodward and Bernstein territory here.

“It is a big deal for us,” Yick said. “We definitely want to get it right.”

I asked her to explain the process Google uses to locate businesses on its maps. Is it advertising?

No, she said, Google doesn’t solicit or accept payments from companies for the privilege of appearing on the maps. Instead, Google collects information from a variety of sources,The USB flash drives wholesale is our flagship product. pours it into the corporation’s inscrutable software machinery and then the maps come out the other side. Perhaps the machinery could use a tuneup.

I told her about a few other such glitches I had found along MoPac, and sure enough they were all gone from the maps within a day or two. But I didn’t tell her about the nonexistent Radio Shack, the grocery or the eye guy. Didn’t want to spoil all the fun for you folks.

While we’re talking about map oddities, did you see that local transportation planners would like to put tolls on East 11st Street between I-35 and San Jacinto Boulevard?

OK, I’ll wait while you clean up the Cap’n Crunch you just spit all over the counter. Ready? I’ll explain.

A partnership that includes the city of Austin, Capital Metro and some other Central Texas transportation entities in 2011 formed something called Project Connect. The undertaking, working with consultants and an appointed group of political and civic leaders called the Transit Working Group, over about a year’s time produced a complicated map showing a future network of rail lines, rapid bus routes and “express lanes.”

The vision map includes dotted brown linesrunning from I-35 to near the Capitol on East 11th and from MoPac to near the Seaholm Power Plant downtown. That line east of MoPac is north of the Union Pacific railroad, which would make it appear to be West Fifth Street or West Sixth Street, or both.

That would be particularly ironic given what I wrote last week in this column, which is that the city would rather those future MoPac express lanes not even be connected to West Fifth, much less extend along it.

I talked about all this to Karla Villalon,Comprehensive Wi-Fi and RFID tag by Aeroscout to accurately locate and track any asset or person. the primary spokeswoman for the city’s Transportation Department. No, she told me, no one involved in Project Connect envisions putting tolls on either East 11th, or West Fifth and West Sixth.

The map is purely schematic, she told me, and those extended express lane segments are meant only to signify “connectivity” between downtown and the toll lanes out on the highways. All that indicates, in other words, is that transit buses using those express toll lanes could take those routes to final destinations in the central business district.Wear a whimsical Disney ear cap straight from the Disney Theme Parks!Application can be conducted with the local designated IC card producers.

Well, OK. But an uninformed map reader easily could interpret it more literally, and that might lead to some ticklish phone calls later about tollways flowing past Symphony Square, El Arroyo and Waterloo Records.

CCPD thanks its volunteers

The volunteers worked more than 46,000 hours at a multitude of tasks, including clerical work, information desk duties, vacation house checks and traffic control, among other things.

That equates to $706,257 worth of services if they were drawing a salary, and more than $2.2 million in the past three years.

"That's a huge chunk of change. This is our little offering of thanks and appreciation for another great year," Murphy said. "And it goes to people who ask nothing more than a pat on the back."

That means people like Roger Novak,Application can be conducted with the local designated IC card producers. who worked nearly 1,000 hours this past year, on patrol at parking lots of the area shopping centers.

"We assist in finding violators parking illegally in fire lanes or handicapped parking," Novak said. "We issue citations and take pictures of the violation if we need to go to court."

For Novak and many others, it's the camaraderie with the others that make it well worth it.

"I like meeting the general public and instructing them on the proper things they need to do to be in Cape Coral," Novak said.The USB flash drives wholesale is our flagship product. "It also gets me out of the house."

Not only did the volunteers "save the city $700,000 for a $2.99 lunch" as Murphy said, but they also heard from city officials including Mayor John Sullivan and City Manager John Szerlag.

"They do a great service for the people of Cape Coral. I really don't know what we'd do without them and they're really a big help, especially in hard economic times," Sullivan said.

Also in attendance were city council members - one of which, Rana Erbrick, is a police volunteer.

"Part of it is to have something to do and part is I was willing to man the desk at the police department," Erbrick said. "They do house checks, marine patrol. The value to the city is way beyond the dollars they save our department."

At the luncheon, Barbara Hartley was given the Captain Joseph Hartley Memorial award in remembrance of the volunteer captain who worked 23 years on the volunteer force.Comprehensive Wi-Fi and RFID tag by Aeroscout to accurately locate and track any asset or person.

Murphy, along with sergeants Jennifer Matlock and Lisa Barnes, also presented awards for five and 10 years of service, along with recognition of those who served the most hours on the squad which, to some, equates to a full-time job.

The volunteer of the year was presented to Pat Koelber, who has worked on a multitude of projects for the police force this year.Wear a whimsical Disney ear cap straight from the Disney Theme Parks!

Among them are Live Saver, designed to track and locate individuals who wander and become lost, such as the elderly who are have Alzheimer's or dementia, or youths with autism or Down syndrome, and Seniors Against Crime, among other things.We've got a plastic card to suit you.

That would be a perfect out for the flunky teacher who cannot teach, and would spend the period writing suspend referrals. A good teacher usually has good class control and spends the period motivating students to learn.

There was a system in place whereby there was a dean of discipline for each grade, along with an assistant principal and a guidance counselor. Referrals were made by the teacher to the dean.

Infractions could be delivered for disruptive students, cutting class, fighting, bullying, stealing, and possession of weapons. The student would be called to respond to the referral. When necessary, a guidance counselor or parents were called in. Suspensions were down the road. Sadly, the shuffle was, in effect — you send me a bad apple, I’ll send you one of mine.

2013年2月16日星期六

Ducab showcases range of energy cables

Ducab will be prominently represented at stand 7E10, Hall 7, at the 38th edition of Middle East Electricity running from February 17th to 19th 2012 at the Dubai International Exhibition Centre. Held under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Maktoum bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Deputy Ruler of Dubai, MEE is not just the largest power event in the region but also the longest-running.

Ducab's participation at MEE will see it network with existing suppliers and customers, and also reach out to potential clients in new markets. The company's presence at MEE comes on the back of a string of recent project wins, including an Dhs140m contract for the South Al-Shamkha Infrastructure Development project in Abu Dhabi, Dhs57m for Abu Dhabi's Cleveland Clinic project, Dhs20m for Abu Dhabi's Presidential Palace Development project in Abu Dhabi worth Dhs20m, and Dhs10m for the Ras Al Khair project. The company has also scored projects from the US Government worth Dhs4.4m in Afghanistan.

