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News & Information Resources /
News Room /
ECONOMIC RECOVERY GRANT PROGRAM AWARD MAXIMUM INCREASED FOR THE VERMONT BUSINESS SECTORS MOST IMPACTED BY COVID-19
Nate Formalarie, Agency of Commerce
Montpelier, Vt. – Governor Phil Scott, the Agency of Commerce and Community Development (ACCD) and the Department of Taxes today announced an increase to the maximum grant award for Economic Recovery Grants for Vermont businesses negatively impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. The increase in the maximum grant award is available to businesses in the lodging, retail, hospitality, arts, travel and event affiliated sectors that have continued capacity constraints.
Previously, businesses could receive up to $50,000 in grant funds. Now, businesses in eligible industries can receive up to an additional $100,000 in grant funding, for a total of $150,000 from the program. The increased maximum award is available both to new applicants to the program and to those businesses that have already received a $50,000 grant.
"We realize how hard this pandemic and the ensuing public health mitigation policies have been on these sectors, which are crucial to the state's economy," said Governor Phil Scott. "In raising the limit by $100,000, we hope businesses that were previously capped at $50,000 can now access additional funding to help them survive as the pandemic continues to limit their capacity."
All businesses that received a $50,000 grant award from the Department of Taxes are eligible to request an increase to the new maximum award amount and can do so through myVTax starting today. ACCD will be contacting eligible businesses that already received a $50,000 grant notifying them this supplemental grant funding may be available to them starting Monday, August 24, 2020.
Businesses that have not yet applied for an Economic Recovery Grant are encouraged to apply if they have experienced losses of at least 50 percent in the months of March to July, 2020 (compared to any one-month period from March to July in 2019). Businesses that may not have been eligible based on earlier months are encouraged to evaluate their losses for the month of July as they may now be eligible. More information can be found at Economic Recovery Grant Program website.
More than $90 million has been awarded to more than 3,500 businesses in 22 different sectors and all 14 counties in Vermont, but there are still funds available.
109 State Street | The Pavilion | Montpelier, VT 05609-0101 | www.vermont.gov
TELEPHONE: 802.828.3333 | FAX: 802.828.3339 | TDD: 802.828.3345
Last Reviewed: August 19, 2020
Here are the most current news releases and opinion pieces from the Health Department.
COVID-19 further evolved, and public health work transitioned to become similar to other infectious diseases. Guidance was streamlined, state-run testing sites closed as at-home testing became prevalent, and more COVID-19 vaccines became available. The Health Department also responded to a new infectious disease outbreak of mpox. Our work with other state agencies to reduce lead in school drinking water was a success, and we continued supporting older Vermonters through various programs.
Vermont's pandemic response led the news in 2021. Vaccination took headlines as availability for vaccines and then for boosters reached one group after another, with clinics offered throughout the state. The year also saw the spread of more contagious variants of the virus. Guidance for testing and for isolation and quarantine evolved throughout 2021. Unfortunately, the opioid crisis did not subside, and news of overdoses still dominated.
As the world faced the historic COVID-19 pandemic, Vermont worked to slow the spread of the virus through prevention, testing and contact tracing. Along with a commitment to data and science, Vermonters made sacrifices and found creative solutions to support one other's health and well-being.
Vermont again named the healthiest state, warnings about vaping illness, messaging of severe weather preparedness and response, and the importance of immunization and prevention of injury and disease.


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Policies, Publics, and Protests
The Alberta government spent 3.5 million dollars investigating environmental groups protesting the oil sands. Gary Mason, writing in The Globe and Mail, Alberta edition, expects the report to be a dud despite it being a year late and a million dollars over budget. His article appears below.
On 31 October 2007, the Calgary Herald published my opinion that protests of public policy contribute to knowledge, democracy, and good policymaking. As Albertans await the report on #environmental NGO funding of protest activities, I dusted off the op-ed of good things that come from public protests. With slightly updated wording, I'm republishing it here as a blog post.
If the $3,500,000.00 report says pretty much what
I wrote fifteen years ago, for free,
where do Alberta taxpayers go for a refund?
All over the world powerful policymakers deploy spies, police, and military to avoid or to control citizens whose viewpoints differ from official public policy. Political analysts believe that power lies in the ballot box. Perhaps traditional political power does but, as current events demonstrate, that is only one kind of power.
The stories of protest power have become familiar: government/State on one side, protesters on the other side, with uniformed troops inside the frame. Protest is depicted as tense, messy, and expensive.
In nature, of which humans are a part, everything is connected. Seeing patterns assists in understanding systems. From my dozens of years studying protests as systems, here are five interconnecting patterns:
Protests are an emergent property of a policy system.
1. Policies are an initial condition for a protest group to form. Their aim is to influence changes in the policy they believe may harm them or the planet. Unlike special interest groups and lobbyists, who seek long-term access to policymakers, protesters may not stay active beyond the end of their particular policy conflict.
People have different risk tolerances.
2. Each side brings forth experts' reports, risk assessments, and information it claims is correct, and which discredits the other side's reports, risk assessments, and information. Sincere belief about a policy's risks spur people to action they see as participating in civic engagement to prevent policy mistakes. Policymakers are confronted with concerns about potential harm that they have not considered, think is a tolerable risk, or do not accept as possible. This translates into power struggles over risks that policy does or does not, can or cannot mitigate.
Protesters and policymakers 'diss and dismiss' each other.
3. Instead of addressing the interpretive differences about the policy's risks, the sides demonize each other, mostly through social media. Policymakers see protesters as unelected, unrepresentative, and unaccountable malcontents whose protest is "counterproductive", its claims "ridiculous", its opinion "a minority", and its analysis "irrelevant". Protesters believe their cause is just, their analysis of the problem is correct, and that policymakers are in the pockets of industry or developers seeking short-term benefits that add burdens to the taxpayer and the planet. So, both carry on.
Each side encourages democratic public participation.
4. Policymakers prefer policy discussions within official public participation processes, such as town hall meetings, focus groups, opinion surveys, or open houses. They expect the public to attend, be orderly, listen to hired experts who manage technical information, and then give input for the policymakers to consider in decisions they alone have authority to make. Protesters characterize their actions as true democratic public participation. On occasion, more people in total attend a protest than go to the notably under-attended official public processes, making protest, they argue, more representative of public opinion.
Protest creates knowledge.
5. The controversy of protest keeps everyone learning about alternative policy interpretations, and potential risks. Like news media, policymakers follow the noise. Policies, and their attendant protests, become Trojan Horses for other agendas, such as who is acting democratically, who speaks for the majority, ethics of governing, and how tax dollars are used. It generates research to prove/discredit each other's policy interpretations. Policymakers consider more options as a result. Decisions improve through diversity of opinion. Protest groups freely give, and policymakers can accept, alternative knowledge and perspectives as part of policy formulation. The alternative knowledge stays in the policy system long after the protest about the policy ends. Members of the public may be persuaded to change an opinion as a result of additional information.
Patterns reframe protest as a contribution to mutual learning participating in policymaking, rather than placing protest as a cost outside policymaking, or an attack on democratic institutions, or as group dysfunction. It is tempting to want to sort good guys from bad guys, and have the news media bring it to the comfort of our homes. However, maybe the option is to spot patterns that help understand protests with more depth than simply regarding protesters as rowdy people who represent no one, or government as a monolithic bureaucracy making policy that benefits the few.
The Cassandra files Alberta, Calgary Herald, conflict, conflict analysis, conflict management, Gary Mason, policy, policy protest, public protest, The Globe and Mail
Tips for Teaching Conflict Competence to Physically Distanced Children
Six lessons from failure

