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Titanic (1997) Review
By Matt Paprocki September 11, 20121 Comment
Marketing departments love romance. James Cameron knows this, so he pitched his uber-expensive retelling of the Titanic disaster as a love story, and the execs ate it up. Two hundred million dollars crafted colossal interiors, sinking sets, miniatures, full scale replicas, all for the sake of realism. Then Cameron added fake people who were never on the boat.
The base logic goes something like this: The people who lived or died are either not interesting enough or unworthy of the screen, so audiences need insufferable villains and 90-minutes of class warfare to sell the tragic nature of the event pre-iceberg. It's terribly illogical, and audiences would grasp how idiotic the idea was when the concept was replicated for Pearl Harbor a few years later. Movie audiences are smarter than we give them credit for once they learn their lesson.
Titanic is and always will be a marvel. The sense of enormous scale, the crippling emotional body count, and unimaginable destruction is unreachable in terms of fictional storytelling. This event happened, and for all of the jokes about how someone knows how it will end, it does end. It ends after a solid hour of complete immersion in a historical context that makes it merciful to watch, not experience first hand.
All of those characters, including a revolting Billy Zane who kidnaps children to get his way (as if his wife-beating, wife shooting, and criminal set ups weren't enough) are merely there to lead this story through. In many ways, they feel like storytellers. The scene in which Rose (Kate Winslet) stops a desperate escape to speak with a mourning designer Thomas Andrews (Victor Garber) has those sensibilities. It's insight into the mind of the person who feels responsible. Those scenes legitimize what is, in reality, a dopey romance with actors still a few years from their prime.
In some way, the script expects the viewer to care about Rose and her new found love Jack (Leonardo DiCaprio) as people leap to their death, drown, freeze, and fall while hitting propellers. Characters are not strong so much as they are forced, and it remains Titanic's grand downfall. We should care because Rose wants to break free from her stuffy, spoiled lifestyle in first class. We should like Jack because he's seen the world, scrounged, and survived. "Should" is the key word.
They're not unlikeable, just useless ancillary edition to a cast nearing 3,000 people. Rose is far more interesting in her framework as an elder reciting her story to a group of hopeful Titanic treasure hunters. Through this, you feel Cameron's own enthusiasm that would only blossom as time passed. Narrative framing is smart too, dropping exposition to get it out of the way naturally so when the inevitable collision happens, the focus is all disaster.
The sea faring nightmare itself trumps just about any other put to screen, fictional or otherwise. As awe-inspiring as it may be to see John Cusak or Bruce Willis save the day from dead civilizations or asteroids, Titanic isn't dumb enough to oversell itself. Each progression of the sinking is signaled with a more alarming sign, increased panic, and world class sound design. The ship at times seems to be mourning its own demise as it creaks and bows under pressure. As such, even if the stilted romance has lose you, a shattering, dying vessel and those souls taken with it have the ability to draw the real emotions.
Technology, in a variety of types, rules James Cameron's life if his public appearances are anything to consider. In steps this Blu-ray, likely created with the top tier of materials and exquisite resolution, and probably a few buzzwords marketing will love. Whatever the case may be, it looks phenomenal.
Somewhat ironically, the only thing marring this feature is technology. Those now vintage (a scary word when applied to a 15-year gap) computer effects cast a glow that reveals their source is less than modern. Robotic animations are impossible to miss during digital ship pans, and black levels will waver when digital effects are necessary. In many ways, you can say this source is so pristine, these elements stick out only because they can. It's not technology so much as it is two conflicting generations of progress.
Paramount manages to squeeze the entire movie in a 2.35:1 ratio on a single disc, two if you're viewing the 3D version at 1.77:1. For 2D, that extra disc isn't needed, and the encode is impressive when you consider length. The video itself -sans audio- is gifted 33GB of space, a bit over 10GB an hour. Grain is preserved with a keen eye towards keeping it a background element, preserving texture. Spikes are noticeable only when put against the haze of smoke during dining or party sessions, and bit rates rise to compensate. Whether that boost in available space hides their flaws is something else all together.
Tremendous fine detail is on display across the breadth of the film, close-ups consistently dazzling in their ability to refine facial texture. Depth is afforded a range that the best of Hollywood can produce, great blacks and bright contrast mixing with the detail to craft a catalog title worthy of sitting alongside today's high-end features. There is one shot – one single shot – that displays anything below the level of film, and it's a zoom of Rose as she is seated for lunch. For whatever reason, the images muddies, grain is removed, and noise reduction has been applied in dramatic quantities. That shot is less than 15-seconds.
Color timing changes are almost an inevitable occurrence with the tools available. Nothing egregious seems to have been done to Titanic, just minor tweaks, saturation, and a slight teal push. It's mostly insignificant in the face of everything else this disc is doing right. All is being sourced from a pristine print that doesn't display any damage or anomalies. Whether or not memories are fuzzy and as cliché as it may be, Titanic almost certainly looks more striking here than it did during those long months of exhibitions back in '97 and '98.
You're not listening to Titanic for anything prior to the iceberg collision. Admit it, you know it's true. If that's your prerogative, skipping right to the later chapters, you're actually missing out on some showcase moments this DTS-HD mix will pump out generously. Engines firing up are awe-inspiring in their simulated size, crowds cheering the ill-fated voyagers are spread wide into the surrounds, and splashing water or wind will focus its attention into the spaced channels.
Then, the ship begins to meet its fate, the collision signaling an outrageously effective display of rushing water, popping electricity, panicked passengers, and a creaking boat. The latter is arguably the most impressive display of heft, hitting the LFE in protest to the incoming water. It's an element that makes Roses' journey through the underbelly to rescue Jack so effective. Walls are closing in without any needed visual element.
Smokestacks slam into the water as the hull splinters, a gruesome feeling knowing people were under it. Cracking in half, the ship puts up a fight, with wood snapping through the surrounds until the back half settles into the water with a mighty blow. Nothing here should disappoint, if only because it never lets up. Not an element is missed and nothing is out of balance. It's a film worth cranking a few notches higher to help set additional scale. Titanic is more effective when pushed through at high volume.
Three commentaries are available on the first disc, all of them recorded in 2005. James Cameron goes solo, cast and crew chat it up on the second, while a historical perspective is given from Don Lynch & Ken Marshall.
Disc two fires off with documentaries, the first of which carries the title Reflections on Titanic. You'll spend an hour on this fun look back, although a lot of it is general praise without much substance. What's great here is The Final Word, where James Cameron and Titanic historians set out to recreate the disaster to decipher exactly how it went down . Much debating ensues over 90-minutes.
Deleted scenes are fully completed, running for an hour with an optional commentary. A section on the disc labeled production covers general behind-the-scenes material, construction, Cameron's deep dive to the site, videomatics, and a video shot by the crew. Archives houses the marketing side along with Celine Dion's overplayed music video and parodies.
Full disclosure: This Blu-ray was provided to us for review. This has not affected the editorial process. For more information on how we handle review material, please visit our about us page to learn more.
Something bad might happen to this boat @ 26:37
Sunset @ 56:44
Iconic @ 1:21:26
Tags •Bill PaxtonBilly ZaneBlu-RayJames CameronKate Winsletkathy batesLeonardo DiCaprioparamounttitanicvictor garber