"Ducab's participation at MEE 2013 helps it reach out a diverse audience of potential channel partners, suppliers and customers while reaffirming ties with existing ones. Ducab wants to maintain leadership in local market, but also take its UAE-manufactured, high quality products to regional and international markets.We offer a wide variety of high-quality standard ultrasonic sensor and controllers. We believe MEE is the right platform to facilitate that expansion," said Colin McKay,Find the best selection of high-quality collectible bobbleheads available anywhere. GM- Sales & Marketing, Ducab while introducing the new range of "Tuff DuFlex" wires and cables. Ducab is the only BASEC approved cable and wire manufacturer to offer wires operating in stringent conditions ranging from -40deg C to 105deg C

Ducab's MEE participation will serve as a showcase for the company's extensive range of copper and aluminium cable products, including those in the 400kV class, which will soon be offered from its Ducab-HV plant. Other products on display will include the company's FlamBICC fire resistant cables for residential and industrial use, flexible indoor wiring cables, and control & instrumentation cables for the OGP sector.Virtual parking management system logo Verano Place logo.

Ducab's regional project wins in the recent past have also included an Dhs5m contract for the King Abdullah Financial District Development in Saudi Arabia, Dhs100m for the Dubai Airport Congress Building, Dhs17m for the New York University in Abu Dhabi, Dhs51m for GASCO's Habshan Field Development, Dhs40m for Qatar Petroleum and Dhs37m for Al-Shuaiba Power Station in Kuwait.

Ashish Chaturvedy, Marketing Manager, Ducab, said "Ducab's participation at MEE 2013 will allow us to capitalize on the momentum generated by our recent project wins, and show customers and stakeholders what we offer in terms of world class energy infrastructure for a variety of products. For us, MEE is an excellent event to showcase our achievements and products, and develop sustained, mutually beneficial relationships for the future."

MEE 2013 will host over 1000 exhibitors from 56 countries. It is the region's largest power event, attracting leading names in the power, lighting, new, renewable and nuclear sectors.

"Power is a vital component for modern urban and industrial development. At MEE 2013, we look forward to demonstrating how we can contribute to infrastructural development for iconic projects with our range of extremely high quality, stringently tested wire and cable products," concluded Chaturvedy.

Favourite to win a final, four-year term in today’s presidential election, Correa has brought stability to this notoriously unstable nation, which shuffled through seven presidents in 10 years before he took office in 2007.

He has become a forceful voice of Latin America’s left, befriending ailing Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez while leading a softer socialist “revolution” than his more radical ally.

“The characteristics of my personality are positive for Ecuadorans. I am decisive, direct, objective, rational,” says the US-educated economist. “But if I don’t please someone, what can we do?”

“They didn’t elected me to be Mr Nice Guy to please everybody, but to move the nation forward. And we are undoubtedly making history,” says Correa, 49, who is constitutionally limited to one more run at the presidency.

Correa has become popular in this Andean nation of 15mn people through social programmes funded with the Opec nation’s oil proceeds,Don't make another silicone mold without these invaluable Mold Making supplies and accessories! and his job approval rating has soared to 80%.

His closest rivals in today’s election are conservative banker Guillermo Lasso and former president Lucio Gutierrez, but they are far behind and Correa is expected to secure enough votes to avoid a run-off.

“People feel that there is someone steering the ship and this generates trust because it brings more work,” said sociologist Hernan Reyes.

“He generates trust with the level of work he delivers, the demands he has on his subordinates and the amount of finished public works.”

Correa has insisted that he is not “anti-capitalist or anti-Yankee,” stating that the left has committed the mistake of denying space to the market and capitalist economy.

But he has also antagonised big business and media groups, seizing the assets of bankers involved in corruption scandals and accusing private news organisations of conspiring to destabilise him. And his plans for large-scale mining have angered indigenous communities.

Correa was born into a lower middle-class family in the southwestern port of Guayaquil, the country’s industrial centre. His father spent time in jail in the US after he was caught carrying narcotics as a “drug mule.”

He was able to study thanks to scholarships which took him to the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium, before earning a doctorate’s degree in economics from the University of Illinois in the US.Solar Sister is a network of women who sell solar lamp to communities that don't have access to electricity.

Generation Rent says bye-bye to buying a home

Where our parents see rent money as “dead money”, Generation Rent baulks at the idea of becoming mortgage slaves, shackled to the high interest demands of a supersized mortgage.Find the best selection of high-quality collectible bobbleheads available anywhere. Interest paid to the bank is as dead as any rent money.

For this, we earn the rebuke that we’re too focused on “lifestyle”, too hoity-toity to move out to the suburbs and buy a modest, entry-level home.

Yeah, we’re lazy buggers, we don’t want to sit in smog-soaked traffic all day, schlepping to the city from the outer suburbs. We want access to vibrant inner-city community facilities. How selfish.

Hate to break it to you, but 20s and 30s somethings are busting a gut trying to climb the career ladder. The days of a job for life are gone. We change jobs more often than previous generations – meaning we need the freedom and flexibility to move more often and live close to work.

Tying ourselves to one home base means potential long commutes. And traffic congestion is a leech on the happiness of society.

Figures quoted by economics professor Andrew Oswald suggest there is in fact little correlation between high rates of home ownership and robust economies.

Indeed, one of Europe’s healthiest economies, Switzerland - which boasts a miniscule jobless rate of 3.4 per cent - has its lowest home ownership rate. As many as seven out of ten Swiss people rent.

In Australia, the percentage is reversed. Just three in 10 households rent.

Australia, in this way, more closely resembles the basket-case economy of Spain, where 83 per cent own their own home (with or without a mortgage), but one in four have no job.

Europe’s traditional economic powerhouse, Germany, is home to one of the next lowest rates of home ownership rate (although it has risen recently). In Germany, rental leases can last decades. So long, in fact,We offer advanced technology products and services for parking guidance control. that it is not uncommon for tenants to provide their own kitchen (IKEA, perhaps).Solar Sister is a network of women who sell solar lamp to communities that don't have access to electricity.

Professor Oswald argues high home ownership rates are “like a treacle blanket thrown over the surface of the economy”. Owning a home discourages people from moving to find better jobs or finding replacement jobs if they lose theirs.