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


What WebRTC needs is related to the use cases I submitted for the  Webapps charter update, for a Push API (based upon the concept presented at TPAC). Without presuming any implementation details at this point (even whether EventSource as it stands will fulfill this), we need the ability of Webapps to register for events to be delivered whether the Webapp (or even the user agent) is running or not. This will ensure that the Webapp does not have to maintain an always-on connection in order to receive incoming call notifications (or other types of notifications).
This is a capability with broad utility, and we have been discussing the possibilities in W3C and beyond for several years. The first discussion in W3C was at the 2009 TPAC where I presented the concept for Connectionless Push to the HTML WG, with the result that the Server-Sent Events spec section on Connectionless Push was updated its current - although still informative - text. I have been leading work in other areas (e.g. the OMA and OMTP/WAC) on this API design, and in bringing the design ideas to Webapps in TPAC 2012 it was agreed in principle that work on such an API would be considered in the Webapps rechartering, given that it would be possible to bind to any underlying delivery system (whether standardized e.g. SMS, OMA Push, or other proprietary connectionless Push capabilities).
On EventSource specifically, I believe its design can in principle be used to attach to event notification services independent of whether the actual over-the-air/wire protocol (bearer) at use at any one time is connection-oriented (e.g. HTTP as in typical SSE) or otherwise. This is the approach we have taken in OMA in defining the Push API which is nearing its final specification stage, and is based purely in SSE (and as a deployment option, transparently to the user agent). But while binding to specific bearers may be an implementation detail (there will be specific behaviors that will need to be implemented by the user-agent), there are some aspects that will need to be considered by the user agent which go beyond the current SSE spec, e.g.
In considering these things, we may determine that SSE is not in fact the best match for this goal in W3C, but that's part of the proposed discussion in Webapps.
> The webrtc WG has identified that the ability to notify, and possibly wake up, a web application of incoming events is important. This to enable support of use cases such as incoming calls. And in certain scenarios the resource use (e.g. power) is very important.
> However, this kind of functionality is not in scope of the webrtc WG, but seems to belong to the Web Applications WG. So this is a message that the webrtc WG is interested in seeing technology that supports this being developed. We have also noted discussions in Web Apps around use cases for connection-less push: <http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-webapps/2012JanMar/0008.html> - especially the third one is very relevant for us.
> Stefan and Harald (chairs) for the webrtc WG.
Could server-sent events meet this requirement?
Next message: Travis Leithead: "RE: DOM3 Events - additional editing help to move the spec forward"
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"LOustaou dei Figo", 17th century farm house completely renovated, mas "LOustaou dei Figo", from the 17th century, renovated. In a detached position. Private: property 4000 m2 with flowers and trees, swimming pool (12 x 4 m, depth 90 - 200 cm, 01.
05.-15.10.) with shutter cover. Boules, terrace (50 m2), garden furniture, barbecue. In the house: central heating system, burglar alarm system. Parking on the premises. Grocery 1.5 km, restaurant 1.5 km. Nearby attractions: Vaugines 3 km. Please note: car recommended. Grounds are partly made up of vineyards and olive groves.
6-room house 240 m2 on 2 levels: large entrance hall. Living/dining room 60 m2 with open-hearth fireplace and hi-fi system. Exit to the terrace. Kitchen (4 hot plates, oven, dishwasher, microwave). Shower, sep. WC. Upper floor: lounge with TV, video, hi-fi system and DVD. Exit to the terrace. 1 room with 1 double bed (150 cm), shower/WC. 1 room with 1 x 2 bunk beds. 1 room with 1 double bed, bathroom and separate WC. 1 room 30 m2 with 1 bed (80 cm), 1 double bed (160 cm). Shower, sep. WC. Deck chairs. Facilities: washing machine, dryer, safe, childrens high chair, baby cot for up to 3 year olds. Reserved parking. Living room (access from outside via a window door opening on to staircase, terrace side). Fridge with freezer compartment. 1 room with double bed, 30 m2 (access from the entrance). View of the countryside and the Luberon. The living/dining room comprises of a large vaulted room, separated by archways. Deposit: 1000 euros.


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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Repayment of the principal and interest of these loans is usually deferred until six months after graduation or withdrawal. Some loans are eligible for internship/residency deferment while others only allow for forbearance. When you are offered a loan, you will be given additional information to assist you with your final decision to accept or reject long-range indebtedness. Interest rates vary, depending on the particular loan source.
For more information about the different types of federal loans available to 2-Year PPID students, please refer to the items below.
Federal Unsubsidized Direct Loans are available to all students regardless of income. Interest accrues from the date of disbursement, but the extra costs of accrual can be avoided by making regular interest payments while in school. The unsubsidized amount may be used to meet the difference between the student budget and financial aid awarded (i.e., to replace the family contribution).


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Breaking... Senator Tokunbo Abiru Wins APC Lagos East Senatorial Ticket For 2023 Elections
The Senator representing Lagos East Senatorial District, Distinguished Senator Mukhail Adetokunbo Abiru, FCA has won the All Progressives Congress (APC) Lagos East Senatorial ticket for the 2023 general elections.
Abiru, the Chairman, Senate Committee on industries who contested unopposed cleared all the 344 votes cast by delegates from wards in the Local Governments areas under the district.
The primary election was held on Saturday at CMD, Magodo Area of Ikosi Isheri LCDA.
The Returning Officer, Mr Fouad Oki who declared Abiru as the winner of the election, said the nomination process complied with the provisions of the 2022 electoral Act . Officials from the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC were also present to monitor the exercise.
In his acceptance speech, Abiru who was overwhelmed by the massive support he got from the delegates said he would not relent in his #DoingGood agenda for the people . ''I want to let you know that I will continue to be passionate about ensuring 'greater good for greater and larger number'. This mantra will continue to guide my philosophy and strategy in giving a lease of life to our people as much as is within my power. The tactics to drive home this strategy is encapsulated in the resonating and reassuring 'DOING GOOD' drive mantra'', Abiru assured.
While acknowledging the unwavering support of party's leaders and members, the Senator said he was honoured to be an unopposed candidate of the ruling party for the Lagos East Senatorial District.
He said, ''I am extremely honored and delighted to be standing before you today to accept the nomination of our great party as the unopposed candidate for the general elections as the candidate for the party to represent Lagos East Senatorial district at the National Assembly.
''I am eternally grateful for this nomination and wholeheartedly accept it as it perhaps also in many ways a recognition of the efforts and work we have put into representing you in the last 16 months.
''Let me start by once again thanking all our leaders and members across Epe, Ibeju-Lekki, Ikorodu, Kosofe and Somolu for their invaluable contributions to how effective we have represented our people and for this honour of being returned unopposed as the candidate of the party for the district at next year's general elections.
''Haven received this affirmation from the party and our people, I would like to assure you that I will remain guided by the priorities and commitment to this cause which I have constantly asserted in the course of the exercise of this sacred mandate".
Notable party leaders attended the exercise., namely; Former Deputy Governor of Lagos and a member of the prestigious Governor's Advisory Council, Prince Abiodun Ogunleye, Alhaji Bode Oyedele, Former Lagos Commissioner, Dr. Tola Kasali , Alhaja Kafayat Ogbara, Dr Saheed Oladapo Ibikunle, Princess Adebimpe Akinsola, Local Governments and Local Council Development Areas, LCDAs Chairmen among other notable chieftains of the APC in Lagos East supported Senator Abiru's candidature.
#DoingGoodContinues!


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Dortmund is under pressure now, says James
After its lead at the top of the Bundesliga was cut to five points, James Rodriguez has told Borussia Dortmund it cannot slip up again.
10 February, 2019 16:13 IST
Bayern Munich playmaker James Rodriguez - Bongarts
James Rodriguez believes Borussia Dortmund is now the team under pressure after Bayern Munich cut its lead at the top of the Bundesliga.
Dortmund was leading Hoffenheim 3-0 after 66 minutes on Saturday, but two goals from Ishak Belfodil either side of Pavel Kaderabek header secured a dramatic 3-3 draw at Signal Iduna Park.
Bayern then took full advantage of its title rival's slip-up with a 3-1 win over Schalke at the Allianz Arena, which moved the champion to within five points of Dortmund.
And James says Lucien Favre's side will be only too aware that it cannot afford to drop more points before it faces Bayern in Munich on April 6.
"They know if they slip up they've still got to come here, so they're under pressure too," the Colombia star told the official Bundesliga website.
"We always are [under pressure]. I think we're going to maintain a high level and I think it's Dortmund who are under pressure."


Robert Bathurst, Bernard Scribbins, Kevin McNally and Mat Horne will star in a 'Dad's Army' which will re-shoot three lost episodes.
Robert Bathurst, Bernard Cribbins and Mat Horne will star in a remake of three lost 'Dad's Army' episodes.
The 'Cold Feet' star is to take on the role of Sergeant Wilson when the hat-trick of eps are re-shot, with Bernard in line to be Private Godfrey, and Mat will also appear in the project.
According to the Daily Mail newspaper, Kevin McNally will portray Captain Mainwaring, made famous by Arthur Lowe.
The trio of episodes, 'The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Walker', 'Stripe For Frazer' and 'Under Fire', were lost after they were recorded over.
They aired in series two of the nine-season sitcom, which was based on the hapless exploits of a British Home Guard during the Second World War.
In the original TV series - which ran from 1968 until 1977 - Wilson was portrayed by John Le Mesurier, who Robert played in BBC film 'Hattie', which told the story of the late actor's ex-wife Hattie Jacques.
Last month, Gold boss Pete Thornton revealed the project was in the works.
He said: "We've been working on this project for several years and will be respecting the genius of the original series. If ever there was a time to 'stick to the script' then this is it."
At the time, Sir David Jason was thought to be in line to play Captain Mainwaring, Hugh Laurie as Sgt Arthur Wilson and EastEnders' Danny Dyer as Private Joe Walker.
Pete added: "The lost episodes are currently being cast, with an extensive hunt on to find the perfect candidates to take on the daunting task of bringing these much-loved comedy characters to life once more."


VIDEO: You just signed a real estate contract. Now what?
VIDEO: Can you marry someone for a green card?The Legal Minute's Lauren Forman speaks with Sarasota, Florida lawyer Donna Scarlatelli about the consequences of marrying someone just for a green card.
VIDEO: What should you be aware of when starting a business with two or more partners.
VIDEO: Defining medical malpractice. Do you have a case?
VIDEO: What you should expect from your condo board?
VIDEO: Who's to blame for a carnival injury?