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Ford recalls nearly 1.5 million F-150 pickups that can downshift without warning
There are reports of five accidents
The recall covers 1.48 million Ford F-150 trucks from the 2011 through 2013 model years with six-speed automatic transmissions. (Source: Ford Motor Company)
By Ed Payne | February 13, 2019 at 11:26 AM EST - Updated February 13 at 3:01 PM
(Gray News) – Ford is recalling almost 1.5 million pickup trucks in the United States and Canada because the transmissions can suddenly downshift.
"Depending on vehicle speed, a downshift to first gear without warning could result in a loss of vehicle control, increasing the risk of a crash," Ford said in a statement.
"Ford is aware of five reports of accidents, including one report of 'whiplash' potentially related to this condition."
The recall covers 1.48 million F-150 trucks – approximately 1.26 million in the U.S. and federalized territories and approximately 221,000 in Canada – from the 2011 through 2013 model years with six-speed automatic transmissions.
Dealers will update the powertrain control software to fix the problem. Owners will be notified by mail starting March 4, the Associated Press reported.
Ford's F-Series pickup is the top-selling vehicle in the U.S.
Oscar Mayer to list Wienermobile on Airbnb for overnight stays
Oscar Mayer is renting out its iconic Wienermobile on Airbnb for three nights in August.
13-year-old in serious condition after being shot at Wilmington apartment complex, police say
A 13-year-old is in serious condition after being shot at a Wilmington apartment complex Wednesday afternoon.
Clint Bullock
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Islamic State demands Christians, Jews submit, convert or face death
Leigh Pritchett
Africa, Latest News, Persecuted Church
Mozambique is No. 41 on Open Doors' 2022 World Watch List of places most difficult to be a Christian.
MAPUTO, Mozambique — Christians and Jews in the Cabo Delgado Province of Mozambique have been threatened with death if they do not convert to Islam or pay a jizya tax, levied on non-Muslim subjects of a state governed by Islamic law.
In a letter written in Swahili, the Islamic State Mozambique (ISM; also known in that area as al Shabaab) not only makes these demands of Christians and Jews, but also threatens moderate Muslims with death if they do not join the ISM cause, reported the relief group Barnabas Fund.
Paying the jizya tax, Barnabas Fund stated, would show submission to the Islamic caliphate.
In October, Islamic extremists staged numerous attacks in northern Mozambique, killing more than 20 Christians. In addition, they raped females and abducted boys to make them child soldiers.
ISM assailants often decapitate individuals during raids, Barnabas Fund reported.
Because of the level of violence in Cabo Delgado, the area has become known as "the land of fear."
Militants murder 43 Nigerian Christians
ABUJA, Nigeria — Militants killed at least 43 Christians in Nigeria, as ongoing violence has prompted thousands to gather together
Belarus officials threaten pastor, congregants with prosecution
MINSK, Belarus — The pastor and members of New Life Pentecostal Church in Minsk have been threatened with administrative and
Christian man sentenced, fined for 'undermining' faith of Muslims
AIN-DEFLA PROVINCE, Algeria — An Algerian court sentenced and fined a Christian man July 8 for allegedly accepting unauthorized donations
Pakistani Christians face charges for studying Bible in public park
LAHORE, Pakistan — Two Christians face blasphemy charges for studying the Bible in a park on Feb. 13. Haroon Ayub


Will the Pelicans regret not trading AD before the deadline? Is it fair for the NBA to force them to play a guy they desperately need to stay healthy till he's traded this off-season? I'm conflicted.
I doubt it, because Boston will give them the best offer they're likely to get this offseason, or another team will pony up big time to match. If New York wins the lottery, that pick will absolutely be on the table.
And what happens if he gets injured? Or announces that he won't resign with the Celtics and/or anyone but the Lakers if traded?
Well, the former is obviously a risk. As for the latter, we've seen multiple times now that teams will take a chance on changing a guy's mind. Not only that, but we've seen it pay off with Paul George.
I think he should have to play if we were around the midpoint of the season, but NO has less than 25 games left and everyone knows he won't be back, so they should be allowed to rest him, but they should also compensate season ticket holders.
As far as regretting not trading him goes, I lean towards no. LA's offer was high volume, but low quality. Ball and Ingram are just going to be average NBA players. Kuzma is the best piece in the deal, and I think his ceiling is making one or two All-Star teams if other players have a down year. Boston has more to offer as noted above, including the shot at a franchise player (Tatum), and the Knicks might have the top pick. Would you trade the rights to Zion if AD agrees to sign long term with the Knicks?
I just don't see how it ends up being the Celtics, on account of the fact that there has been *such* strong signalling from Davis' camp that it has to be LA. With all that's been said by Davis' dad and the whole feel you get, I just don't see how you can go all in with a mega offer if you're Boston. I don't believe it. So I think it'll end up with Lakers. Unless there is something to the Knicks having a chance somehow, with a high pick and the room to sign two max level free agents this summer. But I would imagine The Lakers seem like the preferred option for Davis, with LeBron already there.
Generally I find it a shame he wasn't traded already because taht would have made the Lakers an interesting team for the remainder of this season, a dark horse contender, in the way that they are not now with this young core.
True, but that's not in the Pelican's interest. At worst they'll get roughly the same offer from the Lakers in the summer, and then they'd actually be bidding against other teams so the offer could go up. The only way it's a bad decision is if AD gets hurt.
Lakers pick will also be a lot better this summer without Davis on the team the rest of the season. There's a good chance they miss the playoffs. That absolutely would not have been the case with AD on the team. At best, they're looking at the seven or eight seed as currently constructed.
As far as regretting not trading him goes, I lean towards no. LA's offer was high volume, but low quality. Ball and Ingram are just going to be average NBA players. Kuzma is the best piece in the deal, and I think his ceiling is making one or two All-Star teams if other players have a down year.
Eh, D'Angelo Russell made All-Star after being traded from the Lakers. Not sure what his trajectory was before he was traded, but I think it shows that teams can turn players around. Its not like they haven't shown flashes of potential at all.
I do agree with you though, none of the players are an appealing asset now. Teams might gamble on one of them but it is a bit much to expect NO to gamble on all three of them.
Why would the pick be a lot better? They will participate in the lottery if they miss the playoffs, but it doesn't mean they are guaranteed to win the lottery, and will likely get a pick in the middle as opposed to getting a pick in the late middle if they made playoffs. They are likely out of the top 10 and bottom 10 regardless.
Also, I mentioned it before, but NO seems to be injury prone in general. Not sure if it is just bad luck or if there are other factors leading to it.
It's a thing. Apparently the Bensons, who also own the Saints, have shortchanged the Pelicans in favor of the football operation. They even kept a team doctor who'd been working with both teams, after the Saints fired him for screwing up the diagnosis on a player.
It's a thing. Apparently the Bensons, who also own the Saints, have shortchanged the Pelicans in favor of the football operation.
That's pretty horrid. I guess you can kind of justify the concept of corporate synergy, although it has become apparent now that specialist knowledge is required, but why would you let a doctor who has been dismissed from one role stay in the other? Do they think he has basketball expertise or what?
Because if you add Anthony Davis to the Lakers that team wins a lot more games to close out the season than they probably will without him, and thus their pick, for the purposes of trade, will be better. Yeah, they probably won't win the lottery, but they'd almost certainly have no chance of being in the lottery at all if Davis was there. Maybe the pick is only four or five spots better than it might have been with Davis on the Lakers, but that's not insignificant.
Yeah, but "not insignificant" is not "a lot better". I know the Cavs got a top pick that way, but the odds are really low.
Pels may be screwed. Davis went out with what looks like a shoulder injury. Not seeing an update on twitter yet.
Unless it's so serious that it would carry over well into next year, I wouldn't be too worried if I were them. Lot of time between now and the tipoff of the 19/20 season.
Blazers added Kantor which is intriguing. So that plus Rodney Hood and beat the W's last night which sure feels good.
Will Erdogan send assassins to Portland?
Would you trade the rights to Zion if AD agrees to sign long term with the Knicks?
I don't even free agents the Knicks could potentially land if they did that, but if its just AD and like...Kyrie, then i'd pass and vote to rebuild with young talent.
What I was saying is that I seriously question whether that Boston offer will actually be on the table give all the signalling and clear intentions by Davis' camp that he simply will not want to stay there. From what we know now, he will not extend and would thus be a rental. In my estimation, this puts Boston out of the camp of suitors for Davis given what we currently know. He seems to specifically not want to go there, which is odd to me because that could be a phenomenal team with him there and a contender for years to come.
So given that, it comes down to the Lakers again, in the summer. The Knicks can't trade for him, because they have nothing left to trade, they already tried to trade Porzingis and NO didn't want that. So it seems everything signals that he still goes to LA in the summer. Unless I'm missing out on some serious suitors.
Yeah to me if AD is signaling he only wants to play for the Lakers (or these 3 teams that are not Boston) then Boston can't offer Tatum. You can't give up 5 years of Tatum on a rookie deal for what's likely 1 year of AD. If AD doesn't re-sign that's a travesty for Boston. And you can't bet a blue chipper like Tatum on "maybe we'll convince him".
The main difference between this and the Oladipo for George trade because OKC had nothing to lose in that deal. Oladipo flat didn't fit next to Westbrook. He didn't have a future in OKC. Might as well use him to get a high level all-star on the final year of his contract and try to convince him to stay.
So if the possibility of Tatum is not included in future offers suddenly the Lakers deal is looking pretty good. But there's no guarantee the Lakers will offer as much as they did as the trade deadline because now it's now getting only 1 year of AD vs. 1.5 years. 1 accelerated Lebron + AD playoff run vs. 2. I think their offer only goes down from here.
Pels had a choice at the deadline between the Lakers offer and Door #2 and they opted for the latter. Not an indefensible choice but risky especially with AD murdering their leverage. I think now their best hope to beat that Lakers offer is a third team coming in, like Milwaukee or someone who is just flat like "we're going for it."
ETA: And now the Pels GM Demps has been fired. Yikes. Looks like the Pels are in pure "get what you can for him" mode.