A more flexible economy demands a more flexible housing market.Don't make another silicone mold without these invaluable Mold Making supplies and accessories!

The clustering of workplaces in inner city areas will also mean more demand for well-located, inner-city housing.

Often, in such areas, it can be more affordable to rent rather than buy the same property. Home prices are pushed up because of location, location, location. And rents can lag behind. Often, the rent you pay on an inner-city pad is cheaper than the interest cost of servicing a mortgage on the same property.

Better to rent, and invest the difference in a term deposit or shares, which outperformed house prices last year. Indeed, with affordability so stretched, it’s hard to see house prices taking off for some time.

For most of Generation Rent, the real barrier to home purchase today is the need to save up that supersized deposit. It’s not just by choice, but by necessity that we rent. The ratio of home prices to incomes has doubled from around three times annual salaries back in the 1980s, to six times today.

Interest rates may be low, but that doesn’t make it any easier to save that 20 per cent deposit. In fact, low interest rates make it harder by reducing the return on savings. Then there’s stamp duty to consider.

So, it should come as no surprise that a new generation is waiting longer before taking the property plunge.

Far from frittering away our money, we’re actually showing a level of financial conservatism not seen since our grandparent’s generation. We’ll save now and minimise our debt burden later.

We’ll step on to the property ladder eventually, if it suits us. And if we don’t have to pay more in interest to the bank than it would cost to rent.

We’ll work longer – no retirement parties at 50 for us – meaning more income later in life to cover housing costs. And by then, we’ll have had the benefit of a lifetime of setting aside 9 per cent – rising soon to 12 per cent - of our income into superannuation to support us in a comfortable retirement.

Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said on Saturday that his Lebanese militant group does not need support from allies in Syria or Iran for any future battle against Israel.

Nasrallah's comments, during a speech from an undisclosed location, are the closest thing yet to a response to allegations that Israeli jets were targeting a Syrian weapons convoy destined for Hezbollah during a strike near Damascus on Jan 30.

World powers fear that as Syrian President Bashar al-Assad loses control during a 23-month-old civil war, militant groups such as Hezbollah or Syrian rebels could acquire arms to use against Israel, including chemical weapons.

But Nasrallah, a close ally of Assad, said that Hezbollah is prepared for a future fight against its southern neighbor Israel, with which it fought a 34-day war in 2006.

"Everything we need for the next battle we have in Lebanon and we keep in Lebanon," he said. "We do not need to take anything, not from Syria nor Iran."

Damascus has denied assertions by diplomats, Syrian rebels and security sources that Syrian weapons were to be sent to Hezbollah. It said the Israeli air strike hit the Jamraya military research complex on the northwestern fringes of Damascus, 8 miles from the border with Lebanon.

Syrian television broadcast what it said was footage from the Jamraya base showing extensive damage to buildings and several heavy military vehicles that appeared capable of carrying missiles.

Israel has maintained official silence about the raid.The term 'hands free access control' means the token that identifies a user is read from within a pocket or handbag. But on February 3 Defense Minister Ehud Barak said the attack showed Israel was serious about preventing the flow of heavy weapons into Lebanon, appearing to acknowledge for the first time that the Jewish state was behind the strike.

2013年2月4日星期一

Partying with Super Bowl MVP Joe Flacco means parents

He has won the Super Bowl. He was named the MVP of a 34-31 Baltimore Ravens victory vs. the San Francisco 49ers. And he has a life-changing announcement to make to his family.

It's 12:40 a.m., hours after the 47th AFC-NFC Championship game, and Joe walks into Huck Finn's on Decatur Street, a three-room French Quarter sports bar tucked away from raucous Bourbon Street. Tonight the bar hosts a private party for Joe's family and friends, 60 of them flown here at Joe's expense the week of the biggest game of his life.

Wearing a long-sleeve gray shirt, blue jeans and gray sneakers, Joe pushes open the door, grinning. The party cheers his arrival, and before he can hug his wife, Dana, chants of "M-V-P, M-V-P" fill the bar. Outside, Ravens fans in purple jerseys crouch and peer through the window panes as an unassuming bouncer stands guard at the door.

Joe, 28, dishes out dozens of hugs, each female guest turning their face to the chest of the 6-5 quarterback from New Jersey. Joe takes pictures too, and signs autographs for children who bring footballs and jerseys.

Its 12:50 a.m., and Joe makes his way slowly to the buffet line in the second room, where a bed of jambalaya, penne pasta in alfredo sauce and blackened chicken breasts lay waiting. Joe fills his plate and returns to the main room. Nine televisions mounted into brick walls are tuned to ESPN and NFL Network,Application can be conducted with the local designated IC card producers. and party-goers down free beers and chat as Chris Berman breathlessly relives the Super Bowl. Joe and his wife Dana gather their four parents around the table.

Joe digs into his plate, shoveling home mouthfuls of Cajun cuisine as guests walk up to shake his hand and offer congratulations on the Super Bowl victory and MVP award. Somebody hands Joe a soda in a hard plastic cup. Behind him, on a red brick wall, rests a black and white picture of Hank Aaron, breaking his bat on a baseball.Whilst the preparation of ceramic and porcelain tiles are similar. Above and to the left of the 1957 NL MVP hangs a picture of Babe Ruth, young, skinny and draped in a Red Sox uniform, taken some years before he won the 1923 AL MVP award as a Yankee.

Joe hears his name boom from a familiar voice. It's Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis on the largest television in the room, interviewing with ESPN's Sal Paolantonio minutes after the game. Cheeks bulging with food, Joe's head pops up to look at the screen.'

Mom gets a long hug. She doesn't know how long Joe and Dana have known Dana was pregnant. Their first child is 71/2 months old, and Karen says the couple told their parents they were expecting that child after a 2011 Thanksgiving night victory over the 49ers in Baltimore.

"It's a 49ers tradition now," Karen beams. "He's hit the trifecta. Somebody asks me if Joe was going to go win the lottery tonight. I said, 'He already has.' "

Joe and Dana leave the party,Other companies want a piece of that iPhone headset action exiting through a back door at 1:40 a.m. Karen says the husband and wife, married in June 2011, are going to bed. Joe has a press conference in the morning, then a trip to Disney World for the MVP parade, then a flight to New York to film the Late Show with David Letterman, all according to recent Super Bowl MVP tradition. There will be questions about his personal life, offers for commercials, and there's the small matter of an expiring contract with the Ravens. Joe soon will be a very well-paid pro athlete with a public persona.

