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A Court Challenge to the "Slaughter Solution"
This Politico article provides a good overview of the possibility of a court challenge to healthcare reform legislation if it is enacted through the "Slaughter Solution." The article notes that "[n]o lawyer interviewed by POLITICO thought the constitutionality of the 'deem and pass' approach being considered by House Democrats was an open-and-shut case either way. But most agreed that it could raise constitutional issues sufficiently credible that the Supreme Court might get interested, as it has in the past."
This is important, from a practical perspective, because it provides fair warning to the congressional leadership of what may happen should the "Slaughter Solution" be employed. The takeaway, even from lawyers on the left side of the political spectrum, is that the constitutional issues involved need to be taken seriously by the leadership, and that it is inadvisable to use this procedure if it can be avoided. As Alan Morrison puts it, "'If I were advising somebody,' on whether deem and pass would run into constitutional trouble, 'I would say to them, 'Don't do it.'"
Whether or not this persuades the House to use more traditional means of passing healthcare reform remains to be seen. If it persists in using the "Slaughter Solution," the leadership will have only itself to blame for any resulting court challenge.
Does the "Slaughter Solution" Comply with the Constitution's Lawmaking Requirements?
The latest procedural furor in the healthcare reform debate has been over something dubbed the "Slaughter Solution," so-named after the Chair of the House Rules Committee. To understand this procedure, one must recall that the Democratic leadership intends for the House to pass two separate bills. The first is the bill that previously passed the Senate in December. The second is the "reconciliation fix" bill, which is a new bill that will embody the changes to the Senate bill agreed upon by the leadership.
Once passed by the House, the Senate bill would go to the President and presumably become law. The reconciliation fix, on the other hand, would still need to be passed by the Senate before it can become law. (The hope is that the reconciliation fix can be passed by the Senate under reconciliation procedures, which will enable it to avoid a filibuster). It is possible that only the Senate bill would ultimately become law (theoretically, although not practically, it is also possible that the President could veto the Senate bill, so that neither bill, or only the reconciliation fix, would ultimately become law).
The House could take up and pass the Senate and reconciliation fix bills separately. For reasons that are somewhat unclear (but apparently relate to the unwillingness of House Members to take a specific vote in favor of the Senate bill), however, the House is reluctant to proceed in this manner. The Slaughter Solution is designed to allow the House instead to pass both bills in a single vote. To achieve this goal, the House would first vote to approve a rule that states that passage of the reconciliation fix will be "deemed" to also represent passage of the Senate bill. The House would then vote to pass the reconciliation fix and, voila, two bills for the price of one.
There is a long, but interesting, thread at the Volokh Conspiracy regarding potential constitutional problems with the Slaughter Solution. Professor (and former judge) Michael McConnell has also weighed in with his view that the Slaughter Solution is unconstitutional.
There are basically two objections to the Slaughter Solution. The first is simply to the concept that the House would "deem" a bill to be passed without taking a vote on the bill itself. It is argued that the Constitution implicitly requires that every bill be actually passed by the House (and Senate) with a vote that is, or could be, separately recorded (Article I, section 5, cl. 3 requires that the "yeas and nays" on "any question" be entered in the Journal if one fifth of either House so request). Bills that are merely "deemed" passed, therefore, cannot become law.
Although this objection has some plausibility, it also seems artificial, in that there is arguably no substantive difference between voting to pass a bill and voting to pass a rule that "deems" the bill to be passed. Thus, assuming that there is a constitutional violation, it would seem to be de minimis (and thus no different than other congressional mechanisms like passing bills by unanimous consent despite the absence of a quorum). Moreover, as commenters have pointed out, the House has used "self executing rules" for a number of years, and these rules also can "deem" a bill to have passed. Finally, the Constitution's recorded vote requirement does not, at least expressly, prohibit conducting a vote on a rule rather than a bill.
A more substantial objection, however, is that the Slaughter Solution requires the House to conduct a single vote on passage of two separate bills. This is highly unusual, and perhaps completely unprecedented. Contrary to some claims, the "Gephardt Rule" is not the same because that procedure involves only one bill (a statutory increase in the public debt limit) and one congressional concurrent resolution, which is not presented to the President and does not become law.
What is the constitutional problem with having one vote to pass multiple bills? The answer can be found in the Supreme Court's jurisprudence on the line item veto act, which allowed the President to "rescind" individual spending items in an appropriations act passed by Congress. Members opposed to the line item veto argued that the line item veto unconstitutionally deprived them of their right to vote on the actual legislation that would become law by allowing the President to pick and choose which parts of the appropriations act would be given legal effect. In Clinton v. New York, the Supreme Court held the line item veto to be unconstitutional, finding that it effectively allowed the President to create a new law different from the one actually passed by Congress.
The Slaughter Solution raises constitutional issues similar to the line item veto. By requiring Members to vote on multiple bills at the same time, it deprives them of the opportunity to make discrete decisions on each bill. Members are forced to make an up-or-down decision on a package of bills, but without knowing which of the bills will ultimately become law. As Judge McConnell points out, it also deprives voters of the opportunity to hold Members accountable for their votes on each bill. If the House votes for Bill A and Bill B together, and only Bill B becomes law, Members who voted in favor of the package can claim that they only wanted Bill B to become law on the condition that Bill A also became law.
The Slaughter Solution is most closely analogous to the "separate enrollment" version of the line item veto. Under this proposal, a bill passed by Congress would be "deemed" to consist of multiple individual bills, which would be separately enrolled, and which could then be individually vetoed by the President. The constitutionality of this version of the line item veto was debated in Congress in the 1990s, but Congress ultimately chose to pass the "enhanced rescission" version instead, which was eventually struck down by the Supreme Court.