"Mass starvation stalking Africans." This newspaper headline not only sets the context of my field work which took place at the tail end of the country's worst drought in living memory; the headline also embodies a set of assumptions about the inability of Africans to effectively manage their resources. The thesis challenges the assumptions of African small-holder incompetence by detailing the complexity of local knowledge and management practices with respect to woodland resources in Zimbabwe. The thesis also locates local practices in their wider historical and political context in order to understand the forces that support and erode local control over resources. After setting up this problematic, I describe the research process, main research questions and introduce Common Property theory.
In this chapter I establish the wider national and regional context in which social processes in the study area (Gudyanga) can be understood. Historical events and processes that have played a role in shaping local identity are reviewed. Following this, the chapter looks at the role of the colonial and post-colonial states in shaping local land management practices. National legislation affecting tree use in the Communal Areas, formerly the African Reserves, is reviewed.
In this chapter I present a more detailed picture of the study site itself. Here we see in greater detail where Gudyanga fits within the broader social context outlined in the previous chapter. This specificity enables me to better understand the nature of resource management practices and institutions, the subject of the next chapter. The chapter begins with a description of the resource base and economic practices in the study area then reviews relations between local peoples and state agencies overseeing local administration and development activities. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the local social undercurrents which inform public discourse and, ultimately, resource use and management.
In this chapter I present an overview of tree use practices in Gudyanga. The first objective of this chapter is to detail the very important role trees play in the daily lives of people who reside in the study area. In fact, much can be learned about everyday life through an examination of tree use. The second objective of this chapter is to discuss the nature of management practices and institutions that regulated access to and use of trees in the study area. Here I will be largely descriptive. Discussion of how local management processes can be situated within a political economy of control over resources is reserved for chapter five.
An informal sense of reasonable use was central in structuring household use of trees and tended to limit wasteful practices.
An absence of clear tenure boundaries was found with respect to the daily gathering of household wood and other woodland products.
Vested interests in land were in a vague and uneasy balance whereby individual households, traditional leaders and state agencies all exerted a measure of control over how local woodlands were used.
Woodlands were an integral part of a larger land management system centred on arable land in which users were in theory not permitted to transfer use rights to outsiders.
To speak of a woodlands management system in itself is therefore misleading. There were woodlands management practices but these do not constitute a separate management system set apart from the management of other resources. A key feature of woodlands management in Gudyanga was the regulation of relative proportions of land held communally, principally woodlands, and land effectively held by households, principally fields and homesites.
2) the marked expansion of those administrative powers in the colonial period.
Contrary to the view that the commons aspects of local woodlands management in the current era are an "invention of tradition" I argue they are a response to the changing political economy of the colonial state — the changes in land management can be seen as an indigenous response to land alienation in the early colonial period. The thesis also addresses an important contradiction within the term "common property" – the word "common" implying an inclusive interest and the word "property" an exclusive interest. Corporate or exclusive control of land was only exercised with respect to arable and residential land and even this was not "ownership" as such. Woodlands management in the study area resembled Gluckman's observation that Rotse law specified "not so much the rights of persons over things as the duties between persons in respect of things." I conclude that while woodlands in Gudyanga were clearly managed as a commons, they were not held as property.
In the colonial era a negative view of indigenous land management strategies served to justify European expulsion of Africans from the land and the liquidation of woodlands and forest to meet the needs of the settler economy. The alarm over land degradation in the Communal Lands continues to be a basis for crisis management (ie. short term, interventionist solutions) in the present. Here I review two national land-use planning assumptions that serve to prevent the realization of local control over land management: 1) the assumption that each resource type (woodland, woodlot, arable, irrigated, grazing, residential) be spatially segregated and subject to only one land use; 2) the static, macro-ecological model of Natural Regions which is used as a basis for determining land-use capability. Fully 74% of the land in the Communal Areas is classified as "not suitable for crop production" and yet people survive in these regions, in part, through the maintenance of multiple and overlapping tenure principles that provide for multiple use of resources.
I conclude the thesis by asserting that the true "tragedy of the commons" has been the history of the (post)colonial state dismantling the complex of commons systems on which rural Africans depend.


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Adhesives&Polymers Industry News
Covestro breaks ground on new production line for polycarbonate films in Thailand
Covestro has started to build up a new manufacturing line for polycarbonate films at Map Ta Phut Industrial Estate, Thailand. With this new capacity, the company will serve the fast growing demand in Asia Pacific and strengthen its own position as a market leader. The project is the first step of a global capacity increase for Covestro´s film production. The total investment of more than EUR 100 million also includes an expansion of the associated infrastructure and logistics.
"Our existing films plant in Map Ta Phut has been a high-performing and valued facility," said Dr. Thorsten Dreier, Global Head of Covestro´s Specialty Films Business, at the ground-breaking ceremony. "Our main objective with this expansion is to intensify our collaboration with customers in Asia Pacific, in particular, to improve efficiency and punctual delivery. With market-focused innovations and a stronger customer orientation we want to drive growth for Covestro."
Thorsten Dreier added, "This is an excellent strategic fit, enabling fastest time-to-market, but also broadening our market access in Asia. Not least, we have highly-skilled employees at our existing plant, which will also ensure the success of the new project," added Thorsten Dreier.
The existing films facility started operations in January 2007 and produces Makrofol® polycarbonate and Bayfol® polycarbonate blend films, which are used in industry sectors such as security and ID cards, automotive, medical, as well as electrical and electronics. It produces a selection of grades, including new optical grades, and the new facility is designed to extend the range of products in response to market demand.
About Covestro:
With 2017 sales of EUR 14.1 billion, Covestro is among the world's largest polymer companies. Business activities are focused on the manufacture of high-tech polymer materials and the development of innovative solutions for products used in many areas of daily life. The main segments served are the automotive, construction, wood processing and furniture, and electrical and electronics industries. Other sectors include sports and leisure, cosmetics, health and the chemical industry itself. Covestro has 30 production sites worldwide and employs approximately 16,200 people (calculated as full-time equivalents) at the end of 2017.
← Axalta's Patented Fast Cure Low Energy Technology Redefines What is Possible in Vehicle Refinishing in Europe, the Middle East and Africa
Polyaniline coated core-shell polyacrylates for corrosion protection →
Clariant Additive Masterbatch Makes Black Plastic Packaging "Visible" to Sorting Systems
Covestro to deliver first ever order of polyurethane resin for wind blades
Mitsui Chemicals to Increase Production Capacity for TAFMER™ High-Performance Elastomers


The Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, Dr. Katherine Zappone has today launched the new website of Kilkenny County Childcare Committee.
During her visit to the offices of Kilkenny County Childcare Committee, Minister Zappone met with the Board of Directors, manager, and staff team to discuss key issues of relevance the Early Childhood Care and Education sector in Kilkenny City and County. The committee showcased and discussed some of their work in supporting services and parents across the county. The Minister also met with the chairperson, director and staff team of Kilkenny Education Centre, in addition to the staff from other agencies who are located in the centre along with the county childcare committee. A presentation of 'Starting School' a collaborative publication by the Education Centre and the County Childcare Committee was given to Minister Zappone.