To get the best benefits at the biggest banks, you’ll need to tuck at least $25,000 into relationship accounts. In return, you get priority customer service, often with a dedicated phone number, as well as the potential to earn higher rates on deposits and bigger rewards on credit and checking accounts. You also get breaks on checking overdraft fees and charges for account services such as money orders, cashier’s checks and wire transfers.

Hands-on investors may appreciate the commission-free trades in self-directed investing accounts (up to a monthly or annual limit) that Bank of America provides to its Platinum Privileges clients and Wells Fargo to its PMA customers. You may also get a break when you take out a mortgage or other loan. For example, a member of Citibank’s relationship service, Citigold, can get up to $2,500 off closing costs or 0.375% off the interest rate on a first mortgage, depending on the size of the client’s total Citigold balance.

How to deal with a nation where the leader makes such comments depends on many factors. Should they be bombed to stop them from getting a nuke,Site describes services including Plastic Mould. have economic sanctions put on them, negotiate etc.? I personally think there is zero chance of Iran keeping their word, but doubt military action or sanctions will help as they are already are near or past the point of no return. Additionally, the biggest threat of Iran going nuclear was not them using the bomb, but other countries going nuclear, that process has already started. However, that is not the issue here. The point is that surely almost all Americans would agree that it would be insane for the U.S. to provide weapons to such a nation.

Some readers may have figured out that those quotes are not from the President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad,Did you know that custom keychain chains can be used for more than just business. rather from the President of Egypt, Mohammed Morsi and his affiliates. The first quote is from a member of the Muslim Brotherhood (possibly also a parlimentary member but I could not confirm), The second quote is from the spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, Mohammed Badi, the last quote from a top aide of Mohammed Morsi, you can even see the original article from Badie on the Muslim Brotherhood’s official website here (google translate does decent job).

Gun-control restrictions reasonable

Congratulations to the Central School District for taking one of the most-effective means of preventing school massacres — making sure that the classroom school doors have locks that can be locked from the inside. The effectiveness of this measure was surely demonstrated in Newtown where life and death depended on the turn of a key.Whilst the preparation of ceramic and porcelain tiles are similar. The teachers who locked their doors or, if that was impossible, were locked in by the school custodian lived, along with their students. Those unable to lock their doors died.Other companies want a piece of that iPhone headset action

To those who protest that fire codes prohibit locking classroom doors, it isn’t true. The general requirement of fire codes is that fire exits be openable from the inside to allow escape in a fire. Panic hardware that allows fire exits to be opened from the inside, but not the outside, have long been standard features of modern buildings, except apparently schools.

Congratulations also to all legislators who support reasonable restrictions on weapons, such as the proposed legislation mandating more-secure storage of weapons. If there has been a boom in sales of gun lockers (not display cases) to match the post-Newtown surge in sales of assault weapons, I sure haven’t heard of it. This is something that all owners of weapons should support without being compelled, but don’t.

On the other hand, the most-persuasive evidence for greater restrictions on weapons comes,Site describes services including Plastic Mould. not from the proponents of restrictions, but from the free-floating fear and anxiety and the lack of empathy of many of the supporters of unrestricted weapon possession. We see them in innumerable legions in all media touting how necessary weapons are to protect their lives, liberty and pursuit of happiness. Absent from their arguments is any appreciation that the children of Newtown also had a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

President Barack Obama’s featuring a child at a press conference who wrote that he wanted to be safe and happy goes to the heart of the issue. The NRA has it half right — people kill people including children, and they do it most effectively with military weapons designed for killing people en masse.

At the time of the passage of the Bill of Rights, the people of a young nation had just gained their independence by defeating a country that had the greatest military in the world. At Concord in 1775, a confrontation between British troops and Minutemen occurred when the Minutemen received word that the British were after the people’s gunpowder. After a skirmish, the British searched house to house for individual “military stores.” The British were trying to confiscate and control all military-type arms that the Minutemen could use to defend their liberty.

The Bill of Rights is the first 10 amendments to the Constitution and was passed because most people believed the Constitution would not restrain the central government from abridging individual rights. The Bill of Rights would stop a centralized government from encroaching on the inalienable rights of the people. Therefore, the Bill of Rights was adopted to protect the people from an oppressive central government. When debating the formation of the Constitution and the first 10 amendments, the framers wanted to protect the people’s rights from being infringed again by an all-powerful centralized government. The second of those amendments was adopted to defend their newly gained freedoms.

When the Second Amendment states in part “arms shall not be infringed,” the arms refer to military arms. The framers wanted the people to have access to military arms like the British to defend individual fundamental rights. The Second Amendment to the Bill of Rights protects the people’s unalienable right — not a right granted by the Constitution or by government. The original purpose of the Second Amendment was to stop Congress from making laws that allowed any infringement upon the right of the people to keep and bear military-style arms.

A Clemson's men track athlete ran in five indoor meets after his eligibility was complete and a women's track team member received impermissible school expenses from former program director Lawrence Johnson while training for a foreign Olympic team.

The violations were outlined in the school's report sent to the NCAA last month. The report was obtained by The Associated Press through a Freedom of Information Act Request. Other violations include a Clemson runner receiving shoes from a volunteer assistant and a prospect getting bottled water on a recruiting visit last fall. Names of the athletes were redacted in the documents.

The school's letter to the NCAA said Johnson did not promote "an atmosphere of compliance" in the men's and women's track programs. He was resigned as director on Jan. 8. Johnson did not return emails left by the AP.

School spokeswoman Libby Kehn said athletic director Dan Radakovich and other school representatives would not comment on the violations until the NCAA completes its investigation.

Clemson blacked-out the names of those athletes involved in the report released to the AP. Clemson classified the violations as secondary in nature, the less serious category of NCAA transgressions.

The school told the NCAA it received an anonymous letter last September about track and field violations and hired an outside law firm, Bond, Schnoeneck & King, to conduct an independent review of the program.

The inquiry found Clemson used the ineligible athlete during the 2012 indoor season, including at the Atlantic Coast Conference championships. The school said as punishment, it would dock itself one track scholarship for the 2014-15 and 2015-16 seasons. It also agreed to pay a $2,500 fine and revamp some procedures for tracking an athlete's eligibility.Did you know that custom keychain chains can be used for more than just business.