It could be argued that the "separate enrollment" device could survive constitutional scrutiny because it better complies with the formal requirements of Article I than the enhanced rescission version. On the other hand, Elizabeth Garrett notes that the "extended debate in the Senate may reflect the reality that separate enrollment was really no less constitutionally problematic than enhanced rescission, and, given, its deeming provision that allowed all the little bills to pass without separate votes on each, its constitutionality was perhaps more dubious." In short, the Slaughter Solution raises serious constitutional issues in that it permits the passage of multiple bills with a single vote.
The Role of Reconciliation Instructions
For those who are trying to follow the nearly incomprehensible debate over reconciliation, it is worthwhile keeping in mind the controlling reconciliation instructions, which are contained in Sections 201 and 202 of the Concurrent Budget Resolution for Fiscal Year 2010. The exact language of these instructions turns out, it appears, to be critically important. For example, the reconciliation instructions instruct the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee to report changes in laws within its jurisdiction to reduce the deficit by $1 billion for FYs 2009-2014. But the heathcare "fix" bill, which the House and Senate leadership wishes to pass through reconciliation in order to bypass a Senate filibuster, would not contain such savings. According to this article in the Hill, the solution to this problem is to combine the healthcare fix with a completely unrelated bill regarding student loans, which is scored as achieving net savings for the government. The article states: "A Senate Democratic aide noted that the student lending measure would be necessary for the HELP Committee to craft a reconciliation bill that produced the required savings. Without piggybacking on the lending bill, it would become more difficult to use reconciliation to pass healthcare fixes under the HELP Committee's jurisdiction." As Dave Barry would say, I am not making this up. The 2010 reconciliation instructions are set forth below: SEC. 201. RECONCILIATION IN THE SENATE. (a) COMMITTEE ON FINANCE.—The Senate Committee on Finance shall report changes in laws within its jurisdiction to reduce the deficit by $1,000,000,000 for the period of fiscal years 2009 through 2014. (b) COMMITTEE ON HEALTH, EDUCATION, LABOR, AND PENSIONS.— The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions shall report changes in laws within its jurisdiction to reduce the deficit by $1,000,000,000 for the period of fiscal years 2009 through 2014. (c) SUBMISSIONS.—In the Senate, not later than October 15, 2009, the Senate committees named in subsections (a) and (b) shall submit their recommendations to the Senate Committee on the Budget. Upon receiving all such recommendations, the Senate Committee on the Budget shall report to the Senate a reconciliation bill carrying out all such recommendations without any substantive revision. SEC. 202. RECONCILIATION IN THE HOUSE. (a) HEALTH CARE REFORM.— (1) The House Committee on Energy and Commerce shall report changes in laws to reduce the deficit by $1,000,000,000 for the period of fiscal years 2009 through 2014. (2) The House Committee on Ways and Means shall report changes in laws to reduce the deficit by $1,000,000,000 for the period of fiscal years 2009 through 2014. (3) The House Committee on Education and Labor shall report changes in laws to reduce the deficit by $1,000,000,000 for the period of fiscal years 2009 through 2014. (b) INVESTING IN EDUCATION.—The House Committee on Education and Labor shall report changes in laws to reduce the deficit by $1,000,000,000 for the period of fiscal years 2009 through 2014. (c) SUBMISSIONS.—In the House, not later than October 15, 2009, the House committees named in subsections (a) and (b) shall submit their recommendations to the House Committee on the Budget. Upon receiving all such recommendations, the House Committee on the Budget shall report to the House a reconciliation bill carrying out all such changes without any substantive revision..
Should He Stay or Should He Go?
Congressman Eric Massa (D-NY) has announced that he intends to resign from Congress effective 5 pm today. Massa had announced last Wednesday that he would not seek re-election for health reasons, but his decision on Friday to resign immediately was apparently prompted by revelations that the House Ethics Committee is investigating him for "sexually harassing" a male staffer.
It would be a natural assumption that Massa's resignation reflects some consciousness of guilt. Massa, however, has come forward publicly and detailed the basis for the sexual harassment allegation, which he says was based on a single remark made to a staffer at a wedding reception. If one credits Massa's account, his remark, although juvenile, would seem to fall well short of conduct that would merit discipline, much less expulsion, by the House.
O.k., then why is Massa resigning? According to Massa: "Mine is now the deciding vote on the health care bill, and this administration and this House leadership have said, 'they will stop at nothing to pass this health care bill, and now they've gotten rid of me and it will pass.' You connect the dots."
With all due respect to Congressman Massa, I am having a hard time connecting the dots. I understand that he is suggesting that the House leadership somehow orchestrated the ethics investigation against him, but I don't see how that explains his decision to resign. If he is innocent, one would think that he would want to stay and fight the allegations. And while one can understand the distaste for public airing of such allegations, resignation doesn't make much sense if he is going to be publicly discussing them anyway.
More importantly, Massa's resignation is not, or should not be, simply a personal matter. Professor Josh Chafetz argues in Leaving the House: The Constitutional Status of Resignation from the House of Representatives, 58 Duke L. J. 177 (2008), that Members of the House have no constitutional right to resign their positions, and that at the time of the framing of the Constitution, it was anticipated that Representatives would not be able to resign their seats without permission from the House, as was the tradition in the British House of Commons. (By contrast, the Constitution expressly acknowledges the possibility that Senators may resign, a distinction that Chafetz explains as reflecting the differing structure and purpose of the Senate).
It is true that the House historically has not exercised any authority to prevent Members from resigning, and I think it would be incorrect, even if one largely agrees with Chafetz's argument, to suggest that Members currently need permission to resign from the House. Nevertheless, there is merit in Chafetz's proposal that the House consider restricting resignation as of right. As he puts it:
Is it really so onerous to tell people who ran for House seats that they must remain there for two years? Members are well compensated, in both financial and psychic wages, and for that compensation we have a right to demand that they commit to putting the public interest above their own for a short period. Allowing resignation as a matter of right sends the message that House service is a job like any other, a job that one takes because it suits one's ends, rather than a trust one holds to serve a greater good. In contrast, when leaving the House is a matter of legislative grace, rather than individual right, the message is sent that devotion to the public weal is held above desire for personal gain. This, I suggest, is closer to our aspirational conception of the House of Representatives.