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Reactions: Silk Road bust proves you can't fix stupid
Rachel Hatch	November 7, 2014
A joint sting operation by the U.S. and Europol shut down websites being used for illegal drugs and weapons sales. The massive operation shut down more than 400 sites, including Silk Road 2.0. Assistant Professor of Information Technology Doug Twitchell says the bust shows anonymous websites are not foolproof, and even technology cannot fix stupid.
Twitchell:
The new technologies that allow users to keep a computer's address anonymous are advanced, but certainly not a panacea. They are not foolproof. And no matter how advanced the technology, this really just proves that the guys behind Silk Road are not all that good.
The routers they were using – known as The Onion Router or TOR – were based on ones developed by the U.S. Navy that would make it difficult to track a computer down by hiding its IP address. This can be used for good or bad. It can help dissents in oppressive countries get out messages without being arrested, or it can help drug dealers make their connections. It depends on how it is used.
In reality, it is really difficult to keep yourself entirely anonymous on the Internet. Even drug dealers need bank accounts and ways to transport their products. All these things can be tracked. And people in intelligence agencies understand what to look for.
Of course, like the people who were involved in the first Silk Road, it doesn't help if you make mistakes, like posting to your named Facebook account from your anonymous computer, or using your real name to register online, or talking on online forums. In the case of Silk Road 2.0, intelligence agencies traced leads like these and sent in an undercover agent to gather evidence.
There is one thing that is true across the board: You can have really cool tools. You can have really secure tools. But alone, they are not going to solve your security problems.
Think about the recent Home Depot security breach that stole 53 million credit card numbers. To prevent a theft like this from self-check out registers it is not technologically difficult, but from an organizational standpoint, it is difficult to implement it the right way.
It's not the technology that makes or breaks anonymity. It's the day-to-day difficulty to ensure all goes right. That is the real challenge in cyber security.
Continuous Improvement in Technology conference celebrates seventh year
School of IT graduates find interesting and challenging careers
Department of Technology honors our Veterans
K-12 education resources
Christmas at the Mansions holiday tour, 2019
Celebrated author of Teaching Naked to keynote 2020 Teaching & Learning Symposium
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Useful Stooges
The real Yale-Harvard game: taking dirty money
The scourge of NYC, the pride of NYU
Playing tunes, calling for bloodbaths: Rage against the Machine
Getting rich on rage
American professors, Chinese spies
Catching up with the selectively proud Hanoi Jane
Celebrating terrorism: Max Blumenthal
Anna Louise Strong, cheerleader for Mao
"I must take children": Chaim Rumkowski's final solution
More NBA toadying
Idolizing a cop killer: Susan Sarandon
"Once a meathead, always a meathead": Rob Reiner
Bethany Allen: defending a slavery defender
Maurice Strong, dealmaker for China
Max Blumenthal, Putin slimemeister
Tag: David Miranda
Enemies of reform in Brazil
Last August, the socialist president of Brazil, Dilma Rousseff, was removed from office for corruption. As we've noted on this site, fellow socialists came to Rousseff's defense, with David Miranda (husband of notorious Edward Snowden helpmeet Glenn Greenwald) arguing in the Guardian that Rousseff was the victim of corporations and rich people who don't like socialism.
But in the weeks leading up to Rousseff's removal, millions of Brazilians took to the streets to protest her corrupt government and the deep and lingering economic recession over which she had presided, and to demand her departure from office. Ideologically, the protests were not unlike those currently rocking Venezuela (which, of course, is in far worse shape than Brazil): people were sick of having their freedom squelched and their economy mismanaged.
Rousseff, a member of the Workers' Party, was replaced by her vice president, Michel Temer, who belongs to the more conservative Brazilian Democratic Movement Party. Now, Temer is no saint. Like Rousseff before him (and like many others who still hold high positions in his government), he's been implicated in the massive "Lava Jato" corruption case surrounding the federally owned oil company, Petrobras.
Here and below: some images from the General Strike
During his brief tenure, though, he has at least sought to rescue Brazil from the consequences of his predecessor's socialist policies. Taking office in the midst of an economic crisis, he warned that Brazil's economy faced a "meltdown" unless "severe fiscal discipline and belt tightening" were introduced.
Pronounced himself the head of a "national salvation government," he began instituting the kind of reforms – including significant changes in public employment contracts and pension arrangements – which, although uncomfortable in the short term for many working-class Brazilians, sought to correct policies that simply could not be sustained in the long term without doing to Brazil something similar to what chavismo has done to Venezuela. Indeed, Temer's reforms might well have helped Brazil, which has long been looked to as a nation of immense but unfulfilled economic promise, to finally develop, within a few years, a robust First World economy dominated by a large and prosperous middle class.
But many workers, unsurprisingly, weren't happy with Temer's new policies. The socialists felt threatened to their core. And the labor unions were outraged. On April 28, a new set of public protests began. This time, however, it wasn't a matter of angry citizens taking spontaneously to the streets. This was a nationwide general strike, the first in Brazil since 1996, called by the labor unions. Schools were closed. So were most businesses. Public transport came to a near-total halt. The entrances to many airports were blocked. Media described the nation as "paralyzed." There was widespread violence. Cars and trams and buses were burned. In the Sao Paulo neighborhood where Temer owns a house (he currently lives in the vice-presidential residence in Brasilia), protesters "broke up sidewalks and lobbed chunks of concrete at police."
While socialist leaders celebrated the general strike as an effective pushback against Temer, others disagreed. Yahoo News, for example, quoted landscape architect Marcelo Faisal as saying that "reforms need to take place" and that the strike hadn't (in Yahoo's words) "lived up to the hype." A shipping news website seconded this view, reporting with relief that the strike had "impacted the country's ports, especially the largest port of Santos, less than originally feared." Doubtless we haven't heard the last of the enemies of reform in Brazil, but it may well be that despite their occasional noise-making, the necessary reform will, after all, be able to proceed. And in the end that will likely be good news for almost everyone in that huge and promising country.
Posted on May 8, 2017 May 11, 2017 by usefulstooges	0
Exit Rousseff
Well, it's over. On Wednesday, Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff was removed from office.
Back in January, we wrote about the increasing calls for Rousseff's impeachment by ordinary Brazilians who had lost faith in her government's disastrous socialist policies, who were disgusted by the massive scandal surrounding the government oil firm, Petrobras, and who – bottom line – were determined not to let her turn their country into another Venezuela.
Brazilians, commented Romanian-American political scientist Vladimir Tismaneanu, were turning out to be less susceptible to utopian promises than their neighbors in Venezuelan and Argentina. Philosopher Olavo de Carvalho observed that Brazilians weren't just rejecting Rousseff – they were rejecting "the whole system of power that has been created by the Workers' Party, which includes intellectuals and opinion-makers in the big media."
Dilma the terrorist: a mug shot
Today, on the other side of the Brexit vote and the GOP's nomination of Donald Trump, it's hard not to wonder whether the grassroots Brazilian effort to oust Rousseff is part of a spreading global thumbs-down for corrupt, supercilious socialist elites. If so, good show.
As it happens, we spent that whole week in January on Rousseff, recounting her beginnings as a rich girl who joined a revolutionary terrorist group called COLINA; her entry into politics (a career in which, from the outset, she distinguished herself by her combination of administrative incompetence and genius for making and exploiting connections); and, finally, her increasingly disastrous tenure as president, capped by the Petrobras scandal, described by the Wall Street Journal as "the biggest corruption case ever in a country with a long history of scandals."
Kim Kataguiri addressing an anti-Rousseff rally
We also profiled one of the leaders of the anti-Rousseff movement, 20-year-old Kim Kataguiri, whose activism was spurred when one of his college teachers praised the socialist policies of the ruling Worker's Party. Kataguiri responded by making a series of You Tube videos promoting free-market capitalism and founding the Free Brazil Movement, which has grown like kudzu.
Rousseff with Lula
In March, we noted the arrest of a Rousseff sidekick, the imprisonment of two more of her cronies, and the resignation of her justice minister; in April, we reported on a government raid on the home of former president – and fallen saint – Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. (We also noted Rousseff's unsuccessful, and patently ludicrous, attempt to shield him from prosecution by naming him as her chief of staff.) Not long after, we reported that Marcelo Odebrecht, the CEO of Brazil's biggest construction firm – and, naturally, a close associate of Rousseff's – had sentenced to 19 years for bribing authorities in connection with Petrobras contracts.
Glenn Greenwald and David Miranda
Later in April, we learned that notorious journalist Glenn Greenwald (of Edward Snowden scandal fame) and his husband, David Miranda, were on Team Rousseff, with Miranda signing his name to a Guardian op-ed accusing Rousseff's opponents of seeking to engineer (what else?) a "right-wing coup." In a July profile of callow, reliably far-left Salon columnist Ben Norton, we pointed out that he'd used the same exact words as Miranda, calling Rousseff the victim of a would-be "right-wing coup."
And now – well – here we are. She's out. Congratulations to the people of Brazil. Needless to say, this doesn't mean an instant turnaround for their country –that'll take serious, comprehensive reform – but it's a necessary start.
Oh, and then there's this news. In reaction to the "right-wing coup" in Brasilia, three of Rousseff's fellow socialist economy-destroyers – Rafael Correa of Ecuador, Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela, and Evo Morales of Bolivia – all recalled their ambassadors. Well, birds of a feather and all that. Let's hope their days in power are numbered, too.
Posted on September 1, 2016 September 2, 2016 by usefulstooges	5
Defending Dilma: Greenwald and Miranda
In recent weeks we've watched the massive Petrobras scandal in Brazil spread wider and wider, taking down politicians and business figures, big and small, until it finally reached the most powerful person in the land: the country's corrupt president, Dilma Rousseff. She is now facing impeachment.
Brazilian Congressman Jean Wyllys
On April 20, Shannon Sims of Forbes reported on the novel responses by Rousseff's stooges to the legislature's vote to impeach her. Some of them are describing it as a "right-wing coup" – a ridiculous way to characterize a constitutionally legitimate action that is amply justified by Rousseff's conduct in office. There are other, equally absurd takes on the impeachment: Congressman Jean Wyllys has called it "sexist," an effort by anti-woman reactionaries to unseat Brazil's first female head of state.
Rousseff herself is one of those who have called the impeachment a coup. She's responded in a characteristically authoritative way, threatening to have Brazil removed from Mercosur, the South American common market, if she's removed from office. She's accused her potential successor, Vice-President Michel Temer, of being a leader of the "coup" – a charge that he denied angrily, rejecting the notion that Brazil is "some minor republic where coups are carried out."
Meanwhile one David Miranda contributed an article to the Guardian in which he purported to explain the "real reason Dilma Rousseff's enemies want her impeached." Never mind her corruption in office. Rousseff, insisted Miranda, was being targeted by "rich and powerful" conservatives and the major corporations they own, for no other reason than that they oppose her left-wing politics.
Who is David Miranda? You may have run across his name while reading about the scandal surrounding Edward Snowden, the former contractor for the U.S. National Security Agency who stole sensitive secret papers and passed them on to journalist Glenn Greenwald, who in turn published them in the Guardian. At the height of the controversy, in August 2013, U.K. police detained Greenwald's husband at Heathrow Airport on his way from Berlin to Rio de Janeiro and seized thumb drives containing tens of thousands of classified British Government documents. They'd been given by Snowden, who'd received asylum in Russia, to Laura Poitras, a partner in Snowden's scheme, who'd then passed them on to Greenwald's husband so that he could deliver them to Greenwald, with whom he lives in Rio.
The name of Greenwald's husband? David Miranda.
Miranda at the airport in Rio de Janeiro, after his detention at Heathrow
This past January, Britain's Court of Appeal ruled Miranda's detention at Heathrow legal. The editors of The Spectator approved, describing Miranda as "a mule for industrial-scale sabotage" and arguing that "the right to a free press [does not] extend to the indiscriminate release of secret documents which put agents' lives in danger, or alert terrorists to the gaps in our capabilities." Indeed, as The Spectator pointed out, many of Miranda's staunchest champions in Britain, who invoked the freedom of the press in his defense, are not consistently fans of press freedom; on the contrary, their real reason for standing with Miranda was patently that his actions were potentially very harmful to the U.S. and Britain and very helpful to those countries' jihadist enemies.
An anti-Rousseff protest in Sao Paulo last December
It is no coincidence that Miranda, who in his capacity as Greenwald's "mule" acted against the interests of the U.S. and Britain, is now standing shoulder to shoulder with the socialist regime of Brazil. His claim? That the massive, ever-growing street rallies against Rousseff's corrupt regime are something of an artificial phenomenon – almost a mirage. The protests, he maintains, didn't happen organically: they were incited by the anti-Rousseff media. Moreover, being "disproportionately white and wealthy," the protesters themselves are "not remotely representative of Brazil's population." Miranda, as it happens, had already made much the same argument in an earlier article, published in March and written in collaboration with Greenwald and Andrew Fishman.
Anti-government protest in Venezuela: a picture from 2014
Attentive readers of this website may recall that supporters of the corrupt, authoritative governments of the late Hugo Chávez and his anointed successor, Nicolás Maduro, in Venezuela, have used much the same arguments (they're rich, they're white, they've been ginned up by the media) to discredit opponents of chavismo. The Tea Party movement in the U.S. has also been dismissed in similar terms. Somehow protesters aren't authentic if they don't fit the right demographic.
Dilma and Lula
It's worth noting, by the way, that the chavistas in Caracas have longstanding ties to Rousseff and her predecessor, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, in Brasilia. And the ideological continuities are obvious. And just as the chavistas' incompetent administration, socialist policies, and corrupt conduct have combined to drag Venezuela's economy into the gutter, so it has become increasingly obvious that the exact same attributes on the part of Brazil's rulers threaten to bring down its own economy, which not long ago seemed to be on the verge of First World-level prosperity.
In any case, whatever you may think of Greenwald's other activities, it's certainly interesting to see him and Miranda – who made their names trying to compromise American and British security, all the while seeking to paint themselves as principled – shamelessly carrying water for the socialist thugs who run Brazil.
Posted on April 29, 2016 April 25, 2016 by usefulstooges	1