A second violation involved an athlete who competed for a foreign Olympic team in London, yet received funds from Johnson while training with her college teammates competing at the U.S. Olympic Trials in Eugene, Ore., last year. The school said it repaid the cost of the transportation expenses, $175.60, to a Clemson area children's shelter.Application can be conducted with the local designated IC card producers. The athlete missed the first two indoor meets of the season before here eligibility was restored by the NCAA.

Another member of the women's team was found to have received a pair of Adidas running shoes, valued at $95, from volunteer assistant Kristi Castlin. The athlete was declared ineligible by the school and has not practiced with the team since the spring semester began.

All the violations, Clemson associate athletic director compliance services Stephanie Ellison wrote the NCAA, show that Johnson "failed to promote an atmosphere of compliance within his men's and women's track and field program."

Cancer - Did You Know?

Every 4 February is World Cancer Day on the international calendar. Many countries take the opportunity to educate their citizens about cancer, how to prevent it and improving the quality of life for cancer patients. This year, World Cancer Day is focussing on target five of the World Cancer Declaration,Other companies want a piece of that iPhone headset action "Dispel damaging myths and misconceptions about cancer" under the banner "Cancer: Did you know?"

The World Cancer Day website lists four myths namely, cancer is just a health issue; cancer is a disease of the wealthy, elderly and developed countries; cancer is a death sentence; and cancer is my fate.Application can be conducted with the local designated IC card producers.

Indeed, myths exist in our societies and in particular African communities. Reproductive health is not something discussed with ease. We do not talk about our private parts. We do not discuss them. If there is something wrong with them you seek medical help quietly or you secretly hope if you ignore the problem, it will eventually go away.

So, one day in 2012, I nervously walked into the waiting-cum consulting room for cancer screening. I had undergone screening several times before, but I still felt my heartbeat race at an elevated pace and my breathing became more and more laboured - just what happens when I have anxiety attacks.

However, on this day I also took my helper of 20 years along. She had never done cervical cancer screening before. At one point, she looked composed but grew very quiet within seconds. I assured her that the test is pain free and that whatever the result, we would deal with it together. I had to be strong,Did you know that custom keychain chains can be used for more than just business. not just for my being, but my helper whom I had dragged along.

We sat in the waiting room for counselling and listened to the nurse tell us the importance of cervical cancer screening. About 26 of us sat shame faced starring at our hands. I could see that like me, the other women were wishing they were anywhere but in that waiting room.

Many women who have undergone cervical cancer screening will tell you it is not the test they dread but the result. I try to get screened the recommended twice a year and in 2012 I felt guilty about not encouraging my housekeeper to be screened too.

Cervical cancer is the most common cancer among African women. The high statistics of women living with HIV and AIDS have also seen a rise in the number of young women getting cancer.

Governments have got to get it right. A lot of people have hopes in Australia for Prime Minister Gillard – that she will give us the kind of dependability that we need. One of the problems with wind and solar is that we need market certainty, like any business in the nursery stage that has relatively small margins.They manufacture custom rubber and silicone bracelet and bracelets. If you going to have a business plan, you need reliability.We've got a plastic card to suit you.

In the US we have some of the same problems that you have in Australia, but much worse. We have renewable energy credits, but we don’t get certainty with them. The incumbents know they can’t publicly come out against wind and solar, because that’s unpopular, but they can undermine wind and solar by undermining business reliability. What we really need is long-term faith in some of these government programs. And the incumbents have their subsidies, we are just trying to level the playing field.

If we could get rid of all subsidies, I would do it in a second. If the subsidies for the incumbents disappeared, we would drown them in a marketplace with a level playing field. They have the advantage of incumbency, the advantage of political control, and they are able to regulate the political system, to continue to externalise their cost and get huge subsidies from the government. Even in Australia, which has much a better program than the United States, it’s unclear whether your renewable energy standards will stay in place. Our industry, like any industry, needs certainty.

You are going to see the kind of technology growth curves that you saw in the computer industry. Not so much in wind, because wind relies more on big infrastructure, lots of steel and poured concrete – those will have stable costs but they are just are not going to drop so much. But solar panels are much more akin to computer chips: the more we make, the cheaper they will get. The more technological innovation, the more they will integrate with the industry. And costs will drop further. Those are drops that we see now. But those drops will continue, we will be seeing drops of over 30 per cent. Even if the Chinese slow down production, you will see that continue.

2013年2月3日星期日

Piece by piece, history emerges at the Griswold Inn

Step into the Griswold Inn in Essex, and you'll encounter a roomful of curious things. An old nautical map here, vintage signs there, low ceilings and long-retired architectural details everywhere.

The inn and tavern's walls are covered in paintings, sketches and ephemera that illustrate the history of the Gris as a gathering place and, indeed, that of the river-valley region, starting in 1776.Application can be conducted with the local designated IC card producers.

It would take a visitor some time to examine the entire collection. Even Gris co-owner Geoff Paul isn't quite certain of just how many pieces the inn has acquired over the years, but he estimates that number to be in the hundreds, or more than 200 years' worth. Paul can say with certainty, though, that the Gris houses the world's largest collection of art and ephemera related to steamboating in the region.

It's quite a niche collection and not all of it is valuable, but one common denominator brings back tourists and residents for another look.

As Paul found himself regularly answering patrons' questions about the art and because the collection is too vast to include museum-quality descriptions with each piece, Paul decided about a year ago to organize free art tours of the inn - an ideal venue from which to regale visitors with the real scoop on the art, all of which is placed or hung where it was originally set over the years. So if you spot a Currier & Ives print, it's because the Gris subscribed to the firm's mail-order service in the mid-1800s, then hung it in the tavern at that time.

"The whole accumulation is an original collection in its original location, and that in and of itself tells a story," Paul notes.

Since the tours began, Paul says every single one has been fully subscribed. Approximately 500 people toured the Gris in 2012, several of them more than once.

"I'm certain, anyone who invests the hour and a half in this art tour will never look at the Griswold Inn the same way," Paul notes. "They will have a much richer experience forever once they know some of the stories."