As Chafetz notes, the two situations in which Member resignation seems most inappropriate are (1) resignation to escape punishment by the House and (2) resignation for personal advantage or convenience. Massa's case involves both of these situations. He is either leaving to escape punishment or to avoid the inconvenience of fighting false allegations. Or both. But in any event, he is leaving his constituents without representation during what is, by his own admission, a time in which the House will be making critical and historic decisions affecting their interests.
Put another way, if Massa is innocent, he should stay and fight for his constituents. If he is guilty, he should stay and face the music.
Renzi Update
In a recent series of opinion/orders, the federal district court (Judge Bury) denied former Congressman Renzi's various Speech or Debate claims, upholding the Magistrate's previous rulings on those subjects. (see here, here and here). The judge, however, recognized that the Speech or Debate claims are likely to be the subject of an interlocutory appeal, thus delaying the trial with respect to the land exchange charges against Renzi and one of his co-defendants. There are also a number of insurance fraud counts against Renzi and various co-defendants. Because these charges do not involve Speech or Debate or other congressional privileges, I haven't paid too much attention to them. It is worth noting, however, that these counts will go forward separately from the land exchange counts.
As expected, the court rejected Renzi's arguments for suppressing the results of the FBI wiretap. The court also refused to hold a Kastigar hearing to determine whether prosecution evidence was either protected by the Speech or Debate privilege or derived from privileged evidence. The court reiterated its view that the Speech or Debate Clause is one of non-use, not nondisclosure. It suggested that the Clause places no limits on the executive branch's authority to investigate criminal conduct, but merely prevents the prosecution from introducing privileged evidence against a member of congress. Finally, the court firmly rejected the D.C. Circuit's opinion in United States v. Rayburn House Office Building, agreeing with Judge Henderson that the Rayburn majority's reasoning would inappropriately jeopardize law enforcement tools such as search warrants, wiretaps and voluntary interviews of congressional staffers.
With respect to Renzi's motion to dismiss the indictment on Speech or Debate, the court found that the privilege does not apply to Renzi's negotiations and other communications with private landowners regarding the development of land exchange legislation. According to the court, such communications "were not an integral part of any deliberative and communicative process by which Members participate in committee and House proceedings with respect to the consideration and passage or rejection of proposed land exchange information."
Like the Magistrate, on whom it heavily relied, the court's reasons for reaching this conclusion are obscure. It states that "it is not enough that a private constituent comes to a member of Congress with proposed legislation or to discuss proposed legislation, or to ask the congressman or woman for support of certain legislation." This, according to the court, would merely involve unprotected discussion of a future legislative act. The "legislative acts protected by the Speech or Debate Clause occur subsequent to such meetings and discussions . . . when in fact the congressman acts to promote, support and pass the land exchange legislation in either House or undertakes an act that is an integral part of such an endeavor."
The court does not deny that negotiations with private landowners are sometimes protected. In fact, it states that "after the introduction of the land exchange legislation, negotiations with land exchange proponents, investigations and fact finding conducted for the purposes of preparing for hearings or amending the legislation or preparing speeches, or preparing to vote, etc., will clearly be protected."
Why distinguish between negotiations conducted before and those conducted after the introduction of legislation? The court doesn't say. Since both types of negotiations would seem to involve discussions of future legislative acts, it is hard to see why they would be treated differently on that basis. To make things more confusing, the court expressly denies that it is making the introduction of legislation a prerequisite for the application of Speech or Debate.
The court itself appears to have difficulty applying the line it has drawn. In a footnote, the court declares that the "definition of a legislative act does not reach activities such as political wrangling over which congressional member should sponsor the land exchange legislation, Renzi's insistence that land exchange proponents offer to build a detox center as part of their project, or that they obtain a letter of commendation to him from the Nature Conservatory (sic)." Yet elsewhere in the opinion the court approves the Magistrate's decision to grant Speech or Debate protection to documents that concern precisely those subjects. See, e.g., Exhibit 15 (email concerning Renzi's request for a letter from the Nature Conservancy); Exhibit 16 (same); and Exhibit 29 (memo explaining how "political maneuvering" was delaying introduction of land exchange legislation).
Perhaps the court of appeals will have a more coherent approach to the Speech or Debate Clause.
Issa to Towns: Just the Facts, Man
A recent post suggested the possibility that Toyota could seek to prevent its former attorney, Dimitrios Biller, from disclosing attorney-client privileged documents to Congress in response to a subpoena. Toyota, however, apparently did not attempt to do so, and the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform has obtained the responsive documents.
Now a dispute has broken out between the majority and minority regarding the proper interpretation of the documents. Specifically, Republican Ranking Member Darrell Issa has sent this letter to Chairman Edolphus Towns, identifying four specific areas in which Towns and his staff have allegedly mischaracterized the documents received from Biller. Issa's staff contends that a letter sent by Towns "frequently misquotes and mischaracterizes the underlying material, in one extreme case, actually altering the subject of the underlying document."
It is not unusual for the majority and minority to find themselves on opposite sides of an investigation, with the majority acting as "prosecutors" and the minority as "defense counsel." This investigation, however, has been, in Issa's words, a "successful bipartisan effort" up to this point, and Issa has been just as critical of Toyota as Towns. Issa's objection is not based on a differing perspective on Toyota's culpability, but simply on the notion that congressional committees have an obligation to ground their conclusions in a fair reading of the evidence presented to them.
Having no access to the underlying documents, I have no opinion on whether Issa is correct on these specific criticisms. Given the incentives for congressional committees to use investigations as sound-bite generating machines, however, Issa's admonition is worth highlighting.