text:
Harris Near-Miss Ties for Worst Since Three Mile Island – News Release by NC WARN
Emergency core cooling system was "seriously degraded" for a year, greatly
increasing reactor risk in early 1990s. Group demands more openness.
DURHAM, NC – A year-long, high risk condition at the Shearon Harris nuclear plant has been uncovered by a nuclear watchdog in Washington after remaining secret for 15 years. A design flaw in the reactor's emergency cooling system caused valve and pipe failures that rendered the system inoperable, and unable to respond if called on to prevent a meltdown. The problem went unnoticed until a refueling outage in 1991.
This "precursor event" to a nuclear accident ranks among the highest risk incidents in the U.S. since the 1979 partial meltdown at Three Mile Island, according to Nuclear Regulatory Commission criteria. Agency investigators concluded: "The flow rate of water required to neutralize the effects of 'design basis' accidents assumed in the licensing analysis would not have been attained." (emphasis added)
The discovery was made by Greenpeace's Jim Riccio while conducting research for a report to be released Monday on U.S. nuclear accidents and near-misses since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. The Harris failure stemmed from a flaw by plant designer Westinghouse. After Westinghouse alerted several nuclear plants about the defect, Harris owner CP&L attempted to correct the problem, but unknowingly made it worse.
Riccio noted that NRC calculated the year-long Harris failure as having the same risk for a meltdown as did the 2002 near-miss at Ohio's Davis Besse plant, when a large hole was discovered in the reactor vessel. The NRC calculated the Harris failure as increasing the risk of a reactor meltdown by up to 1,000 times over normal. If a rupture in primary cooling system valves or pipe connections had occurred during that year, the emergency cooling system would have been triggered, but unable to protect the reactor core from overheating and releasing large amounts of radioactive materials.
Durham-based watchdog group NC WARN said today the discovery was further indication that Progress Energy needs to be more open with the public about problems and how the utility is correcting them. "This is dramatic evidence that major system failures do occur at nuclear plants," said Jim Warren, Executive Director of NC WARN. "It shows that the utilities and NRC do not have everything under control, and that they gamble on the public not finding about these problems – instead of explaining them."
Warren also questioned why the system failure persisted for a full year without CP&L rechecking the correction it had made after Westinghouse alerted them about the defect. NC WARN has detailed other Harris design flaws that have remained uncorrected for years, according to Warren. Next week, the group will publish a report on serious and ongoing safety problems at Harris, along with other reasons Progress should abandon plans for new reactors at the southeastern Wake County plant.
CP&L was recently renamed Progress Energy, and in January selected Westinghouse to possibly build two more reactors at Harris. Westinghouse is still altering its new design in an effort to entice some utility to build a new plant and revive the fading industry. "Cost-cutting pressures are pervasive in this industry," said Warren. "This near-miss is another reason the public and local governments should not be shut out during the licensing process for new reactors."
Union of Concerned Scientists' David Lochbaum, a technical advisor for NC WARN, said the Harris failure further belies industry claims of being safer over the years "just because they haven't melted down another reactor since Three Mile Island." He said there's a common misconception that only explosions, such as the Chernobyl disaster, can lead to large releases of radiation. During a reactor or steam generator accident, high pressure inside the containment building can last for hours or days, which would push large amounts of radioactive gases through scores of openings and seals in the building's walls.
NC WARN has urged Progress for years to be more forthcoming about problems at its plants – and whether they are being corrected – instead of the watchdog group and its allies having to discover and expose them.
"Public safety shouldn't depend on cat and mouse games about problems, nor on watchdog groups having to dig out information from NRC's Byzantine data system where everything is written in nukespeak," added Warren. "We call on CEO Robert McGehee to instruct his people to be forthcoming about problems that arise, and whether and how they are being corrected. And we want to know what other skeletons there might be in the Shearon Harris closet."
Posted In: NC WARN News Releases, Plants in North & South Carolina, Reactor Safety


Another ninja turtle cake! They are prooving to be quite popular. The cake was a chocolate cake covered in white fondant and air brushed to look like bricks using a stencil.
I hand cut the 2 swords and the name out of fondant and painted silver with lustre dust.
Next Lime and coconut cupcakes!