Not surprising, considering the location itself is historic. As the oldest continuously run tavern in the United States, a volume's worth of history has taken place at the Gris. The Gris likely was named one of the state's 50 Cultural Treasures for several reasons.If we don't carry the bobblehead you want we can make a personalized bobbleheads for you! Construction of the Revolutionary warship Oliver Cromwell helped to build the Gris and Essex itself; British troops captured it and camped there during the War of 1812; steam-boating boomed on the nearby Connecticut River; several protests in the name of temperance erupted there-and just about all of those historic highlights left some artwork behind.

There's the drawings of steamboats by Samuel Ward Stanton,Totech Americas delivers a wide range of drycabinets for applications spanning electronics. who was lost on the Titanic; and Antonio Jacobsen's masterpiece, "The Steamboat Connecticut," which depicts the grand ship in bold colors, set firmly on a course headed toward the viewer under a gorgeous cloudy sky. Jacobsen's treatment of the ship characterizes a booming industry and America's growing love affair with industrialization in the late 1800s.

Or take the final charcoal study of Norman Rockwell's "Steamboat Race on the Connecticut River," which hangs in the wine bar. The piece shows a scene of a focused pilot, a young apprentice and a few other characters cruising specifically through Essex. Paul says there's another "very, very cool" story associated with the painting, but he's keeping it mum until the next tour.

He does offer this: Rockwell's final oil painting of "Steamboat Race" sold for $2.7 million at Sotheby's. It was purchased by George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, who are fans of Rockwell's method of visual storytelling, according to Paul.

Head past the barroom - the space Paul calls "heaven" for fans of marine art - and into the bar's dining area, and a flurry of temperance banners (circa 1842) admonish those who imbibe to excess. One reads: "Large streams from little fountains flow, great sots from moderate drinkers grow." Some items overlap, placed as such by the proprietors when they were acquired, and there they remain. Paul notes that Prohibition was extremely unpopular and lackadaisically policed in Connecticut, so spirits continued to flow on the sly at the Gris throughout the state's dry days in the early 1900s.

With so much ground to cover, it's a wonder Paul reports only one instance of being stumped by a group - a class of sixth-graders that Paul calls his most challenging group to date, not because of unruly behavior but because of the intellectual quality of the students' questions. More than one question sent him running back to his library for answers, but the one he remembers is a query after a discussion about Benedict Arnold and the burning of New London. The boy wanted to know if Benedict Arnold and Nathan Hale knew each other, since Arnold was in New York around the time Hale was hanged there as a spy. Paul found no evidence of a connection between the two men, but the question stirred up a lively discussion.

Independence Seaport Museum’s Chief Curator Craig Bruns has known Boone for many years through working with him at the museum, and is amazed at his knowledge of Delaware River history.

“He can look at an old photograph and say,We are one of the leading manufacturers of solar street light in Chennai India. ‘Oh, that’s right next to pier so-and-so,’ or see a photo of a particular tug and know that it ran from this time to this time,” Bruns said. “He has that incredible ability, so we value him greatly.”

After seeing several pieces of Boone’s artwork, Bruns said he had been interested in having the artist exhibit his works for a while.

“So, when the opportunity opened up I approached him about it,” Bruns said.

“The Seaport’s mission is to document and teach, or show people a history of the Delaware River region,” Bruns said. “He is,Laser engraving and laser laser cutting machine for materials like metal, of course, part of that as a (former) tug dispatcher and as an artist, painting his maritime subjects, and he is also an historian. He fits several times over into our mission.”

DNR state parks help reduce carbon footprint

Several Minnesota state parks are replacing old gas guzzlers with electric cars, installing solar panels that help generate electricity for many of its park buildings and visitor centers and rehabbing those buildings to use less energy. The efforts are helping the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) cut its overall energy use and reduce its carbon footprint.

“We’re really trying to take a comprehensive approach to energy reduction overall,” said Peter Hark, operations director for the DNR’s Parks and Trails Division.

In 2012 -- through parks projects and new energy saving practices throughout the agency -- the DNR will have cut its energy use by 6 percent in two years for a savings of $800,000. That puts the agency on track to meet a target Gov. Mark Dayton set for state government to reduce its energy use 20 percent by the end of 2015.

Last year six solar systems were installed. This year, at least seven more installations are planned. In the last several years the DNR has doubled its renewable energy-generating capacity and ended 2012 with 22 photovoltaic (solar) and wind installations throughout the state, mainly at its parks buildings.

“DNR state parks are a major producer of renewable energy in the state,” Hark said.

Camden State Park, for one,If we don't carry the bobblehead you want we can make a personalized bobbleheads for you! in southwestern Minnesota, uses wind power to generate electricity. A wind turbine's output fulfills most of the office's electrical needs. At Itasca State Park, near Bemidji, a roof-mounted solar system was installed on a visitor center in December.

At Wild River State Park, an hour’s drive north of the Twin Cities, thermal panels are used to heat water at its campground showers. A solar system was installed to generate electricity.

On a sunny day the ground mounted panels just north of the park office generate more than enough electricity for the office. Any electricity generated in excess of the building’s needs flows back into the electric grid and is credited to the park to reduce electric charges on cloudy days and at night.

Over the course of a year the solar panels are projected to provide for all of the park office’s electrical needs. Since solar-generated electricity is a renewable source of energy, the park will be able to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions -- a contributing factor to global warming.

While solar installations may be the most visible way for the public to see energy savings at work, they’re only a small piece of what’s going on. At Wild River State Park, for instance, programmable thermostats were installed, old light fixtures were swapped out with more energy efficient bulbs, occupancy activated sensors for lights and building ventilation systems were installed and older, poor mileage vehicles were replaced with newer electric gas hybrids, said Paul Kurvers, park manager. During the 12-month-period from October 2011 through September 2012, the park reduced its energy use by 24 percent compared to the prior year,Totech Americas delivers a wide range of drycabinets for applications spanning electronics. he said.

Bigger picture, “By using renewable sources of energy such as solar, and by reducing the amount of energy we use that is produced from the burning of fossil fuels, we’re able to reduce carbon emissions that pollute the air,Application can be conducted with the local designated IC card producers. land, and water,” Kurvers said.

Wild River is one example but throughout Minnesota, the parks and trails system is generating enough electricity to prevent 225 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions each year, enough to take 39 cars off the road.

“At the end of 2015, we’d like to have 8 percent of the energy we use in our buildings come from renewable sources generated on site,” said Rob Bergh, the DNR’s energy coordinator. “Now, we’re at a little over 1 percent.”