This site supports the commissioning of adult social care in the Yorkshire and the Humber Region. The information on this website is designed to develop the commissioning capacity within the region to enable local authorities and their partners to deliver high quality, more personalised and efficient services.
While every care has been taken in the compilation of this information, neither Yorkshire and Humber Commissioning or Connect to Commissioning Support will be held responsible for any loss, damage or inconvenience caused as a result of using the site and any inaccuracies/errors within these pages.
This site is currently under construction as we transfer content over from yhsscommissioning.org.uk. We are working hard to get this ready for you and appreciate your patience.


Unfortunately the water filtration industry has been tainted by fraud over the years. We know that your legitimate business deserves the best credit card processing services and we are prepared to set up your high risk merchant account. Whether you have had problems placing your account before or you are new to the water filtration industry we want to help you today! And last resort we can always set you up with an offshore merchant account. Give us a call at Call Us Here or fill out an application online and get approved today.


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Q: How best to structure this MVC or Razor Pages web application given a required tcp/ip server data source that acts like a web api? I am rewriting an old asp.net 4.0 web forms website that exposes an application's data and logic to the web. I am moving this to a .net core mvc or razor page project. The website has minimal formatting logic and some take-input-and-return-data logic. I am not using his logic because he essentially wrote a procedural, non-OOP version.
I am a little ways into a Razor Pages project right now but am finding myself writing awkward code. My issue is all this data comes from a server socket listener that uses TCP/IP protocol to return xml-like text data.
This is great except the person who wrote the listener (cannot change and have 0 control over it) made it act like a pseudo web api. It is listening on a specific port and ip address. However, It closes the connection after he finishes responding to every request and the only security is relying on the connection coming from specific hosts/servers. So creating an SPA (ideal) is out of the question because I can't connect from the client.
Therefore, all data and model creation has to be done on the server. I could wrap an actual api around the tcp listener but that is for another day. Let's assume this TCP conundrum will not change. How do I best go about this?
I currently am injecting an IDataSource class into the pagemodels. I am then defining "models" that essentially define what data the pagemodel needs those models to have in order to function. I then implement the IDataSource in a class that knows about the tcp connection, call the listener, parse the xml, and return the "model" class as if it was a real repository.
Is there a better way to do this? I am trying to maintain SOC but the data coming back and what is displayed is so interconnected I am almost wondering if I should try another way. I was considering possibly switching to MVC and just have the controller know about the tcp connection and having it call the server, parse the data, and then create a viewmodel and return a view. Or at least injecting those functionalities into the controller while still letting the controller know about the data source.
This would be quicker and make for less awkward proxy classes for the data. Instead, the controller is the application and only shapes the data for different views. Not traditional, but this situation is a bit different.
Any input welcome.

A: My first idea would be to write a small proxy for this pseudo web api.
The proxy should be whitelisted so it can contact the listener and it would handle the authentication and authorization of clients that connect from random ip addresses.
Then you can develop your client software using the more established patterns. The biggest difference with a regular web-api would then probably be that you use XML-based data structures in the communication rather than JSON-based data structures.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