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ROWING COMMUNITIES
Women's Quadruple Sculls (W4x) – Final
Sunday Podiums at the 2018 World Rowing Cup II in Linz Ottensheim, Austria © FISA Igor Meijer
A-Final
In the quiet of the start line, you can hear the birds singing. Then the names were called, the starter said 'attention' and it was all go. Ukraine had a very high starting rate and got a small lead as they dropped down to their race pace stroke rate. Only Australia was slightly off the pace. The Netherlands then got ahead. The Dutch are the reigning World Champions and also finished first at World Rowing Cup I at the start of the month.
Ukraine then moved up on the Dutch. This is the same Ukrainian crew that finished fourth at the Rio Olympics and it included the World Record holder on the indoor rower, Olena Buryak. Ukraine hit the middle of the race in the lead. But there was nothing in it with just two seconds separating the entire fleet. In the third 500 the Olympic Champions, Germany did a push and took the lead. This is a different crew than the 2016 boat, but the support must have been there. Ukraine was now in second but trying to hold on to the Germans. Now Australia really found their rhythm as was at 40 coming into the final sprint. This was one close race! China One went to 45. China got the silver and Australia bronze.
Results: GER, CHN1, AUS, UKR, NED, POL
Marie-Catherine Arnold (b), Germany, gold
"We had a really good start and we were able to keep with the others. We pushed with 500 meters to go and managed to create a boat length. It felt amazing and we really enjoyed the win. There is a big group of women to select from but looking forward to racing again."
Caitlin Cronin, Australia, bronze
"We were expecting a tight race today after the times in the heats and the reps. It really could have been anyone's game but we executed our plan. We will be in Lucerne where we hope to build on what we did today."
Re-watch the live race here
B-final
After an initial lead by Romania, Great Britain got out in front and once there never looked back. Belarus made the best of it and went after the British, but they didn't have the same boat speed.
Results: GBR, BLR, NOR, ROU, CZE, CHN2
Strong entries for the 2019 World Rowing Under 23 Championships
Medals for 23 nations at World Rowing Cup III in Rotterdam
The 2000m test for medals at World Rowing Cup III in Rotterdam
Attention, Go… lightweight and para-rowing finals in Rotterdam
Return to six lanes for semifinals at World Rowing Cup III in Rotterdam
Weather moves racing to time trials at Rotterdam World Rowing Cup


Obsession With Small Child. Fixated. Reactive.
Maddie, a delightful seven-year-old Miniature Schnauzer, has an obsession – the little grandson, now aged four.
I met a confident, relaxed and friendly little dog. I had left her alone to sniff and investigate me without trying to touch her until she was ready. Also, I was already seated before she joined us.
A new person walking directly towards a dog in a doorway, looming, can be intimidating.
Maddie is a very friendly and well socialised little dog, great with most people. She is particularly reactive to children however.
Her main problem is the little grandson – we will call him Jack.
Jack is a very good with Maddie. He treats her with respect. They have known each other since he was born.
He is now getting fed up with her behaviour towards him – even a a bit scared.
Maddie has an obsession: Jack.
As soon as he arrives Maddie is running at him, jumping up and barking. It's excitement to see him for sure, but is it pure pleasure? I doubt it.
This generates a lot of human excitement and understandable scolding. The dog is getting worse.
All the time Jack is moving about, Maddie is barking at him. She rushes up the stairs ahead of him, barking down at him. When he goes downstairs she rushes ahead of him, barking up at him.
When he sits down she stops barking but she sits right beside him, staring at him.
He may now be able to move about slowly – though she will be at his heels. If he runs, as children do, she will begin to bark again.
So far I haven't actually seen this for myself. My assessment is from close questioning rather than observation. They have some groundwork to put in place first before having Jack round again.
It is obvious that Maddie has some sort of fascination for Jack. She seems excited and scared of him in equal measure. It sounds like she seems to want to control him, herd him. The herding theory is plausible. Schnauzers and Miniature Schnauzers were originally used as cattle herding dogs.
Being a child, Jack will naturally be somewhat unpredictable. He has become Maddie's obsession.
The plan is for them to have a well-rehearsed short visit with Jack, dealing with Maddie completely differently but without me there to complicate things or cause any extra excitement.
Then Jack will make second visit with me already there.
Instead of trying to stop Maddie from behaving like this using scolding and restraint, they will be upbeat. They will sound encouraging and reward her for being quiet instead. They will reinforce her when she looks away from him – with food. They've not tried using food for reward and reinforcement so they have a big, unplayed, trump card!
They will now think in terms of helping her out rather than disciplining her. This will mean putting her on 'remote control' by working on a solid, bright and encouraging 'Maddie Come!' so that she immediately comes away from Jack when asked to. This is part of the groundwork.
Most importantly, the scene needs to be set in the best way to help Maddie, so that when she comes into Jack's presence she's not already highly aroused and barking.
Managed in this way, both Jack and the adult humans will be a lot calmer and less anxious, which Maddie should pick up on.
She will be out of the way when Jack arrives. He will already be sitting down when, much calmer, she is brought in to join him. She will then be given things to occupy her mind and help her to calm – she would love a Kong or a chew. The session will be kept very short.
After this initial 'trial' session, I will be there for the second session to see for myself what is now happening. I can make sure we are using the very best tactics for both Jack and Maddie.
Email couple of weeks later: I'm pleased to let you know we had Jack round for a couple of hours and the difference was immense. Did exactly as you asked and it worked very well. Jack enjoyed hiding her food as well.
Seldom do I go to see dogs that so clearly reflect the state of mind of their owners.
Poppy is a 'Yorkiepoo', a tiny underage pitiful little puppy for sale three years ago in a shop. One can only guess that she came from a puppy farm somewhere, very possibly shipped over from Eastern Europe as so many are. Not a good start in life.
Ollie is a Miniature Schnauzer, chosen to keep Poppy company and to give her a bit more confidence which hasn't really worked.
The most concerning thing is how inseparable they are from the adult daughter, Poppy in particular. They are much too attached. Poppy won't let her out of their sight. If the daughter moves, she moves. All the time I was there Poppy sat beside or in front of her, scared but protective. Even thought the young lady wasn't touching her, a sort of invisible concern cloaked her.
The girl herself is equally needy of the dogs and worries and watches over them constantly (as do the whole family to a lesser extent). She hates going out to work, conjuring up all sorts of scenarios of their coming to harm when she is out. This started, somewhat understandably, when the tiny, scared and vulnerable Poppy came into their lives.
When I arrived it took Poppy quite a while to stop barking at me, keeping me away from the young lady. When the lady goes out, she cries at the door, even when other people are in the house. She then transfers her 'following' onto the mother. The family has not felt able to go out in the evening for two years now. Predictably, Poppy is very scared of people and other dogs, and when off lead may run away and hide. Both she and Ollie bark constantly at anything they see. Ollie is a much more stable character in general, but is affected by Poppy's barking and panicking.
We discussed ways of dissolving the invisible umbilical attaching Poppy to the daughter because they are literally too attached. We looked at ways of enriching the dogs' lives and encouraging independence. The humans' tone of voice and body language can make a huge difference – hellos and goodbyes can be matter-of-fact. The young lady and the little dog are simply over-dependent upon one another. We put in place little changes in many aspects of the dogs' lives. A bit like a jigsaw puzzle, if all the bits are slotted into place then you start to get the whole picture looking different.
One day later I received this email – before even they had received their written plan: 'We made all of the changes that we could remember and the transformation with Poppy has been absolutely astounding. It is literally as though someone has pressed a switch. I can't explain it any better than that. She is like a different, chilled out little dog. Would you believe that neither Poppy or Ollie followed ……… when she came home from work today? They stayed in the living room, sprawled out and (hopefully) carefree. They both ate all of their dinner. The baby was here today but they did not seem as interested in him as they usually would be'.
I did give them one word of warning. A familiar pattern I see is dramatic improvement immediately, followed by a downturn as the dogs start to adjust and test the new boundaries, maybe even becoming frustrated. If this does happen, the people can now see what they are aiming for if they work through this and remain consistent.
NB. The precise protocols to best use for your own dog may be different to the approach I have worked out for Poppy and Ollie, which is why I don't go into all exact details here of our plan. Finding instructions on the internet or TV that are not tailored to your own dogs can do more harm than good. One size does not fit all. If you live in my own area I would be very pleased to help with strategies specific to your own dog (see my Get Help page).
Two Miniature Schnauzers, Scared of People. Go Away!
Go Away, Go Away, Go Away, they bark!
Whilst Bill barks and backs off, Little Ben (now one year old) charges at people coming to the house. The person then recoils of course, and Ben achieves his result – the person backs away. Now he is actually making contact with his teeth.
Both dogs barked frantically for a long time when I arrived – I didn't recoil when Ben made contact! We tried various strategies. I took no notice of them. I looked away. I stayed sitting down. I moved slowly. Eventually I dropped treats gently onto the floor. Any sudden movement made them jump away.
This isn't aggression at all – it is pure fear.
I asked the owners to show me what they did when people came. Like many people, they have reinforced the behaviour, maybe sitting on the floor with them and petting them while they growl and bark Go Away – in effect backing them up in their belief that the 'intruder' is an enemy. Then, having had enough, they will loudly command them to be quiet. How it is currently dealt with must be confusing for the dogs. Reinforcing them for NOT barking makes more sense.
These little dogs n eed to learn that visiting people mean good stuff – calm owners, nice treats and eventually fun, but being removed when things become too much for them. The people also need more 'guinea pigs' to the house to work with.
Because they have few visitors it's a vicious circle. The more reactive their dogs are to visitors, the less the owners feel able to involve their friends and family.
Unsurprisingly this fearful and noisy reactivity, barking Go Away, extends to people on walks – and to dogs.
I would say that old-fashioned formal dog training classes have made things worse, especially with Ben. I felt really sad to hear that, because of his barking, he had been pinned down in the middle of the hall and forced to lie there while the other owners and dogs walked around him. It's hardly surprising he believes people and dogs are bad news!
Knowledge of what makes dogs tick and how to train them positively based on scientific fact has advanced hugely over the last few years, but unfortunately a lot of existing trainers simply haven't kept up. Old-fashioned dog trainers just keep on doing what they always have done, and dog owners, in their ignorance, believe in them.
Here is fifteen-week-old Miniature Schnauzer Herbie, in his bed surrounded by toys!
His lady is a first-time dog owner and over some things she is being very sensible and over other things she has picked up mis-information. For instance, she is running him with other dogs for an hour a day when at four months old Herbie's limbs are not up to this, and she may scold him for toileting indoors – both of which I believe to be wrong. She wants to do her very best so that Herbie grows into a stable and happy companion.
Puppies can be exasperating – especially when they are grabbing clothes, biting feet or latching onto jewellery! People can feel helpless because repeated use of the word 'no' only makes matters worse, and they don't know how to stop their little terror from doing these things.
Herbie was a 'solo' puppy – he had no brothers or sisters on whom to learn bite-inhibition, so ideally his early humans should have been filling this role. It's all very well to be cross with a puppy (and those little teeth both hurt and can do quite a lot of damage to clothes), but this doesn't teach the youngster what he should be doing, especially when his antics are getting him so much attention.
Already Herbie is on sentry duty, barking at passing children and dogs from the large upstairs window, and at people coming into the house. He can be intimidated by people approaching him too directly and by being loomed over, and he may leap up and snap at a hand that is held out over him.
We have worked on basic 'dog-parenting' rules and strategies, on removing temptation for now so that it's not such hard work (why set him up to fail) – not wearing flowing clothes, boots with dangly zips, hanging neck chains and so on. A gate to pop him behind while he calms down will work wonders when he is being challenging.
Jumping up on people, flying all over furniture, barking at people walking towards him and so on are perhaps cute in a fifteen week old puppy but not so good in an adult dog, so the basics in rules and boundaries, taught by using positive reinforcement for the desired behaviour, need to be set in place immediately.
I shall be helping this lady and her lovely puppy for months to come, through the various stages of his growth.
What a cutie! Basil is only seven months old and life isn't always easy for him. Mainly, he's scared of people coming too near to him or into the house and he barks like mad. First time dog owners, they have taken advice from a so-called trainer/behaviourist who advocated things like teaching him impulse control by having him on lead, putting his food down and as soon as he goes for it to jerk him back and shout Leave It. How cruel and pointless is that! Fortunately his caring owners, who only want to do the best for him, didn't follow these instructions.
Other advice, this time from the breeder, has included using a pet-corrector when he barks both at home and on walks where he barks at people (this is punishing fear rather than getting to the root of the problem and dealing with that!). A trainer advocated forcibly controlling him on walks with a Gentle Leader not used 'gently'. Poor Basil started to run away when the lead was brought out – and no wonder. Thankfully they also abandoned this a week ago and already Basil is happier before walks. They now need to go back to the beginning and teach him to walk comfortably on a loose lead, and then work on his apprehension of approaching people.
One very good thing in Basil's life is he goes to a good doggy daycare once a week where he mixes with plenty of dogs and they are grouped according to size and temperament, so they don't need to worry about his socialising with other dogs whilst they work on his lead walking.
There is another challenge for them all. They have an autistic ten-year-old whose actions must baffle Basil. She is noisy and 'sudden' – her actions can be random. Basil barks at her also. He needs helping out.
Let's look at it from the perspective of a small dog. Large unpredictable humans approaching and looming, maybe shouting or moving suddenly, would scare any dog. We worked on his barking at myself and he calmed down surprisingly quickly. They could see by the way I moved slowly, didn't go up to him, looked away and talked calmly whilst they also quietly followed certain procedures, that Basil quite soon was happy around me and taking treats. I am sure that, dealt with right and with the pressure taken off him, with the humans around him now helping him out through understanding not force, gadgets, commands or punishment, he will become more trusting and less fearful.