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Every business needs to have money for carrying out operational activities. Since the field of business is unpredictable; a business should always have a pool of money. To save more money, the business should cut down the operation costs. A business should combine its resources to save more money. Businesses which have already combined their resources can acquire things at reduced prices. The following are the four best methods of combining resources to save money.
The best way of saving more money, is to reduce salaries. In a business, salaries and wages are huge expenditures. Many businesses also possess an excess number of employees. To avoid having excess employees and reduce the salary bills, a business should only hire the right number of employees. The business can also consider training the members of staff so that they will be able to carry out more tasks. The successful businesses do not hire new employees but assign the responsibilities of the employees who have been fired or retired to other employees. Instead of hiring other employees, the business should look for some interns. Interns who are willing to work without salary will enable the business to reduce the salaries and wages bills. Click here to learn more.
Second, a business should link with other businesses. Businesses which offer the same goods are advised to link together and order for commodities as a group. When the businesses link together, they are able to negotiate on prices better. In case you want to identify more benefits of bulk buying, please visit this site. A business should link with the highly reputable businesses only.
Sharing the premises is another effective method a business should use to save money. A business should avoid paying for the unused places. Examples of unused spaces are meeting rooms and boardrooms. A boardroom and a meeting room are only put into use when there is a meeting, therefore, sharing it is a good idea. Electricity and HVAC expenses are also supposed to be shared among the organizations therefore, the business will not pay these bills throughout the year. In case you want to see more ways of sharing premises, click here.
The fourth method a business should use to save money is to combine the technology. Technology integration will enable the business to synchronize, automate and connect all the applications and processes so that the business will not hire people to do updates manually. Automatic updating is also free from human errors which may lead to higher operating costs. The employees who could have carried out the manual update will carry out other tasks. For example, a business can visit this website to see an example of an application integration platform.


There's moments when you finally come to acceptance with your life's course. Those moments when you totally embrace your reality. When you are ok with whatever happens next. When you receive the life you are given, when you love it, when you actually live it.
Not all that you wish, though, is what you need.
And when you come to acceptance with that, that's when you find tranquility.
A couple of months ago, I experienced a strong sense of tranquility for the life I lead. A sense of belonging to the universe and this feeling intensifies mostly when I travel, when I am in the air and I see the tiny colored places (from the airplane, I mean). It's in those moments, when there is no music in the background, when there is no other distraction, that you clearly see who you are and that shows you that you Must live more. Love more, experience life more. But that's only in the air. When I land, I "Get back on Earth.", reality kicks in, and that "thing" felt when living in the clouds fades in. And tranquility is lost once again.
How to achieve that sensation that life is wonderful and start living it and stop being so linked to perfectionism? … What do I even mean by that?
I am extremely perfectionist. I rarely say, write, create, express something if I do not make it sound perfect, if it does not sound perfectly into an idea, in a thought, making a reason, a meaning. I want to write, and I wish to write and to create and to expand and to go beyond, but I stop myself for fear I am not enough of a person that I want to be, a creative writer, a storyteller, an illustrator of the mind. Or what I want to become.
"Perfect imperfections" sang John Legend.
Most of that need and strive for perfectionism comes from seeing other people, other creations, other products, other services being made so beautiful, presented in such a wonderful way, in such a creative, innovative way. I want that creativity, that sparkle, that perfection. I desire for producing art, meaningful things, I do not know what, do not ask me that, however I am in an endeavor and strong need for producing something worthwhile. I do not know if this is like a creativity crisis or something, and I totally feel there are extraordinary people out there, creating and making the best out of nothing, which is making me seeing that in an even more perfectionism manner, which in turn, makes me even more prone to thinking on what can I do to achieve that feeling, to create in others the same feeling I experience when I notice art, creation, innovation, beauty.
But no, I want it all. And that, truly is perfectionism. It goes beyond ambition.


Bell Helicopter, May 20, 2014 - GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Bell Helicopter, a Textron Inc. company, announced the delivery of a Bell 429 helicopter for operation by Heli-Alps, a Swiss-based company offering corporate transport, sightseeing tours and aerial photography.
This is the first Bell 429 to be configured for VIP transport in Switzerland and was customized at the Bell Helicopter facility in Prague.
Serving a company with multiple mission requirements, the Bell 429's flight capacity, comfortable seating, luxurious interior and economical light twin engine all helped drive Heli-Alps' choice of a Bell helicopter. Additional equipment such as the Cineflex Camera and Heli-Ski with utility basket will give Heli-Alps additional capabilities and performance to meet their customer needs in their daily operations.
The Bell 429 offers exceptional flight performance with a fully integrated glass cockpit, advanced drive system and best-in-class Wide Area Augmentation System navigation and Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) capability. Additional safety features include a collective mounted throttle, damage tolerant hub and rotor system, and energy attenuating seats. It is the first helicopter certified through the MSG-3 process, resulting in reduced maintenance costs for operators. The buyer will take advantage of the Bell 429's spacious cabin and extra large 60 inch side doors, as well as IFR capability certified for single or dual pilot operations to better fulfill their missions.


text:
Previous / Race of my life: James Hunt on the 1975 Dutch GP Next / Kimi Raikkonen's top 10 F1 races ranked: Japanese GP, Belgian GP and more
Kimi Raikkonen to retire from Formula 1 at end of 2021 season
Kimi Raikkonen has announced he will retire from Formula 1 at the end of the 2021 season.
The 2007 F1 world champion, Raikkonen was out of contract with Alfa Romeo at the end of the year and widely expected to leave the team.
The Finn has now confirmed he will be leaving F1 at the end of the season, calling time on a career in the series spanning over 20 years.
Raikkonen revealed the news on Instagram on Wednesday evening ahead of this weekend's Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort.
"This is it. This will be my last season in Formula 1," Raikkonen said.
"This is a decision I did during last winter. It was not an easy decision but after this season it is time for new things.
"Even though the season is still on, I want to thank my family, all my teams, everyone involved in my racing career and especially all of you great fans that have been rooting for me all this time.
"Formula 1 might come to an end for me but there is a lot more in life that I want to experience and enjoy. See you around after all of this! Sincerely Kimi."
PLUS: Why the time is right for Raikkonen to hang up his F1 helmet
Raikkonen's retirement opens up a coveted seat at Alfa Romeo for the 2022 season, which looks set to be filled by current Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas should he be replaced by George Russell for next year.
Alfa Romeo is yet to confirm whether Raikkonen's team-mate, Antonio Giovinazzi, will return for next season, having run an unchanged line-up for the past three years.
Raikkonen made his F1 debut with Sauber in 2001 as a relatively-unknown racer who had jumped up from Formula Renault, but scored points on debut and quickly established himself as one of the brightest young talents on the grid.
Top 10: Kimi Raikkonen's greatest F1 races ranked
Kimi Raikkonen, McLaren Mercedes MP4-20 celebrates his victory
Photo by: Steve Etherington / Motorsport Images
Raikkonen replaced Mika Hakkinen at McLaren for the 2002 season, and took his maiden victory the following year as he finished second in the championship.
A move to Ferrari in 2007 yielded his first world title, pipping Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso by a single point in a dramatic Brazil finale, but he would struggle to reach such heights again.
Archive: The ups and downs of Raikkonen's 2007 F1 title triumph
A two-year break from F1 in 2010 and 2011 saw Raikkonen dip his toe into other ventures, such as rallying and even NASCAR. It helped renew his passion for racing in F1, with Raikkonen long crediting the break as being instrumental to his career continuing for as long as it did.
PLUS: In his own words - The secret to Raikkonen's F1 longevity
Raikkonen returned with Lotus in 2012 and scored two wins for the team, but left the cash-strapped outfit two races before the end of the 2013 season to undergo back surgery ahead of a return to Ferrari.
After a slow start to life back at Maranello, Raikkonen's form gradually improved, paving the way for his first victory in over five years at the 2018 United States Grand Prix en route to third place in that year's championship.
Ferrari's decision to sign Charles Leclerc for 2019 resulted in Raikkonen returning to Sauber, where his F1 career had started, albeit under the Alfa Romeo name.
He recorded a best race finish for the team of fourth at Interlagos 2019, but has failed to cross the line any higher than ninth since then after seeing Alfa Romeo's form take a dip. So far this season, Raikkonen has scored two points, finishing 10th in both Azerbaijan and Hungary.
Race of my life: James Hunt on the 1975 Dutch GP
Kimi Raikkonen's top 10 F1 races ranked: Japanese GP, Belgian GP and more
How Driver's Eye camera became a Formula 1 TV gamechanger
Gasly: Mindset for Alpine is "completely different" to Red Bull F1 move
How F1's sole rookie of 2022 proved his critics wrong
Kimi Raikkonen
How an underdog NASCAR team flipped the script for success
Raikkonen's Project 91 NASCAR ride is "his until he says otherwise"
Why newly-retired Raikkonen won't miss F1