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Here's the First Trailer for HBO's 'Watchmen'
It's finally here — our first proper glimpse of HBO's anticipated Watchmen series.
Down below, you can watch the newly revealed teaser trailer and soak it all in.
As previously reported, the new TV adaptation of Alan Moore's beloved DC Comics series Watchmen is coming at the hands of Leftovers creator Damon Lindelof. So far the series has yet to get a firm release date, but it is expected to arrive on HBO this fall.
For now, watch the trailer below.
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The first half of BoJack Horseman's sixth and final season landed on Netflix last October, and we now have a trailer for the rest of the epi...
Watch the First Trailer for 'Morbius' Starring Jared Leto
Back in 2018, we learned about Sony's Spider-Man spinoff movie about the Spiderverse's vampiric villain Morbius. Now, the film's first trail...
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The trailer for the upcoming fourth season of Fargo has arrived, and it's tense as hell. The teaser clip sees Chris Rock as the head of...
'Ex Machina'/'Annihilation' Director Alex Garland Shares the First Trailer for His New Show 'Devs'
If you've seen Alex Garland's previous work like Ex Machina and Annihilation, you should know what to expect from his upcoming FX/Hulu serie...
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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(Photo: Netflix)
New Netflix show 'Kaleidoscope' can be watched in any order
by: Bill Shannon, Nexstar Media Wire
ALTOONA, Pa. (WTAJ) — Netflix could change how we watch TV with its new crime mystery show "Kaleidoscope" that landed on the streaming platform on Jan. 1.
The show seems like a standard crime drama/mystery at first, but the company says the user experience will be different.
Without any spoilers, the show is about a group of seven who look to pull off the biggest heist in history by breaking into the world's most secure vault and walking out with $7 billion in bonds.
Netflix touts that there's no real order to the episodes. You can start with any episode you want and continue watching in any order.
Each episode watched creates more questions, and when you think you know the answer, details revealed in another episode change everything.
Every episode is based on a color – episode names are Yellow, Pink, Violet, White, etc. – and they all take place at various times from 24 years before the heist to 6 months after the heist, as well as one episode that takes place during the heist itself. Every episode is a different piece to a puzzle that is hard to solve.
The show stars Giancarlo Esposito, who most fans know as Gus Fring from "Breaking Bad" and "Better Call Saul." Rufus Sewell from "A Knights Tale" and "Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter" co-stars as the antagonist.
Sewell's character owns one of the world's most advanced security companies with a vault secured by armed guards, motion sensors, heat sensors, facial recognition and dual combinations that need to be entered simultaneously.
Meanwhile, Esposito's wants the $7 billion in bonds that are in that vault. And don't forget: The FBI is closing in on this whole thing.
The show is available to subscribers as of Sunday.
This isn't the first time Netflix has experimented with its content. In 2018, it released an episode of "Black Mirror" that allowed viewers to choose their own adventure at multiple turning points. The platform has also released several interactive trivia shows.
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In Honor of the 70th Anniversary of the Choir's First Broadcast to Britain, Four Songs with Lyrics by British Writers
Today marks the 70th anniversary of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir's first overseas broadcast. On January 16, 1944, the music of the Choir was broadcast from Salt Lake City to U.S. Army Special Services in Great Britain.
In commemoration of that event, here are four Mormon Tabernacle Choir songs with lyrics by British writers.
Nearer, My God, to Thee
The lyrics to "Nearer, My God, to Thee" were written by Sarah F. Adams, an English poet.
I Sing the Mighty Power of God
While the piece above is arranged by Mack Wilberg, the lyrics to the song are credited to Englishman Issac Watts.
Come, Ye Thankful People, Come
Henry Alford of London wrote the lyrics to this hymn.
Lead, Kindly Light
London-born John Henry Newman was 33 years-old when he wrote the lyrics to "Lead, Kindly Light."
This Guest Artist Is a Commander of the Order of the British Empire—an Honor He Received from the Queen of England
Young And Old: Five Mormon Tabernacle Choir Songs For Children Of All Ages


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We're solving challenges.
What we measure matters, and measuring quality of life and well-being is essential for understanding rural communities. Our Northwoods Quality of Life (NWQoL) Database brings together a comprehensive list of data on rural, northern communities across the north woods of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.
Utilizing a variety of original, proprietary data collected by the Center for Rural Communities and data gathered from governmental, nonprofit, and print sources, this initiative supports a public database of quality of life metrics for rural, northern communities and examines the various factors and characteristics that describe quality of life in the north woods region.
View our Current Data Sets
Northwoods Database Visualizations:
Energy Usage & Burden
Renewable Energy Production & Potential
Northwoods Community Survey Visualizations:
Assets & Amenities
Social Infrastructure
The NWQoL database emerged from work with local stakeholders in the Chequamegon Bay region of northern Wisconsin in the development of the City of Ashland Assets & Amenities report. This project uncovered a pressing need for valid and reliable data and models and solutions appropriate for rural communities.
The NWQoL database is made up of a comprehensive set of quality of life metrics for rural communities of the north woods region of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. These rural communities share common characteristics, stories, experiences, opportunities, and challenges.
Database Framework
The NWQoL database organizes data into three broad categories of quality of life: (1) natural and built environment; (2) community characteristics and services; and (3) people.
Each broad category is made up of multiple domains with specific indicators gathers from existing data sources or collected by the CRC and are intended to capture part of quality of life important to rural communities – for more information about the framework, see Research Handbook on Community Development edited by Phillips and Trevan (2019).
By placing these categories into a single framework of quality of life and well-being, the CRC allows community leaders, practitioners, and academics to better understand and examine how to create thriving, resilient communities with the best possible quality of life for local community members.
The NWQoL database is funded in part by the Otto Bremer Trust.
What is the purpose of the database?
We want to understand the things that make a rural community a good place to live, work, and play. We also want to provide baseline data and track changes over time related to important characteristics of rural communities in the north woods region (northern Minnesota, northern Wisconsin, and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan). This information is intended for use by leaders and decision-makers within these local communities and counties and for academics, practitioners, and student researchers interested in rural communities.
Who is doing this work?
The Center for Rural Communities at Northland College is responsible for collecting data, housing data, and completing analysis. The work is funded in part by the Otto Bremer Trust.
How are categories, indicators, and data selected? Will they remain the same?
Categories, indicators, and data are selected and organized through both top-down (e.g., informed from community of science, academic literature, and science research) and bottom-up (e.g., informed from experience and feedback from community residents and leaders) approaches. Categories, indicators, and data for this project are neither static nor immutable; rather, they are dynamic, responsive, and changing based on the needs, wants, and interests of rural communities in the north woods and influenced by best practices. It is our intention to collect the same information overtime; however, we have set the database up as a "living" project meant to adapt and change as new data sources become available, as more information is learned about best practices, and as we learn from our community partners what information is most useful and relevant for making and informing local decisions.
What is/are the units of analysis?
The database is made up of both county and community level indicators, but our focus is primarily on rural communities.
Why do we include county level data?
County level data are intended to help situate smaller rural communities in a broader regional context. For example, when examining tourism and recreation trends, the database tracks individual community trends but situates these trends in a broader county or regional context of natural resources, recreational infrastructure, and demographic and economic activity.
How do we define rural community?
We define rural communities by their relative location to metropolitan areas, overall population size, and municipal boundaries. Only rural communities from across the north woods region that are at or above 1,000 and below 30,000 in population are included in the NWQoL database. Additionally, these rural communities must be at least 10 miles from mid-size cities and their metro areas (i.e., <350,000 people) or 30 miles away from large cities and their metro areas (i.e., >350,000 population).
How do I cite data found in one of the CRC data visualizations?
We recommend citing data from our data visualizations with the following information: Center for Rural Communities, name/title of data visualization, and the URL.
Center for Rural Communities. (n.d.). Northwoods database: Your quality of life. Retrieved from https://www.northland.edu/sustainability/crc/north-woods-database/
Can I download data visualizations from the CRC website?
Yes. Most data visualizations found on our website can be downloaded as an image, pdf, PowerPoint, or Tableau Workbook. If you are interested in additional data or specific data, please contact the CRC via email (crc@northland.edu) or phone (715-682-1282)
https://www.northland.edu/centers/crc/rural-livelihood/quality-of-life-database