text:
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Home TV TV News
November 1, 2019 10:30AM ET
Greta Thunberg Wouldn't Meet With Trump If Asked
Climate activist discusses making small changes in own life, inspiring global movement
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Greta Thunberg — 16-year-old Swedish climate change activist — dismissed meeting with President Donald Trump as pointless during an interview with Ellen DeGeneres on Ellen Friday.
Thunberg and Trump briefly crossed paths at the United Nations in September. Following Thunberg's impassioned and grave speech about climate change, Trump seemed to mock her on Twitter, writing, "She seems like a very happy young girl looking forward to a bright and wonderful future. So nice to see!"
When DeGeneres asked Thunberg if she would take the opportunity, if invited, to meet with Trump and discuss climate change with him, she cooly replied, "I don't understand why I would. I don't see what I could tell him that he hasn't already heard, and I just think it would be a waste of time, really."
Elsewhere in the interview, Thunberg spoke about first learning about climate change as a child, and then realizing that so few people in power were actually doing anything to stop it. She also explained some of the smaller things she's done in her everyday life to combat climate change, such as refusing to fly, going vegan and declining to buy new things unless she really has to.
Thunberg also spoke about watching her initial climate strike evolve into a global movement. "I would never have expected that something like that would happen," she said. "I just thought I need to do whatever I can do, and it's obviously not going to be enough, but at least it's something. I needed to, just for myself, make sure that I did whatever I could, so I could look myself in the eye in this crisis."
In This Article: Climate Change,	Donald Trump,	Ellen,	Ellen DeGeneres,	Greta Thunberg


At this upscale senior housing community in Indianapolis, Indiana, lifestyle takes center stage. Members have the freedom to choose their daily schedule of social programs, dining experiences and wellness activities while receiving the care which they require. The Stratford offers a lifestyle that is designed to ensure Members maintain important relationships with friends and family as they age. Nothing is more important to the residents' health and happiness than staying in regular, positive contact with their closest friends and family. With close proximity to Carmel and Indianapolis it's easy to visit!
The Stratford prides itself on providing a unique approach to dining. Unlike other retirement homes in Indianapolis, Indiana, The Stratford offers a restaurant approach to full-service dining with an emphasis on variety and quality of their meals. Daily specials and seemingly endless menu options are freshly crafted by our Executive Chef. Carefully selected wine, beer and spirits from our fully stocked clubhouse bar create a refreshing culinary celebration.
At this assisted living facility by Indianapolis, all of the social events and dining experiences are put together with family in mind. Joining your loved ones for an event, whether a private birthday dinner party, spending time enjoying family traditions during the holidays, or just stopping by for a quick visit with the grandkids are cherished memories.


There may be several franchise utility lines running through your yard or on other parcels. Before digging contact Texas 811 by dialing 811 from any touch tone phone, or go to the Texas One Call website at www.texas811.org. Texas 811 will locate and identify utility lines including electric, natural gas, cable television, and fiber optic communications buried in your yard. Please call two business days before digging and excavation starts.
For any private development or residential projects where excavation will be done within a Town easement or Right-of-Way, a permit is required. Contact Construction Inspection at 972.874.6309.
For any Capital Improvement (CIP) projects where excavation will be done within a Town easement or Right-of-Way, contact CIP Engineering at 972.874.6310.


Four years ago, John asked me to marry him. Would you mind indulging me in a walk down memory lane? I didn't have a wedding blog, so I'd like to document our engagement story here.
I was out of town with work for the month of August 2007, coming home on the weekends. While home for a weekend, we planned on going out for sushi at The Drunken Fish. Afterwards, we were going to a party at a friend's apartment. We finished dinner early, so we decided to take a walk around Saint Louis University's campus. The campus is between the restaurant and the friend's place, so it made logistical sense.
SLU has all sorts of fountains and statues on campus. Earlier in the week a friend told me there were some new statues by the business school of a bull and bear, similar to the one near Wall Street. John and I had been to NYC for spring break, so we thought about stopping by and seeing them.
As we walked past the clocktower, close to Cupples House, and towards the business school, we pass the pond. On the stony ledge near the water, I see candles, champagne, and roses. We walk closer to the spot, and I realize it's for us. We stop by all of the candles and John gets down on one knee. He tells me, "I love you" and all sorts of other wonderful things.
John asks me to marry him and I say, "YES!" He shows me the ring and it's beautiful.
Afterwards we proceeded to call our family and friends to share the good news. And of course we started planning the wedding within the following week.
If you were wondering, there weren't any statues and we didn't go to a party. John's friend set up the candles and display while we were at dinner. And as an excellent planner, John had timeline broken down by the minute for dinner and our trip to campus. He even had some stall tactics if dinner finished early or the set-up took longer than expected. John had also worked for campus safety while a student at SLU and cleared the whole proposal with his old boss.
I love you, John! Thank you for asking me to be your wife.
What a fun story!!! Happy engagement anniversary!
That is a beautiful story. Thank you for sharing it!
lovely proposal! thanks for sharing on this on the 4 year anniversary!


text:
Renée Stout
TALES OF THE CONJURE WOMAN
EXHIBITION SPECS
53 works. Download the checklist here.
Space Requirement:
2,500 – 3,000 sq ft
Rental Fee:
Venue pays for incoming shipping
To be carried by venue
Exhibition Signage:
Label and wall text information in digital format
Supporting Materials:
A 172-page, full color illustrated catalogue, produced by the Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art. A video also accompanies the exhibition.
Halsey Institute of Contemporary Art
October 18 – December 14, 2013
Spelman College Museum
January 25 – May 15, 2014
Wellin Museum of Art, Hamilton College
Clinton, NY
August 22 – December 20, 2015
American University Art Museum
January 23 - March 13, 2016
Kalamazoo Institute of Arts
July 23 – October 23, 2016
For more information, please contact Katie Hirsch: MccampbellKG@cofc.edu
The exhibition features recent work by Washington, DC-based Renée Stout, who is best known for her exploration of vestigial retentions of African cultural traditions as manifested in contemporary America. For many years, the artist has used the alter ego Fatima Mayfield, a fictitious herbalist/fortuneteller, as a vehicle to role-play and confront issues such as romantic relationships, social ills, or financial woes in a way that is open, creative, and humorous. The exhibition focuses on the artist's assumed role through an array of works in various media. As Stout explains, "The common thread running through bodies of my work of the past several years is the continuing need for self-discovery and the need to understand and make sense of human motives and the way we relate and respond to each other."
This video accompanies the exhibition Renée Stout: Tales of the Conjure Woman
Executive Producer: Mark Sloan
Produced by: Brady Welch
Directed by: Colin Sonner & Brady Welch
Cinematography by: Colin Sonner
Edited by: Meghan Sims
Original Score by Bill Carson
Color Correction: Evan Kultangwatana
Sound Design by: Roger Middenway
Funding for this project has been generously provided by Furthermore: a program of the J.M. Kaplan Fund. Additional support was provided by Accola Griefen Gallery in New York City, the Elizabeth Firestone Graham Foundation, Hemphill Fine Arts in Washington, D.C., and Zanatta Contemporary Art / Zanatta Editions in Shawnee, Kansas.
The catalogue includes essays by several contributors, including Mark Sloan, Director of the Halsey Institute, Andrea Barnwell Brownlee, Director of the Spelman College Museum of Fine Art, and award-winning poet/essayist Kevin Young.
Funding for this publication has been generously provided by Furthermore: a program of the J.M. Kaplan Fund. Additional support was provided by Accola Griefen Gallery in New York City, the Elizabeth Firestone Graham Foundation, Hemphill Fine Arts in Washington, D.C., and Zanatta Contemporary Art / Zanatta Editions in Shawnee, Kansas.
PULSE DOME PROJECT: ART & DESIGN BY DON ZANFAGNA
PATTERNS OF PLACE