(Newser) – More drug charges have been dropped in Baltimore as a result of a second body-camera video that apparently shows police officers planting evidence. The unreleased video "appears to depict multiple officers working together to manufacture evidence," according to the city's public defender. The news comes less than two weeks after a separate video was released seeming to show a police officer planting drugs in an alley while with two other officers. The latest video involves different officers, reports the Baltimore Sun. It shows authorities repeatedly searching a vehicle during a November 2016 traffic stop but finding nothing, lawyer Debbie Katz Levi of the public defender's office tells WBFF. Later, she says, an officer looks like he places an item in the car.
Worse than the scum they are trying to frame.
This is the cream of the crop! Yeah right, losers.
Police LIE. If they want a promotion, they need arrests that end in convictions. No easier way than to frame people.


text:
from unittest import TestCase

class ByteBufferTestCase(TestCase):
    def test_bytearray(self):
        a = bytearray(b'aa')
        b = a[:]
        b[1] = ord('b')

        self.assertEqual(a, b'aa')
        self.assertEqual(b, b'ab')

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


In life there are many choices. As well as going outside and getting your hands covered in paint, you can stay at home – put on some coffee / drink a beer – and nail Photoshop inna graffiti stylee.
We have put together a selection of Photoshop graffiti tutorials. Enjoy.
Awesome video from Dan Pat.
Super awesome graffiti business. Part one of two, see below for part 2.
An awesome wildstyle graffiti piece in Photoshop.
Speed art graffiti wildstyle in Photoshop.
A tutorial for making a graffiti background image, using an already existing graffiti design.
Incredible glimpse of a photoshop graffiti collaboration between Pick 1 and Facelessdrone. Video is x20.
Damn that was a whole lot of awesome in one place.
For more graffiti tutorials click here.


text:
5 August. Tally Ho! circuit with new members. 17 miles.
Post author By Martin Woodhead
No Comments on 5 August. Tally Ho! circuit with new members. 17 miles.
A warm welcome was given to two new members on this fine summer's evening, John and Tim, both of whom had discovered the Windmill Club on the Cycling UK website. As well as being keen cyclists they are also car fanatics, John having competed in the Mille Miglia in Italy recently in his hotted up Triumph TR3 whilst Tim has designed and races his own sports car at Silverstone and other places. John lives in Much Hadham and Tim in Fulbourn. They found themselves in good company.
Meeting at The Tally Ho! in Barkway at 5.00pm, John and Tim were accompanied by Maurice, Andrew, Deborah, Charles, Nick and Martin on a pleasant 17 mile circuit around the lanes. But Charles clocked up around 30 miles in all having cycled from Chrishall and back again. Well done Charles! Newish member Nick has been considering buying an e-bike but after just a few rides he is thinking of changing his mind – it's amazing how quickly cycling fitness can be achieved,
This is where we went:
The pace was fairly leisurely which meant there was ample time to learn about the racing exploits of John and Tim in their very different cars – John describing in graphic detail the crazy nature of the Mille Miglia when hundreds of competitors are encouraged by the police to drive at break neck speeds on public roads and Tim promising to show us pictures of his hairy sports car powered by a Honda Fireblade motorbike engine, which he subsequently did in The Tally Ho!.
Stopping for a breather near Kelshall. From the left, John, Charles, Nick, Deborah, Maurice, Andrew and Tim
A brief stop was made in Sandon before passing Lyn and John Bagrie's house on the way to Buntingford, where thoughts of what we might see between Wyddial and Anstey on this warm evening entered the minds of both Andrew and Martin. But it was not to be – the scantily clad ladies seen emerging two years ago from their Mini Convertible down what has since been named Visions of Loveliness Lane were nowhere to be seen. Alas, we live in hope for another day.
Deborah and Maurice back at The Tally Ho! Deborah and her husband have recently returned from a glorious bike ride through the Hebridean islands of Scotland.
The Tally Ho! had its usual jolly atmosphere, even though the choice of beers was not quite what we are used to. What a fussy lot the Windmillers are! It was good to see the pics of Tim's smart sports racing car and we look forward to hearing how he fared at Silverstone.
Thanks go to Maurice as usual for planning the route and to Andrew for organising us.
← 1 August 2019: Stevenage Orbital → 8 August. Beware Walberswick women! 40 miles.


text:
Gillian Sanders (Johannesburgo, 15 de octubre de 1981) es una deportista sudafricana que compite en triatlón. Ganó diez medallas en el Campeonato Africano de Triatlón entre los años 2011 y 2021.

Palmarés internacional

Referencias

Triatletas de Sudáfrica
Triatletas en los Juegos Olímpicos de Londres 2012
Triatletas en los Juegos Olímpicos de Río de Janeiro 2016
Triatletas en los Juegos Olímpicos de Tokio 2020
Deportistas femeninas de Sudáfrica
Nacidos en Johannesburgo

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


I've deployed tele-disruptors in battle many times. Highly effective. Like every other part of Krypton, they were lost to time. New ones would take weeks to assemble.
For you. I'm the guy who rebuilt Coast City in thirty days. Stand back, Zod. Watch me work.


text:
using JetBrains.ReSharper.FeaturesTestFramework.Intentions;
using JetBrains.ReSharper.TestFramework;
using NUnit.Framework;
using ReCommendedExtension.ContextActions.CodeContracts;

namespace ReCommendedExtension.Tests.ContextActions.CodeContracts.Types
{
    [TestNetFramework4]
    [TestFixture]
    public sealed class NumericZeroExecuteTests : CSharpContextActionExecuteTestBase<NumericZero>
    {
        protected override string ExtraPath => "";

        protected override string RelativeTestDataPath => @"ContextActions\CodeContracts\Types\NumericZero";

        [Test]
        public void TestExecuteInt() => DoNamedTest2();

        [Test]
        public void TestExecuteUInt() => DoNamedTest2();

        [Test]
        public void TestExecuteLong() => DoNamedTest2();

        [Test]
        public void TestExecuteUlong() => DoNamedTest2();

        [Test]
        public void TestExecuteByte() => DoNamedTest2();

        [Test]
        public void TestExecuteSbyte() => DoNamedTest2();

        [Test]
        public void TestExecuteShort() => DoNamedTest2();

        [Test]
        public void TestExecuteUshort() => DoNamedTest2();

        [Test]
        public void TestExecuteDecimal() => DoNamedTest2();

        [Test]
        public void TestExecuteDouble() => DoNamedTest2();