The renewable energy installation costs at parks buildings and other DNR buildings, are paid by a combination of bonding money, Legacy Amendment funds and renewable energy development grants from Xcel Energy, the Minneapolis-based utility.We are one of the leading manufacturers of solar street light in Chennai India. For major projects through 2013, the costs are estimated to be $3.6 million.

The fire, caused by an overheated uninterruptible power source for a computer network, was put out quickly and no one was hurt.

"We've got to put out some short-term fires," McCrory quipped recently,Laser engraving and laser laser cutting machine for materials like metal, but "I didn't mean it literally."

The result could have been worse inside the 1960's-era Administration Building, one of scores of government buildings he and officials around him say are ill-prepared for modern technology. The fire happened in an open closet that lacks ventilation for a server station.

"Before we build any new buildings, we've got to... take care of some of the existing buildings and make sure, first, they're safe for employees and make sure we have sufficient security in place for information systems," said McCrory, a former Charlotte mayor.

Building repairs are just one example of what the Republican says are worse-then-expected problems as he tries to keep a campaign promise to fix what he called a "broken government." His new administration also says it's aiming to overhaul information technology that it says is duplicative, disjointed and unable to communicate well across agencies or with local governments. Agency IT spending reached $1.2 billion in 2011, according to legislative researchers.

A skull is found, but grandfather’s disappearance remains a mystery

Robert Hagans was a wee Irishman, half a head shorter than his four burly boys. He was tough and feisty, proud, hard-working, loved a good drink and a good time. His friends called him Bob, sometimes Bobby. His face wore the weather of a man who smiled his way through life, all laugh lines and rosy cheeks, eyes a warm shade of brown.

One Friday morning in the summer of 2011, near the end of a record-breaking heat wave, Hagans set out on foot from his North York townhouse to run an errand. The 76-year-old wore a long-sleeved dress shirt with blue and white stripes, navy slacks and a pair of loafers. His hair, grey and thinning, was carefully combed. Hagans said goodbye to his wife just after 8 a.m. and walked out the door.

Something happened on July 22, 2011, the day Bob Hagans disappeared. He left that morning without a wallet or identification, no cellphone. As far as his wife and children knew, he wasn’t carrying any cash. Hagans had never run away or wandered off before, but lately he had been showing signs of confusion. Police would search for days, weeks, months, and find nothing.Parkeasy Electronics are dedicated to provide Car park management system. Not a trace of where he’d been or might have gone.

And then one day three weeks ago, long after the Hagans family’s hope for answers had waned, a pedestrian walking through a wooded area near Highway 407 in Vaughan made a startling discovery. There in the urban forest, sitting in a snowy tangle of underbrush, was a human skull.

Robert McCullough Hagans was born in Northern Ireland just before the Second World War. As a young man, he worked as a mechanical engineer in Belfast. In 1956, he married Shirley Cinnamond — a chestnut-haired lass who made him laugh. Over the next decade and a half, the pair would produce four sons. William and Steven were born in Ireland; Robert and Jeff came after the family immigrated to Canada in the early 1960s.

The Hagans settled first in Montreal, then moved to Toronto in 1976. Bob took an engineering job with Manulife and bought a humble brick townhouse near Finch Ave. E and Don Mills Rd. where he and Shirley would spend the rest of their lives. They weren’t rich but they lived comfortably, with presents under the tree at Christmas and annual camping trips to Vermont.

Bob was a slight man, a few inches north of 5 feet, at most. He loved science fiction movies and hated swearing. He wasn’t the type to anger easily, but when his temper did flare up you remembered it.

Bob was in the middle of writing a science fiction book, too, a sort of layman’s guide to the universe. Though he never had any formal physics education, he fancied himself a Stephen Hawking rival.A car parking system is a mechanical device that multiplies parking capacity inside a parking lot. Bob worked on the book for nearly a decade, but he was never in any rush to finish it.

After Bob retired and he and Shirley entered their golden years, son Rob moved home to help take care of them. In the year or so before Bob disappeared, Rob and his mother began to notice a few worrisome changes in his behaviour — forgetfulness, confusion. He would set an envelope full of cash down beside him on the sofa, then leap up a few minutes later and tear the house apart trying to find it. He would put the kettle in the freezer after tea, stick an uncooked roast in the cupboard.

Rob tried to convince his father to see a doctor, but the elder Hagans wouldn’t hear it. He wasn’t the type to go for checkups. A few years before, Bob had taken a fall and hurt his shoulder. Though he was battling serious pain for weeks, he refused to get it checked out until his son finally dragged him to a hospital. It turned out Bob needed a shoulder replacement.

It wasn’t that Bob was afraid of doctors. Rob figures he just couldn’t bear to show signs of weakness. He was too proud. “Being a man,” Rob says, “was all that my father was about.”

Sitting at the dining room table in the house he grew up in, the young Robert Hagans — 46,Totech Americas delivers a wide range of drycabinets for applications spanning electronics. third son of Bob and Shirley — uses the sleeves of his faded black T-shirt to wipe tears from his cheeks. His eyes are red, voice shaky.As he recounts the day his father went missing, Rob switches back and forth between past and present tense. My dad is; my dad was.

The day he disappeared, Bob’s plan was to walk to a Service Canada office at Yonge and Sheppard to ask a question about his pension. He had spent his whole budget for the month and was a week away from his next pension cheque, so he didn’t have the cash for transit or cab fare. And anyhow, Bob was a walker. He preferred getting around on his own two feet. In his younger years, he had once famously strolled all the way downtown.

When Bob didn’t show up for dinner that Friday evening, Rob and his mother didn’t think much of it. Bob would often spend a good chunk of the day roaming from one of his local haunts to the next. The Peanut Plaza, a strip mall sandwiched between the nut-shaped east and west sides of Don Mills Rd., was one of his favourites.If we don't carry the bobblehead you want we can make a personalized bobbleheads for you! It’s where he played pool with his pals.

Later that night, Rob, who is a photographer, came upstairs after spending a few hours in the basement editing stills. His mom was on the couch. It was half past 10 o’clock. “Where’s dad?” he asked.