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OnBase – Security
OnBase ECM
A Secure, Protected Environment for your Critical Information
OnBase is designed to be secure—from inception through release and beyond. Protecting your sensitive data and critical information is of paramount importance, and it's a job we take seriously.
From design through post-launch support, security is a priority at every step of the OnBase lifecycle.
@ info@twofold.co.uk
Natively Secure Platform
At Hyland, every developer and tester in the R&D department undergoes training in secure development and penetration testing practices during onboarding. As new vulnerabilities are identified and new attack vectors are discovered, their dedicated security team provides additional training to make sure you're always protected against the latest threats.
The security of each OnBase release is further ensured as the security team shepherds the product through our security-focused development process – based on principles from Microsoft's Secure Development Lifecycle (SDL) including:
Mandatory security gates
Static and dynamic analysis scans
Manual penetration testing (internal and external)
Protected at Every Data State
OnBase keeps your information secure at all times, protecting it from unauthorised access while it isn't actively being used; as it's transported between servers; and as it's used.
At rest: Data, including keyword values, can be encrypted using strong, industry-tested algorithms (AES-128 or AES-256).
In transit: Full Transport Layer Security (TLS) support protects communication of data between client and server, and an AES-128 encrypted connection can be used to render data unusable if intercepted as it's being written to the file system.
In use: Session timeouts and masked keyword values keep your data safe from prying eyes even while it's being accessed by legitimate users.
Configurable Security Options
OnBase is pre-configured to be secure—the first time you install it, right out of the box. The security is inherent, whether it's deployed on-premises or in the cloud. OnBase is also capable of integrating with other external security systems, including single sign on integrations like Active Directory (AD) and Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP).
Built-in security features include:
Strict password policies with configurable complexity, rotation, and lockout requirements
Granular rights management which limits users' access exclusively to authorised data
Security keywords that allow administrators to further restrict access based on document metadata.
In addition to strong native security, there are numerous enhanced security measures that OnBase admins can configure in their solution. OnBase has the ability to provide:
Encrypted disk groups and encrypted keywords to protect your data directly at the database and file system levels
Distributed disk services that protect your data as it's written to the file system and can act as a layer to aid in the protection against ransomware attacks.
Digital signatures to alert users to unauthorised content modification
OnBase 18
Business Content Management
Imaging, Import and Capture
Email Modules
Accreditations & Partners


Karisma Kapoor (nickname Lolo named after Hollywood actress Gina Lollobrigida) was born on 25th June, 1974 in Mumbai in renowned Kapoor family. Her parents Randhir Kapoor and Babita both were actors. She is the granddaughter of legendary actor and filmmaker Raj Kapoor and great grand daughter of Prithviraj Kapoor. She is sister of popular actress Kareena Kapoor and niece of actor directors Rishi Kapoor and Rajiv Kapoor. Karisma went to school at Cathedral and John Connon School until grade six.
Karisma was initially supposed to make her debut with Bobby Deol in Barsaat (2000). But she quit the film after the movie was delayed. She finally made her debut in D Rama Naidu's Prem Qaidi (1991) with Harish. The movie went on to become a box-office success.


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The Homians had a simple dream: escape their poisoned world by colonizing a comparatively pristine planet. Earth is an almost perfect candidate. While it is inhabited, the natives are backward and will be easy to displace. All that is required is for the world to be seeded with Homian organisms. The recorded minds of a select few Homians will then be downloaded into compatible hosts so they can prepare the Earth for its proper owners.
The plan is straightforward. Implementing it doesn't go as planned.
A Homian seed took root in Rosewater, Nigeria. An enigmatic structure grew. It's the foothold for the invasion. In the long run it's the harbinger of human doom. In the short run, it's a resource, one that crafty humans have learned to exploit. A human community has grown around the alien structure.
Rosewater has become a valuable resource; it has also become a threat to the Nigerian President. Rosewater mayor Jack Jacques demands greater autonomy. The President attempts assassination. When that fails, the President orders a mayoral election. One that will be contested by a second candidate. Jacques resists this challenge to his position. Unpleasantness ensues, and the other candidate dies. Backed into a corner, Jacques issues a unilateral declaration of independence.
A previous attempt at secession from Nigeria did not go well1. But Jacques has an ally: the alien at the heart of Rosewater, which is know to defend its territory vigorously. Nigerian forces attacking Rosewater will be blasted from the face of the Earth. Or they would if something were not seriously wrong with the alien.
Something has gone awry. Elements of the Home-forming biotech package have turned on each other. The entity at the heart of the city is dying and if it dies, so too will independent Rosewater.
The aliens have a backup plan. But something has gone wrong with that as well. Alyssa Sutcliffe has the form of a human and the mind of a Homian. She should step in to take control. She has instead vanished, as far as the Homians can tell.
Aminat and Kaaro know exactly where the missing alien can be found: in the middle of an escalating civil war.
In the aliens' defense, they have absolutely no malice towards the humans they plan to exterminate. It's hardly the aliens' fault if humans insist on living on one of the few life-bearing worlds available, especially if the humans are so undeveloped, chaotic and focused on the short term as to be easy targets. Really, it would be wrong of the Homians not to appropriate our world.
Some readers may object to a story about colonial strife in an African setting. However, Africa is doing better than North America. North America is, as established early in the book, "lost." Ah, well.
Readers may wonder why a declared idealist like Jacques and his allies are willing to ally with alien invaders whose long-term plan is to take Earth for their own. Well, that's a long-term problem and to get to the long term, one has to survive the short term. Allying with the aliens (or at least orchestrating events so the aliens are compelled to act in self-defence in ways that also protect Rosewater) may be a reasonable choice if the alternative is being bombed to smithereens by the Nigerian air force.
Not everyone agrees with Jacques' glowing assessment of himself or his methods. Just as well that Alyssa, Aminat, and Kaaro get more page time than the would-be great reformer.
There are other sympathetic characters in this book, but few of them are politicians or administrators. The powerful do not tolerate dissent. Disagreements can easily turn lethal, which means bad outcomes for the losers in the turf wars and worse outcomes for the little people caught in the crossfire.
The Earth's long-term prospects may seem dim but … perhaps the horse will learn to sing. And there are sympathetic characters who may do well in the short term.
The Rosewater Insurrection is available here (Amazon) and here (Chapters-Indigo).
1: In one of those odd coincidences, I ushered a play set during the Biafra conflict the day before reading this.