        [Test]
        public void TestExecuteFloat() => DoNamedTest2();
    }
}


text:
Arrow and The Flash (2014)
Arrow (2012- )
The Flash (2014- )
Group: DC Multiverse: Earth 1
Wow, I had better watch my step. This crossover deals with shows based on comic books with decades of continuity that I could easily fall into rambling on about. I'm going to try and keep this on topic.
In 2014 movies and TV shows based on comic books were hot. Marvel comics was in the process of creating movies based on every character imaginable and moving into TV as well. DC was working to play catch up. They were holding back their big names like Batman and Superman for the big screen, only using them on TV in indirect ways (Gotham: Batman before he was Batman. Smallville: Superman before he was Superman). For TV they decided to go with their B characters. (With respect. Great characters.) So in 2012 the CW Netwok debuted Arrow, based on The Green Arrow. DC heroes tended to be lighter and less angsty than Marvel. I think they decided to call the show Arrow instead of Green Arrow both to make it seem a bit grittier and to also try to not put off audience members not into comics.
The show itself was a bit darker than the comics. Green Arrow was known as a wisecracking adventurer who often used trick arrows that were sometimes goofy. For the show they made Arrow a bit more Batman-ish, a bit more grim. And while he still had trick arrows they kept the sillier ones out.
Green Arrow was bajillionaire playboy Oliver Queen. His yacht is lost at sea and Oliver is believed dead. In truth he ends up trapped on a deserted island (deserted being a relative term) for five years. While on the island he survives all sorts of adventures which forge him into a different more serious man, incredibly skilled with a bow and arrow. Eventually rescued he returns to his hometown of Starling City where he fights crime as the vigilante Arrow. Again, the name change pulls it a bit away from the comics. In the same vein, instead of wearing a domino mask like in the comics they had him wear face paint similar to a mask.
But aside from the cosmetic changes, the show was actually more deeply comic booky than many past superhero TV shows. Shows like The Incredible Hulk or Wonder Woman would make use of the titular character while setting aside everything else comic book related. They'd almost never meet comic supervillains or borrow plots from the books. But Arrow saw the value of fully exploiting the resources of the DC Comics universe, using all sorts of characters and plot elements that fans knew and loved. As a comic book fan I can tell you there is nothing better than seeing a comic character appearing live action (or "cartoon action") for the first time.
By the second season things were going pretty damn well. They were going well enough that I think the powers that be were less worried about people perceiving the show as a superhero show. Not only that, maybe there might even be more room on the CW schedule for another show. Around 8 episodes into season 2 they laid the groundwork for a spin off series starring another DC hero, The Flash.
In the episode The Scientist, someone breaks into a warehouse owned by Oliver Queen's family. While investigating the break in a young CSI investigator from Central City named Barry Allen shows up unannounced to help out. In the comics Barry Allen is the fastest man alive, the hero known as The Flash. But arriving on Arrow he is still just Barry Allen. They make quite a number of jokes based on who Barry will become: he never gets anywhere on time, always misses trains, and he himself explains he can't dance because he's not very good on his feet.
They use Barry's time on Arrow to fully set up Barry Allen's backstory. He shows up to help claiming he was investigating similar crimes to the break in back in Central City and that his boss sent him to help. The truth is when he was 11 years old his mother was killed by a mysterious blur and his father was wrongly convicted of the crime. So now whenever he becomes aware of a strange crime that reminds him of what happened to his mother, he checks it out, hoping it might lead him to her killer. In this case, it seemed a single super strong person broke through an impregnable door and carried off a giant piece of equipment singlehanded. Throughout the story they also set up that back in Central City Star Labs is about to start a new particle accelerator.
At first Oliver Queen does not trust Barry at all. Partly because at the start Barry lies about why he's there. On top of that Barry flirts quite a bit with Oliver's potential love interest (And Team Arrow member) Felicity Smoak. Despite this, Barry sticks around to help Arrow figure out what is going on. In the middle of this they also bring in a bit of the comic book Barry Allen. In the comics before he became The Flash, Barry Allen was a comic book nerd himself. On Arrow they present him as the same sort of fanboy towards Arrow. He knows all about him and criticizes his using face paint instead of a mask. Arrow explains that a mask would interfere with his crime fighting. Barry explains exactly what sort of mask he needs.
See, I knew I'd get too long winded.
The story, stretching over two episodes, not only introduced The Flash but is full to the brim with all sorts of comic book elements being introduced. The story serves basically as an origin tale for the villains Deathstroke and Solomon Grundy. As the episode ends Barry heads back to Central City, hoping to arrive in time to see the particle accelerator go online. He arrives in time but ends up unable to get into Star Labs for the big moment. He's at his lab when it goes online... and explodes. He watches the fireball from his window. The skylight to his lab is open, flooding his floor. He is in the process of trying to close the skylight when lightening caused by the Star Lab explosion shoots down and zaps him, knocking him unconscious for months... until the first episode of The Flash.
Meanwhile, Arrow is opening a present from Barry: a form fitting mask Barry has created for him. Oliver puts in on and all the "he can't be a comic book superhero" bull gets the boot.
With the premiere of The Flash, the CW fully embraced the idea of letting their superhero shows BE superhero shows. The starting premise was that the super collider explosion caused a large number of people in Central City to gain super powers, including Barry who, duh, gained the power of super speed. The show introduced all sorts of comic book characters and locations. And as with comics, The Flash and Arrow began to do crossover team ups. But that's not all. Before this version of The Flash there was an earlier Flash series. This Flash fully embraced that show. The original Barry Allen/Flash, John Wesley Shipp, was brought on to play Barry Allen's unfairly imprisoned father. On the original show actress Amanda Pays played The Flash's friend Tina McGee. Amanda Pays was brought back to play this show's version of the character. And Mark Hamill was also brought back to play a new version of the villain The Trickster he played on the original show.
As the show started up I heard a lot of people complaining about it. They didn't think the show quite worked. They didn't know if the show's star Grant Gustin was a good Flash. But my attitude was... just wait. Starting up any show means taking some time to get things right. And with a show like this you have to build up the world of the show before you can really get down to business. And I was right. By the end of the first season people were loving The Flash. The first year the show had a year long very involved plot involving one of Flash's biggest comic book villains trying to destroy The Flash, including going into the past and being the blur who killed his mother.
Again, I could go on and on with the comic book love Flash, like Arrow, throws out to the fans. But I'll hold back on some of that for my Flash/Supergirl page, a crossover which severely complicates my job of tracking shows sharing a common "world".
Other Arrow Crossover Links
Arrow and Constantine
Arrow and Legends of Tomorrow
Other Flash Crossover Links
The Flash (2014) and The Flash (1990)
The Flash (2014) and Legends of Tomorrow
The Flash (2014) and Supergirl (1990)
Buy these shows on Amazon.com and support this site at the same time! Check out Arrow and The Flash on disc!