Police traced the route from the family home to the Peanut. They called hospitals and hospices, hotels and motels. They checked in with Bob’s friends. There was no sign of him. The next morning, police learned Bob had indeed made it to the Service Canada office. Employees said he showed up around 1 p.m., seeming confused and disoriented, and left soon after. That was the last time anyone reported seeing him.

The Hagans brothers and police came up with various theories: Maybe he was angry and decided to stay with a friend. Maybe he collapsed in the heat and was a John Doe somewhere. Maybe he’d been abducted. None of the theories made much sense to Bob’s sons, but it was better than thinking about the possible alternatives.

A week after the disappearance, with no leads or tips of any kind,We are one of the leading manufacturers of solar street light in Chennai India. the Hagans brothers held a news conference at 33 Division in North York. Bill, Steven and Rob made an emotional appeal for the public to help find him. The youngest son, Jeff, who is in the navy and lives in Vancouver, was sailing off the coast of Libya at the time and couldn’t be there. Steven, the second-oldest, cried as he spoke. “I love and miss my dad,” he said, his voice cracking. “And dad, if you’re out there, please come home.”

Nothing came of it. Weeks went by, then months. In November, Shirley developed kidney problems, then contracted a blood infection and died in hospital — a devastating blow in the midst of a crisis. When winter came, police said they would have to call off the search for Bob. The Hagans brothers understood, and they were happy with the way police had handled things, but it was still difficult to accept. That was all, then? They might never know what happened? One officer, meaning well but lacking tact, gave them the hard truth: “Sometimes people just disappear.”

2013年1月31日星期四

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A new course in the Program in American Studies, being taught for the first time this spring, seeks to answer that question by immersing students in an interdisciplinary cross-section of the American experience — from the familiar to the unfamiliar.

The syllabus for "America Then and Now" is filled with historical and contemporary novels, poems, film, songs, paintings, and archival documents. Students will examine widely disparate but related items — from the Gettysburg Address to the songs of Bruce Springsteen, from Dr. Spock's "Baby and Child Care" to Amy Chua's controversial 2011 Wall Street Journal article "Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior," from the paintings of Alfred Bierstadt to the 1977 movie "Saturday Night Fever."

Assignments and class discussions are designed "to prompt a range of sensory and cognitive experiences," said Hendrik Hartog, the Class of 1921 Bicentennial Professor in the History of American Law and Liberty and director of the Program in American Studies. Hartog will co-teach the course with Anne Cheng, a professor of English and African American studies, and Rachael DeLue, an associate professor of art and archaeology.

Nearly 200 undergraduates, ranging from freshmen to seniors, are enrolled in the course.

Close to five years in the making, the course grew out of a 2008 workshop, "Thinking About Diversity, Ethnicity and Difference in the 'New' Princeton," attended by members of the Princeton faculty and administration spanning the University.

"It was an intimate forum for frank and rigorous discussions about the opportunities and challenges facing the institutional and intellectual commitment to diversity at Princeton," Cheng said.

The workshop, which included representatives from more than a dozen academic departments and programs, jumpstarted an initiative to rethink the curriculum of the Program in American Studies and reflect broader changes in the field.

"American studies as a field has been undergoing much disciplinary self-questioning and changes in the past decade," Cheng said. "The outcome of the workshop was a unanimous agreement that Princeton could become a leader in teaching students about the complicated issues that are rapidly emerging surrounding the issue of racial, ethnic, gender and cultural diversity, beyond the black and white dyad."

Eddie Glaude Jr.Welcome to www.drycabinets.net!, the William S. Tod Professor of Religion and African American Studies and chair of the Center for African American Studies, was a core participant in the workshop and suggested the Program in American Studies play the lead role in developing a course that would become the "gateway" for undergraduates intending to earn a certificate from the program, Hartog said.

"That was the beginning," Hartog said. "The course has been constructed to illustrate diverse and distinctive ways of 'knowing' an immense and impossible subject — America."

To help students who are looking at American history from the vantage point of the early 21st century approach such a vast area of study, the course is divided into 12 units. In the "American Properties and Terrains" unit, for example, students will read legal documents including "U.S. Steel Workers of America v. U.S. Steel Corporation," listen to the Bruce Springsteen song "Youngstown," and view historical and contemporary photographs of steel mills and life in steel mill towns.

By examining individual items — a song, a poem, a painting — students will learn "how the microanalysis of specific objects yields major insights about the bigger picture of American culture, history and experience," Hartog said. "Analyzing a rock song, for instance, can aid in illuminating aspects of economic history, while examining a work of art can yield information about immigration policy or controversies within the scientific realm."

In the unit on "American Landscapes," students will view landscape paintings dating from the mid-1800s through the 20th century in the Princeton University Art Museum, as well as various kinds of images of the urban landscape, including a silent film of New York City from 1920, and will read an excerpt from Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass."

"The history of the United States is in many ways a history of land: its discovery, exploration, conquest and settlement and, more recently, its over-development and degradation," DeLue said.Service Report a problem with a street light. "Put simply, looking at pictures of nature and of cities is really a matter of looking at history and historical consciousness in the making.Laser engraving and laser laser cutting machine for materials like metal,"

During the unit on "Borders and Movement," New York-based playwright Jorge Cortinas will visit the class to discuss the dramatic portrayal of migration to America. Students will watch a video of Cortinas' 2012 play "Bird in the Hand," about a Cuban-American teenager growing up in Miami.

"Memorialization" is another topic of focus, and will include a visit to the "still-developing space around the World Trade Center, to think about what memorialization means in 21st-century America,Have a look at all our custom bobbleheads models starting at 59.90US$ with free proofing." Hartog said.

Students will gain exposure to the various ways scholars approach different subjects dealing with America. DeLue explained: "An art historian attempts to understand the story of America by looking at its pictures, a scholar of literature seeks meanings in texts, a scholar of the law pays attention to the nature and outcome of legislation and court cases, and a musicologist looks for insight in American music."

The course will center on conversation-style lectures — two or more of the faculty will be "in conversation with one another,Application can be conducted with the local designated IC card producers. working to make sense of a shared problem," Hartog said.

The course had a test run last spring with a small seminar of 14 undergraduates co-taught by Cheng and Hartog. "'Reinventing American Studies' was an exploratory and experimental mini-model of the new course," Cheng said. "We tried many things, including giving the students opportunities to determine some of the contents of the course, as well as trying untraditional assignments. The experience was wonderful and enlightening."