ABC Discount Appliances in Pennsauken, NJ is an authorized dealer of Premier Products. Peerless-Premier is a complete manufacturer, designing and making its own tools and dies, stamping parts and applying porcelain enamel to the raw steel parts and then assembling those parts into modern gas and electric ranges in 20", 24", 30"and 36" widths. The facilities are housed under one roof, taking up an area of two square blocks in the city of Belleville, Illinois.
So if you are looking for Premier products in Pennsauken, Cherry Hill, Medford, Mount Laurel, Moorestown, Marlton, Maple Shade, Collingswood, Audubon, Voorhees and regions of Pennsylvania, or if you have any questions about Premier products, please feel free to call us at (856) 665-0711 or simply stop by ABC Discount Appliances at any time and we would be glad to help you.


We will have the Paw (Pain Version) available in store at our Chicago location tomorrow at noon.
That's Wednesday, January 28 at 12 noon.
Sorry, no phone or email orders. You must come buy it in person.
If there's still one left in the store and someone one in the Chicago area wants to buy it for me and I'll pay you back it would be much appreciated . . .
Sorry...we are completely sold out.
Just got my paw pain today! Coarsetoys does not mess around with their attention to detail. This is a bad mofo, one of my top toys to date.


The Graduate / Junior Ruby on Rails Developer will work cross-functionally across different business areas to solve technical issues as well as carry out new development requests specifically related to the customer ordering process.
The Graduate / Junior Ruby on Rails Developer will be able to code in Ruby (whether this be academically or commercially) and have a keen interest in applying and enhancing your skill-set within an exciting and rewarding environment where on the job training and support opportunities are plentiful!
This role will suit an ambitious Graduate who is keen to work alongside and learn from some of the best Developer's in the business!


text:
"And So We Walked" @ PCS
Delanna Studi's "And So We Walked" is probably the first One-Woman show where the word "epic" can be properly applied. Yet, despite its breadth, I enjoyed its small moments most. Moments like when Studi was a grade schooler, and Native Americans were called "extinct" by a virtue on a rule in the curriculum, which Studo's father- a towering presence in the show- managed to get overturned. Or moments where little traditions are revealed, like defacing $20s because of the presence of Andrew "Indian Killer" Jackson. These brief stories truly inform the whole, and give the Big Event at the play's center huge personal meaning.
The recurring motif of dreams is also effective, but to uninitiated eyes, the lines between them can occasionally be blurred.
I wonder if the bookending with Artist's Rep's "The Thanksgiving Play" was intentional, because they complement each other tremendously, because "And So We Walked" is a show in which a Native Woman tells her story, and "The Thanksgiving Play" is about what happens when others try to tell stories for others. The contrast is remarkable, even beyond the humor. I feel privileged to have watched these shows by voices so neglected, that in all my years of theatre going, I believe that they are the only two I've seen from a Native perspective.
Major Barbara @ PCS
"Luna Gale" @ Coho
"Always Patsy Cline" @ Broadway Rose
"The Thanksgiving Play" @ Artist's Rep