text:
Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/soceps/v42y2008i3p151-157.html
Evaluation of research in efficiency and productivity: A survey and analysis of the first 30 years of scholarly literature in DEA
Emrouznejad, Ali
Parker, Barnett R.
Tavares, Gabriel
Barnett Richard Parker
Since the original Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) study by Charnes et al. [Measuring the efficiency of decision-making units. European Journal of Operational Research 1978;2(6):429-44], there has been rapid and continuous growth in the field. As a result, a considerable amount of published research has appeared, with a significant portion focused on DEA applications of efficiency and productivity in both public and private sector activities. While several bibliographic collections have been reported, a comprehensive listing and analysis of DEA research covering its first 30 years of history is not available. This paper thus presents an extensive, if not nearly complete, listing of DEA research covering theoretical developments as well as "real-world" applications from inception to the year 2007. A listing of the most utilized/relevant journals, a keyword analysis, and selected statistics are presented.
Emrouznejad, Ali & Parker, Barnett R. & Tavares, Gabriel, 2008. "Evaluation of research in efficiency and productivity: A survey and analysis of the first 30 years of scholarly literature in DEA," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 151-157, September.
Handle: RePEc:eee:soceps:v:42:y:2008:i:3:p:151-157
File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0038-0121(07)00042-0
Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
Charnes, A. & Cooper, W. W. & Rhodes, E., 1978. "Measuring the efficiency of decision making units," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 2(6), pages 429-444, November.
Lawrence Seiford, 1997. "A bibliography for Data Envelopment Analysis (1978-1996)," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 73(0), pages 393-438, October.
Gattoufi, Said & Oral, Muhittin & Reisman, Arnold, 2004. "A taxonomy for data envelopment analysis," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 38(2-3), pages 141-158.
All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:soceps:v:42:y:2008:i:3:p:151-157. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.
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text:
Mario Andretti petition to receive Presidential Medal of Freedom started
By Paul Reinhard
Special to The Morning Call |
The license plate on Jim Knipe's car reads "69 INDY."
Last year, he said, Mario Andretti autographed the plate for him.
"I'm a pretty heavy-duty Mario Andretti fan," Knipe, a 58-year-old Bethlehem resident, said this week.
Considering that it has been more than 20 years since Andretti drove his final IndyCar series race, the fact that Knipe still has such a passionate interest in the 1967 Daytona 500 winner, 1969 Indianapolis 500 winner, 1978 Formula One world champion and four-time Indy-car national champion is beyond commendable.
But this week, Knipe has taken that passion to another level.
On Tuesday, Knipe initiated a petition to get the almost-75-year-old Andretti considered as a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
But getting Andretti to the next step in the selection process won't be easy. Knipe won't be bringing a piece of paper to your home. You need to go online to sign the petition. The Web address is: http://1.usa.gov/1KPwIdW.
Knipe needs 150 people to sign his petition online with name, email address and zip code. After the first 150 signatures are received, the petition can be publicly searched by way of the "We the People" tool on the WhiteHouse.gov site.
Then all Knipe needs for President Barack Obama to consider Andretti for the medal is 100,000 signatures on the petition by March March 12.
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According to WhiteHouse.gov site: "Once the petition reaches the required threshold [100,000], it will be put in a queue to be reviewed by the White House. Others can still sign the petition while it is awaiting a response from the White House. When the White House responds, everyone who has signed the petition will get email from the White House to let you know that we've reviewed and responded to the petition."
The Presidential Medal of Freedom originally was known simply as the Medal of Freedom and was instated by President Harry S. Truman to honor civilians who had roles in the United States' World War II efforts.
President John F. Kennedy renamed it the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1963.
The medals are given to people from all walks of life. The 2014 recipients included TV news anchor Tom Brokaw, Ethel Kennedy, former pro golfer Charlie Sifford, Meryl Streep, Marlo Thomas and Stevie Wonder.
Only one other race-car driver has received a Presidential Medal of Freedom: NASCAR legend Richard Petty, who won 200 races during his career.
A president may select a recipient, but often, the list of potential award winners comes from petitions that come through the whitehouse.gov website.
"I grew up in Easton and I've followed Mario's career since I was a kid," Knipe said. "My parents took me to the Indianapolis 500 for the first time in 1970, the year after Mario won. Basically, I have a room full of [Andretti] artifacts that I've collected."
Knipe, who said he's retired, wasn't aware of the Presidential Medal of Freedom or the means of nominating someone for it until he received an email from an automotive magazine supporting a similar petition for Andretti's main Indy-car rival, A.J. Foyt, who turned 80 in January. As of Thursday afternoon, the petition for Foyt had almost 1,800 signatures.
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"I figured if they can do it for A.J., I can do it for Mario," Knipe said. "Mario and his racing accomplishments are well known all around the world."
He says he has set up a Twitter account and hopes to recruit friends who, via social media like Facebook and Twitter, will recruit their friends to sign the petition. He's looking for a snowball effect on social media and also plans to solicit some racing publications for assistance through their websites.
The task appears to be a daunting one, but Knipe is enthusiastic.
And Andretti is flattered.
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He said that while he may have met Knipe, who said he has had Andretti autograph various memorabilia over the years, he is not familiar with him. But the fact that fans like Knipe continue to support him is not lost on him.
"Oh, God, it's so wonderful; are you kidding?" Andretti said Wednesday. "That's the precious part of my career. The fans have stayed loyal; they care. They come up and bring memorabilia for me to sign and you can see their sincerity. There is no bigger gift for anyone who has worked like myself than to know people enjoy your work. No bigger compliment."
The honors have never really stopped coming for Andretti, who on June 16 will celebrate the 60th anniversary of his arrival in the U.S. from Italy. Mario and his twin brother, Aldo, were 15 at the time. They'll be 75 on Feb. 28.
Last year, Andretti was the featured driver at Legends Day at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, was grand marshal of the Long Beach Grand Prix and was inducted into the National Motorsports Press Association Hall of Fame.
In 2006 he was given the Italian government's highest civilian honor — only the second racer to receive the Commendatore — and in 2008 he was named a U.S. Library of Congress Living Legend.
On Facebook, 72,352 people "like" Andretti. He has more than 92,200 followers on Twitter.
If Knipe can crack those lists, he's well on his way to getting his favorite driver still another piece of hardware for the trophy hallway in his Bushkill Township home.
"Wouldn't that be nice?" Andretti said.
Retired sports columnist Paul Reinhard is a freelance writer.
•After receiving 150 signatures, a petition to have Mario Andretti awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom can be publicly searched by way of the "We the People" tool on the WhiteHouse.gov site.
•Once the petition reaches 100,000 signatures, it is put in a public queue to be reviewed by the White House.
•Recent winners include Stevie Wonder, Richard Petty, Meryl Streep, Maya Angelou, Warren Buffett, Bob Dylan, Yo Yo Ma, President George H.W. Bush.
Source: http://www.us.senate.gov
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Resolve complaints quickly to the satisfaction of all parties involved.
Avoid unnecessary upset for all parties concerned.
Avoid progression towards a formal complaint being lodged with Aneurin Bevan Health Board.
Learn from situations and improve our general practice services where possible.
Alyson Jones Practice Manager is responsible for the management of any complaints.
The practice manager will inform the partners of any complaint whether it be of non clinical or clinical nature. If the written complaint is of an organisational nature, the nature of the complaint will be acknowledged within two working days, a copy of 'Putting Things Right' will be enclosed with initial correspondence. Information is also available from Putting Things Right website.
The practice manager will set up an investigatory meeting with the team member concerned and if deemed necessary with the complainant. Alternatively the practice manager will consult with the complainant via the telephone at a mutually convenient time.
All events and outcomes will be clearly documented at every stage of the complaints process and shared will all parties concerned. The practice requests a reassurance that the complainant is satisfied with the outcome.
If the complainant remains unsatisfied then he/she will be advised to lodge a formal complaint with the Complaints Manager, Aneurin Bevan Health Board, Llanarth House, Unit 1 Newbridge Gateway, Bridge Street, Newbridge, Gwent, NP11 5GH.
The practice undertakes annual audits of patients complaints to enable the team to learn plus develop guidelines and policies.
The practice operates a Zero Tolerance Policy with regard to violence and abuse and the has the right to remove violent patients from the list with immediate effect in order to safeguard practice staff, patients and other persons.
In this situation we are obliged to notify the patient in writing of their removal from the list and record in the patient's medical records the fact of the removal and circumstances leading to it. The LHB is then responsible for providing further medical care for such patients.
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All individuals with access to your data have a professional and/or contractual duty of confidentiality.
NHS Wales is making some changes to the way it uses patient information for care.
From autumn 2016 a digital summary of the information held in your GP record will be available to the doctors nurses and registered health professionals looking after you when you are in hospital.
It will help them to give quick, safe and quality care.
Vital information from your GP record has been available for some time to support your care when the surgery is closed 'out of hours' or in an emergency.
But, until now those caring for you in hospital, during an outpatient appointment or in-patient stay, were not able to access the important information held by your GP straight away. This includes current medications, recent tests and allergies.
Only the healthcare professionals can see your information, and only with your permission. NHS Wales can check on who, and how every record was looked at.
Current medication and medication that has been prescribed in the last two years.
It does not include any private discussions you may have had with your GP.
If you don't want anyone other than your GP to see your records you can opt-out. You can do this by completing an opt-out form. Click here to download the opt-out form.
Patients are encouraged to talk with their GP before opting out as it could make a difference to the care they receive. If a parent or guardian of a child under 16 does not wish their child to have a record, they can opt-out on their behalf, but should discuss this with their GP first.
You have a right to expect a high standard of medical care from our Practice and we will try at all times to provide the very best care possible within the resources available.
Very occasionally a practice/patient relationship breaks down completely. In this situation the patient may choose to register with a different practice. The practice also has the right to remove that patient from their list.