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SFS Stadium Redevelopment seeking new Construction Company
The redevelopment of the Sydney Football Stadium has been full of controversy with a massive public backlash to the development.
The development has been subject to a lot of public debate with questions as to why the NSW Government are demolishing a functioning stadium instead of upgrading the stadium at a fraction of the cost.
The approval process for the stadium was also met with backlash as the NSW Government conducted the planning assessment and approved the development as state significant development without sufficient public consultation. City of Sydney Council and Randwick Council were bypassed in the approval process despite the stadium impacting both of these Council areas.
State Significant Development is an alternative pathway for development to be approved by the State Government bypassing Council. The assessment process enables the assessment of significant projects at the State level, rather than at the local Council level ensuring that broader state significant issues are taken into account when determining the merit of the proposal rather than focusing on local issues.
Despite the backlash the stadium was demolished by Lendlease and the NSW Government is now looking for a new company to rebuild Allianz Stadium (SFS) after Lendlease walked away from the project. Multiplex and John Holland have been identified as potential candidates.
Lendlease, which has demolished the arena formerly known as Allianz Stadium, had also been locked in since December as the new stadium's constructor after beating rival builder Multiplex to the contract.
It's now understood Lendlease only signed a contract for stage one of the development, with the developer being told by the government that it needed to "cut costs" for its stage two proposal.
The total budget for knocking down and rebuilding Allianz Stadium at Moore Park is $729 million.
Lendlease did bid for stage two of the contract, the construction phase, as the government wanted the company to do the work for less than it thought feasible.
The NSW sports minister, John Sidoti, said Lendlease's stage two offer "did not meet the government's expectations so we are looking for another builder in a competitive market".
Sidoti is still promising the Sydney Football Stadium can be built on time and on budget, after inviting Multiplex and John Holland to participate in the competitive tender process to deliver stage two of the project.
"The two shortlisted parties have a wealth of experience in delivering high quality infrastructure projects," Sidoti said.
"We know that if we want to continue attracting global events we need our stadiums to be the best in the world but the NSW public expects us to negotiate the best price."
The winning bidder will be announced later this year, following the receipt of stage two planning approval and completion of the tender evaluation.
Gladys Berejiklian's government is now on the back foot with the premier saying the government had "until November" to secure another company to build the stadium, which is scheduled to be completed by 2022.
"A government needs to get the best price and the best product to make sure that we do the best thing for our citizens and if it means going through processes, then so be it."
Once complete, the new SFS will be the biggest rectangular stadium in the country and the NSW Government hopes to use the stadium as a multi purpose stadium that will allow for a broad range of uses including international music performances.
Have a chat with one of our planners today!
Getting approval for unapproved developments
Unapproved works is one of our most common jobs for Outlook Planning and Development. Read our article on what to do and how to deal with the scary letters from Council!
Subdivision of rural zoned land
We explain what to consider when planning a rural subdivision and the various costs and reports associated.
Architectural Plan Drafting now available!
Outlook Planning and Development are now offering architectural plans in addition to our normal town planning services. We are fast becoming the number one planning firm in Sydney and we are excited to add plan drafting to our services.
Thornton Developments Booming
Thornton and Chisholm has become a booming area for investors and first home buyers wanting to leave Sydney and head towards the Hunter Valley. The greater Maitland area is a booming area with plenty of land available for developers.
What can I build without Council Approval?
We explain what types of development you can do without any Council approval for everyone doing their home renovations. Read all about exempt development and what you can build this weekend after a trip to Bunnings to get your DIY tools.
Complying Development Certificates
Want to build a house or renovate but don't want the hassle of a development application. You might be able to get approval through a private certifier. We take some time to explain what a complying development is and the steps you need to take to obtain a CDC through a private certifier.
Preliminary Planning Assessment – Feasibility Reports
Are you looking at determining what you can do for your property? A Preliminary Planning Assessment can help you determine what your development options are for your site.
Guide to Heritage Impact Statements
Heritage Impact Statements are essential for any development involving a heritage item or heritage conservation area. We go into some of the basics of what makes up a heritage impact statement and who should be preparing them for your development.
How To Write a Development Application Objection Letter
Have you received a notification in the mail about a development application and want to write a submission. We outline some steps to help you prepare a development application objection letter.
Western Sydney Airport Terminal Unveiled
The first concept designs for Western Sydney Airport Terminal have been unveiled.
New Generation Boarding Houses
New generation boarding houses have a lot of negativity at the moment with developers obtaining approvals for large scale boarding house developments. So what exactly is a new generation boarding house?
Northern Beaches Dual Occupancy for beginners
Northern Beaches Town Planners explain Dual occupancy facts on the Northern Beaches including Pittwater, Warringah and Manly. We provide some information on dual occupancy developments on the Northern Beaches of Sydney. Where you should be looking and what you should be considering.
Reducing Car Parking in CBDs
We explore the theory that as the amount of parking decreases, the appeal of driving gives way to more environmentally friendly transport modes such as walking, cycling, ride-hailing, car pooling and public transport.
Some evidence suggests reducing or capping parking pays off. In cities that have implemented these measures, driving has declined and public transport use has increased.
SFS Stadium Redevelopment seeks new construction company
University of Newcastle Expanding with Honeysuckle Campus
The University of Newcastle has recently submitted a seven building masterplan to the NSW Government for their new education precinct for Honeysuckle in Newcastle.
Objection to Boutique Hotel in Redfern
Outlook Planning and Development were engaged by a group of concerned residents in regards to a nearby development that sought consent to demolish an existing (abandoned) service station to a boutique hotel with 58 guest rooms, car lift and guest facilities.
Windale Rezoning – Planning Proposal
A change of land zoning proposed by Lake Macquarie council would open the door for medium-density housing in a large part of Windale.
What you need to know before building a granny flat!
Granny flats, or secondary dwellings as they are known as in the Planning world, can allow home owners to keep parents or adult children close by while giving them their own space. They can also be a great way to generate additional rental income.
Property Development Spotlight: Beresfield
History and Context Beresfield and Tarro are often described as twin towns. The district remained rural until the 1920's when it was divided and offered
Rethinking Sydney – Greater Newcastle and the development potential
Background and Context With Sydney ranking as one of the most expensive cities in the world, it is no wonder why so many savvy property
Statement of Environmental Effects
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The first in mam!records Clouds series, [praw]'s They Cast Shadows sets you up for a lot, but it may be misleading. The opening beats give way shortly to ambient soundscapes, flowing like clouds through your dreams.
Originally released 2 July 2008, mam028 is now offered in lossless formats for the first time via Project: mam!restoration.


Live a Long Life - Wouldn't You Rather Live to One Hundred?
Live a Long Life - You Deserve It!
You have the right to a long life but if you smoke your chances of having this are slim.
On August 21st 2014 my Dad died from emphysema - he was 78 years old. Dad was diagnosed eight years ago and has struggled to breathe for most of those eight years. My Mum is now alone and has spent most of the last eight years taking care of Dad when instead, they should have been enjoying their retirement.
As a nurse working in the aged care sector I have residents in my care who are celebrating their 90 - 100th birthdays. They are still having fun - their families take them out for picnics in the park with their great grand kids and apart from some aches and pains in the joints life is still good and it's a great long life!.
But - guess what? - they didn't smoke.
I have people in my care that did smoke and most of them are bed-ridden and on oxygen therapy 24 hours a day and they are a good 20 years younger. They are often battling more than one illness because some lung diseases can lead to problems such as pulmonary hypertension.
The smokers are few though because most of them don't make it to a residential care facility because they died too young. I know that some of you are saying that you know some smokers that are still smoking and they are in their 90's. It is SO rare!
Are you going to take the risk and bet everything on being one of the very very few that make it to 90 still smoking?
Recently a friend's father died at the age of 80 and he was still smoking. My friend bragged that his father had lived a great long life while still enjoying the thing he loved most - a cigarette. What the ..?
One of my very dear friends is 100 years old and enjoying life to the full. She is a vibrant witty, funny lady and she has a few aches that can be taken care of with mild pain killers. She didn't smoke and when I told her about my friend's father dying at the age of 80 she was sad to think that he missed out on another 20 years of his life. He was also living with a constant cough, a wheeze, he couldn't walk very far and he didn't appear to be "enjoying" life very much at all!
The choice you make now about smoking can potentially increase not only the length of your life but also the quality of the last years of your life. You don't know what the future holds for you but why would you choose a path of destruction? Why would you not want to give yourself the best chance of a happy, comfortable and long life?
I get so angry when I hear smokers say things like "I'm here for a good time not a long time" or "You've got to die of something"
I will answer the first comment with "why not be here for a good time and a long time because it is possible to have a good time without puffing on a cigarette - millions of people around the world don't smoke."
To the second comment I say "Why not die of old age if you've got to die of something?"
Why not go for a Guinness Book of Records title and live the longest life possible?
Gaining Weight when they quit smoking - help is here.
Return from "Long Life" to "How to Quit Smoking"


The resume has become the number one requirement employers request. Regardless, of what you are applying for, the resume is the go-to tool for employers to analyze their potential candidates. Colleges and Universities throughout the nation have provided resume-building classes for their students. As a training facility, we educate our students on how to properly update their resume. We go the extra mile to ensure that you have an up-to-date resume including professional advice on what to add to your resume.
Why should I have an updated resume?
Does your resume stand out from the rest? Does it sell your skills to the best of your ability? You may think that being able to communicate with an employer face-to-face is your strong suit. While it is a confidence necessary for job interviews, the resume is the first impression a company receives of you. A poorly written resume, even if person, can result in being passed for the job. There are instances where employers and Human Resource departments will discard a poorly written resume. It is the first impression you provide an employer before you are given the opportunity to come in for an interview.
A resume's purpose is a summary of your skills and your capabilities. Your resume is an extension of what you are capable of bringing to the company you are applying for. A well-prepared resume will help you rise above the competition. According to most resume experts, the employer will quickly understand what advantages you offer to the company at first glimpse of a resume. The skills that you place on a resume indicate your potential while the benefits demonstrate your actual accomplishments. Even if you don't have experience or accomplishments, a solid resume can give you the food in the door that you need to move forward.
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We offer weekly services where you can receive an updated resume within 3 to 7 business days. You can submit your resume to our academy or visit us in person to have your resume reviewed. We've helped thousands of students find their best skills and as a result, have been employed by our tips. In addition, we have attended workshops at Rutgers University, Saint Peters' University, and other major Universities, to guide graduate level students with their resumes.
Our teams of experts will provide you with the professional assistance you need to for further questions on how you can improve your resume, you can call our academy at (844) 372-2233 or email us at info@esacademy-usa.com.


Discussion in 'Community' started by WinterMute, Feb 4, 2003.
It's pre-emptive non-aggression, bomb Iraq.
I've been laughing like a demented fool for the past 10 minutes!
did you come up with it you're self ?
geee, which article and in what paper did you find this? oh you wrote it, that would mean that it is not a Current Event. It's not that hard to post in the right forums is it?
It's not difficult to get the wrong end of the stick either, is it?
i thought it was hilarious...i got it in an email, so no medea he didnt write it.
if you dont like it, dont just get snappy.