text:
Dual-layer nanoparticle vaccine lays foundation for universal flu shot
The flu virus mutates quickly and unpredictably, making it hard to develop effective vaccines. Now, researchers have created a drug that protects mice against six different strains of the flu, potentially paving the way for a universal flu vaccine.
New CRISPR tool hijacks "jumping genes" for gentle DNA editing
INTEGRATE is a newly-developed version of CRISPR that edits genes more gently. It uses "jumping genes" that insert large sequences of DNA without breaking the strands, and now scientists have imaged the mechanism at work for the first time.
Hijacking bacteria's lethal injections allows nano-syringes for drugs
Some bacteria use tiny syringes to inject toxins into their host's cells. Now, researchers from the Max Planck Institute have found a way to use this to our advantage, by swapping out these toxins for other chemicals, like drugs.
Study finds aging tends to shift gears as you turn 34, 60 and 78
The blood-borne signs of aging – and indeed, perhaps the causes of agiing – make three big shifts around the ages of 34, 60 and 78, a new Stanford-led study has found, potentially leading to new diagnostic tests and avenues of anti-aging research.
"Liquid health check" offers blood test predicting future disease risk
A new study is suggesting a novel blood test could effectively predict a person's risk in developing a broad array of different diseases. The test is dubbed a "liquid health check" and detects patterns of proteins linked to certain health conditions.
Anticancer compound shows promise in preclinical trials
In preclinical tests, scientists at Wistar Institute have developed a molecule that disrupts a protein complex vital to cancer cell survival.
Disabling a single protein could "cure" common cold
A new study shows that disabling a single protein in human cells could render the cold virus ineffective.
Scientists find how one superbug locks antibiotics out
Researchers at Imperial College London have found that a high-priority superbug resists drugs by closing its pores.
Incredible Stanford study discovers thousands of novel proteins produced by human microbiome
A remarkable new study revealed thousands of previously undiscovered small proteins produced by bacteria in the human microbiome. Almost all of these proteins serve unknown functions in the human body and the researchers suggest the discovery opens up a new frontier for future drug development.
Life's building blocks spontaneously self-assemble in primordial soup experiment
Exactly how life sprung out of non-living matter is one of biology's biggest mysteries. In new research, scientists cooked up a "primordial soup" and found that some of the crucial building blocks of life spontaneously stacked themselves in a surprisingly efficient way.
Breakthrough discovery of signal cancers use to hide from immune system
Cancer cells often deploy specific "don't eat me" signals to hide from immune cells. A breakthrough new study has homed in on a previously undiscovered signalling protein that, if effectively inhibited, may lead to new treatments for breast, ovarian, and other difficult-to-treat cancers.
Artificial protein can reprogram cells to become self-regulating "smart cells"
Proteins are the workhorses of the cell, but nature sometimes has room for improvement. Now a team from the Institute for Protein Design and the University of California San Francisco has created a new artificial protein that acts like a switch, turning regular cells into "smart cells."


text:
Q: Inputing a list of words from the file and then choosing a random word? So I'm working on a Hangman game and since the words is in a text file, I want to put the words into an array and pick a random work from the array and use it as my secret word. Any help will be great. thanks!
#include <iostream>
#include <fstream>
#include <string>
#include <ctime>
#include <cstdlib>
#include <stdlib.h>
#include <time.h>

using namespace std;

const int MAX_NUMS = 200;   // Constant for the maximum number of words.
const int MAX_GUESSES = 8;
const string LETTERS = "abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz";

//function prototypes
char   inputLetter();
int    findChar(char letter, string word);
string getGuessedWord(string secretWord, string lettersGuessed);

//main function
int main()
{
    string word;                    // holds one word from input file
    string secretWord;              // holds secret word to be guessed
    string words[MAX_NUMS];         // holds list of words from input file
    int randomValue;                // holds index of secret word
    int count = 0;                  // holds number of words in the file

    // Declare an ifstream object named myFile and open an input file
    string line;

    ifstream myfile ("p4words.txt");

    if (myfile.is_open())
    {
        while (! myfile.eof() )
        {
            getline (myfile,line);

            cout << line << endl;
        }
         myfile.close();
    }

    else cout << "Unable to open file";

    // Input words from a file into words array
    {
        ifstream myfile("p4words.txt");

        if(myfile.is_open())
        {
            string words[MAX_NUMS];

            for(int count = 0; count < MAX_NUMS; count++)
            {
                myfile >> words[count];
            }
        }

    }

    cout << count << " words loaded." << endl;

    srand(static_cast<unsigned int>(time(0)));

    // Select a secret word

A: Use #include <random> if you have C++11. You can do something like
#include <random>
...

std::random_device rd; // source of randomness
std::mt19937 rng(rd()); // seed random number engine
std::uniform_int_distribution<std::size_t> uid(0,words.size() - 1);
std::size_t sample = uid(rng);

std::cout << words[sample] << std::endl; // uniform randomly chosen word

See full example on http://ideone.com/uD04b9
In case you do not have a C++11 compliant compiler, you have to use the old srand()/rand() functions to simulate a uniform distribution, something like:
srand(static_cast<unsigned int>(time(0)));
sample = static_cast<std::size_t>(rand() % words.size()); // uniform distribution
std::cout << words[sample] << std::endl; // uniform randomly chosen word


Bath Iron Works' dry dock floats on the Kennebec River on Tuesday in Bath.
A man walks a dog on Tuesday in Bath's South End Park on Washington Street with the cranes of Bath Iron Works seen in the distance.
This digital image, distributed by BIW, depicts a proposed U.S. Coast Guard ship the Bath-based company hopes to win a contract to produce.
Sen. Susan Collins toured the future USS Zumwalt, the first of three DDG 1000 stealth destroyers to be built at Bath Iron Works in this 2014 BDN file photo. Prior to the tour, union leadership presented her with letters signed by thousands of BIW employees thanking her for her work securing funding for future BIW work.
BATH, Maine — The Maine shipyard building three of the Navy's largest and most complex destroyers faces a complexity of its own: What comes next?
Bath Iron Works will enter major bidding competitions in the next two years that company officials have said the yard must win to keep up employment amid decreased demand from the Navy for the large surface combatants that have kept thousands of Maine shipbuilders on the job for decades.
The business concern is that losing any work makes getting future work harder. As a result, the company is starting to ask more from its employees, according to BIW President Fred Harris.
"We're not going to pay people less, but we need to do more per hour than we've done," Harris said.
For years, Bath Iron Works and its advocates, most notably Maine's congressional delegation, have succeeded in persuading Navy leaders that the quality of ships built in Bath supersedes the higher costs connected with construction in a cold-weather, northeastern shipyard.
But Harris and defense analysts interviewed by the Bangor Daily News said that quality comes up against the Navy's strict financial pressures.
"The Navy is trying to find ways to cut costs on every ship program that's out there and in part it's because the Navy hasn't been great at containing costs," said Jay Korman, senior Navy analyst with the Washington, D.C.-based consulting firm The Avascent Group.
Congress has placed limits on the Navy budget until at least 2021 and big questions ahead for its budget in 2020, when it starts in on a $100 billion ballistic submarine program at General Dynamics Connecticut subsidiary, Electric Boat.
With cost an increasing focus, BIW officials are concerned about getting underbid for work that could mean losing skilled employees and having fewer contracts, meaning each contract would include a larger share of overhead costs, such as snow removal, among other things. Either circumstance would dent the yard's ability to compete for federal defense contracts.
Harris said that's where the company is in preparing its bid for a batch of offshore patrol cutters for the Coast Guard, providing work company officials said would avert laying off about 35 percent, or 1,200, of its manufacturing employees.
The new customer will pose an even tougher challenge on cost, Thompson said.
BIW cleared a design round to compete for the nine-ship deal against the small Florida-based Eastern Shipbuilding and the Louisiana-based Bollinger Shipyard, which in late 2008 beat BIW for $1.5 billion from the Coast Guard for its last batch of ships.
Jay Wadleigh, president of Local S6 of the machinists union, the shipyard's largest union, said he agrees that the shipyard will have to work on lowering its costs to compete on the Coast Guard bid and the next batch of Arleigh Burke-class destroyers in 2016.
But how to cut costs could be the rub.
With completion of a new outfitting hall later this year, just about all shipbuilding processes at BIW will occur indoors, and a new humidity-controlled paint facility will make blast and paint work more efficient.
Those additions aim to chip away at the largest disadvantage of shipbuilding in Maine: the weather.
"This is a great shipyard, but if it's going to continue in the future, we have to work on being more productive and beating competition in the South and in the Gulf [of Mexico] and sometimes in other states, like Florida," Harris said.
Aboard the deck of the first Zumwalt-class destroyer, now in the Kennebec River, a few wooden structures that look like well-engineered smelt shacks provide shelter in some areas where workers pass from the deck to the interior of the ship.
Despite adjustments for the weather, managements see outsourcing work as a way to reduce costs. Negotiations with the union over that prickly issue are expected to begin later this month.
Korman, the Avascent analyst, said pressure to outsource comes from on high.
"There's a huge Pentagon pressure to stop the 'make-it-ourselves' mentality," Korman said.
The company has proposed buying some ship components from outside vendors, which Wadleigh said won't save as much as the company projects.
"We've found several miscalculations from the company, and their time studies have been very different than what we've come up with," Wadleigh said earlier this week.
Management's cost-savings proposal started with some contention over whether buying from away would mean sourcing components from a General Dynamics subsidiary in Mexicali, Mexico, just across the border from the other shipyard Harris oversees in San Diego, the National Steel and Shipbuilding Co., or NASSCO.
Wadleigh said the company "absolutely" planned to buy from the subsidiary in Mexico, until the union contacted Republican Sen. Susan Collins, who secured a promise from Harris that it would not deal with the plant in Mexico.
In a joint statement to the Bangor Daily News, Collins and independent Sen. Angus King said cost is a real concern for the yard as they continue to work to secure federal funding for programs at BIW.
Democratic 1st District Rep. Chellie Pingree said she believes there are other ways than outsourcing to cut costs.
"I understand that there needs to be a focus on costs to win Coast Guard contracts, but I believe the skill and experience of those workers is the key to finding those cost efficiencies," Pingree said.
If union and company negotiators can't agree on outsourcing, their respective cases will go to an independent arbitrator. And in 2016, the overall union labor contract is back up for negotiation.
Harris said the about 5,700-employee company plans to continue hiring, largely to deal with between 200 and 300 shipyard workers expected to retire annually for the next few years.
"I need to train those young people to do shipyard work, not what I can get done elsewhere by people who do it professionally all year-round," Harris said, noting electrical cabinets are one item he'd like the yard to buy from an outside supplier.
Since the summer, Harris has shared his outlook on the competition ahead with groups of about 150 BIW employees at a time.
That includes the Navy's plan to buy two Arleigh Burke-class destroyers per year for the next few years. It will bid on another multi-year contract for those ships in 2016, competing against the Pascagoula, Mississippi, shipyard of Huntington Ingalls Industries, which also builds ships for the Navy.
While the trouble would still be years away, the lead time required in federal defense contracting makes 2020 the near future. That's when work through the Zumwalt-class program — which was curtailed after three vessels because of cost concerns — will taper off and when the Navy will start spending heavily on a new batch of ballistic missile nuclear submarines, built by another General Dynamics subsidiary, Electric Boat in Connecticut, and Ingalls in Mississippi.
Korman said that the Bath shipyard's quality and the strategic advantage as a second shipyard for the Navy at a time when China and Russia are building out their fleets makes the future workload for the yard not quite so dire.
"It tells me that the programs that [General Dynamics] is involved in are going to be around for a long time," Korman said.


He specifically highlighted the crisis in Venezuela, pointing out 500,000 Venezuelans fled to Peru in 2018 alone to escape the worsening conditions in their country. This comes after Peru was forced to cancel work permits for Venezuelan refugees in late 2018 to cope with the influx of migrant workers.
The U.S. secretary of state thanked Peru's leadership for "graciously" opening their country to help Venezuelan refugees.