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text:
Web-Exclusive
The Angel and the Covenant
By Yitzhak Y. Melamed
A Best-Selling Hebrew Book of the Modern Era: The Book of the Covenant of Pinhas Hurwitz and Its Remarkable Legacy
by David B. Ruderman
University of Washington Press, 192 pp., $50
Sefer ha-Brit ha-Shalem
by Pinhas Eliyahu Hurwitz, expanded edition by Yitzhak Lax
Sifriati Press, 779 pp., 61 NIS
Sometime in the 1770s, Rabbi Shmelke of Nikolsburg, one of the closest disciples of the Maggid of Mezheritch, decided to bring the new teachings of Hasidism to his brethren in Western Europe. As the story goes, he was halted at the German border by the Angel of Death, who told him, "This is not your place." Shmelke hesitated, but went on. The angel warned him again, but Shmelke stuck to his course. "If you spread your teachings in this land," the angel warned him, "I will personally make sure that all the Jews here become Hasidim." At this, Shmelke stopped, realizing that it would radically alter the nature of the movement, thus Hasidism remained an Eastern European Jewish phenomenon.
Although Sefer ha-Brit (Book of the Covenant) by Pinchas Eliyahu Hurwitz (1765–1821) was an attempt to bring the news of 18th-century science, not Hasidism, to its Jewish readers, it too was an essentially Eastern European Jewish phenomenon. Throughout the 19th century, it was the main source of scientific information and natural history for traditional Eastern European Jews, though of course much of it was fanciful or already outdated (for instance the medieval notion that there are geese in Scotland that grow botanically, like barnacles, on trees).
The book was first published anonymously in 1797 in Brünn, Moravia (modern-day Brno, Czech Republic) and quickly became a best-seller, occasioning speculation that the author was really Rabbi Eliyahu of Vilna, the great Vilna Gaon, or, perhaps, the late philosopher Moses Mendelssohn. Following a pirated 1800–1801 edition, Hurwitz published an expanded edition with his name in Zolkiew in 1806–1807. In that preface, he boasts that copies of the book were even sold in Holland, England, France, and Italy. Yet, of the 40 editions that are meticulously documented in an appendix to the distinguished historian David B. Ruderman's fascinating new study of Sefer ha-Brit, not one was printed in Western Europe. Neither of the two parts of the book—the first part consisting of a concise, popular compendium of modern science, nor the second part comprising a treatise on kabbalistic piety—apparently had much to offer Western Jews. The 41st edition just appeared in Israel, where it still finds a receptive haredi audience, interested primarily in the book's kabbalistic and ethical teachings.
A portion of a page from Megillat Setarim, an unpublished kabbalistic manuscript by Pinchas Eliyahu Horowitz. The acronym after the title stands for Pinchas zeh Eliyahu.
According to one account, Pinchas Eliyahu Hurwitz was born to Meir and Yente Hurwitz in Lvov, while they were traveling from their hometown of Vilna to Buczacz, Galicia. Yitzhak Lax, the editor of the recent haredi edition of Sefer ha-Brit, speculates that the couple left Vilna because of its anti-Hasidic edicts. But Lax provides no historical evidence for his claim, and the major campaign against the Hasidim did not begin until 1772, when Pinchas Eliyahu was seven years old or so.
Hurwitz's father died while he was still a child, and apparently he began wandering not long afterward. In spite of the great interest on the part of both academic and religious scholars in Hurwitz, very little is known about his biography beyond the fact that he was married and had children. According to his own testimony, he began writing Sefer ha-Brit while residing in Buczacz sometime in the mid-1780s. In the following dozen years, Hurwitz would travel as far as Berlin, Pressburg, Amsterdam, the Hague, and London. During these travels he continued working on the book intermittently, acquiring the approbation of several notable rabbinic figures, until eventually he published the book in Brünn.
Hurwitz composed several other works, most of them kabbalistic commentaries, though none of them were published in his lifetime. "Why should a kabbalist bother to master natural philosophy when his ultimate goal was to transcend his earthly existence and enter a spiritual place beyond nature itself?" Ruderman asks pointedly. His answer is that, for Hurwitz, the study of nature "revealed constantly the majesty of the creator and the finitude of his created beings." But, arguably, there were other motivations at work as well.
Hurwitz perceived himself as a kanai (zealot) whose aim was to defend the honor of rabbinic culture. Thus, in Sefer ha-Brit, he launches a fascinating attack on the study of philosophy (mainly, metaphysics), which he associates with heresy. At the same time, he admits to a sense of shame at the Gentiles' alleged perception of the Jews as "a nation lacking intelligence except in the Talmud." Hurwitz's ideal Jew is the rabbinic scholar who is also knowledgeable about, and open to, modern science, and yet he was very far from Moses Mendelssohn or any other Haskalah figure. He was, rather, what could be called an exponent of the Jewish counter-enlightenment. That is to say that he adopted (and occasionally even radicalizes) some elements from the Haskalah's world view while essentially defending traditional talmudism.
Somewhat like Hasdai Crescas, the late 14th-century thinker, Hurwitz attempted to use the tools of philosophy in order to undermine what he perceived as the tyranny of rationalism. Crescas had skillfully attacked the tenets of Aristotelian physics in order to undermine Maimonidean rationalism at its foundations. Hurwitz did not have the talent of a Crescas, who may have been a more original and acute philosopher than Maimonides, but he also didn't need it, since he had Immanuel Kant. Kant's Critique of Pure Reason had recently seemed to clear away a space for traditional faith by undermining the overweening claims of reason, thus justifying what Ruderman describes as Hurwitz's "unwavering fideism." He draws upon Kant's attack on the pretenses of reason extensively, and then goes on to rebut Salomon Maimon's attempt to defend rationalism from Kant (though, in truth, he might have actually learned of Kant's arguments from reading Maimon).
Ruderman's study of Sefer ha-Brit is an excellent entry into the recent subgenre of microhistories of odd or influential books, and, for the most part, his discussion of Hurwitz's views is nuanced and precise. One exception, it seems to me, is his discussion of Hurwitz's exploration of the religious duty to love all human beings. Hurwitz devoted one of the longest chapters of Sefer ha-Brit to this obligation, which, among other things, he regarded as a precondition for the ascent to prophecy.
Ruderman seems to be at a loss to understand Hurwitz's repeated insistence that the biblical command to love one's neighbor had as its object all human beings, not merely other Jews. He admits that previous rabbinic figures preached tolerance and fairness toward Gentiles, yet, he claims, "there were limits to these positions, since the emphasis was always on correct behavior and tolerance, not on love . . . Even the enlightened Moses Mendelssohn spoke about toleration, not love." Ruderman ends up speculating on the possible influence of Freemasonry on Hurwitz:
Whether or not Hurwitz or his readers fully grasped the import of his message, it appears in hindsight that he had indeed articulated a radical understanding of Judaism for his time and perhaps for ours as well.
While I share much of Ruderman's admiration of Hurwitz, I believe this is overstated. To be sure, Ruderman cites chauvinistic and xenophobic views in a variety of Jewish literary genres throughout the centuries, and I think this recognition is both morally important and, regrettably, factually correct. Yet he fails to account for the persistence of a universalist—sometimes even egalitarian—attitude toward Gentiles at the very core of rabbinic culture.
The command to love one's Gentile neighbor was hardly Hurwitz's invention. Consider Leviticus 19:34—"The stranger [ger] who resides with you shall be to you as one of your citizens; you shall love him [ve-ahavta lo] as yourself"—or Deuteronomy 10:19—"You shall love the stranger [ve-ahavtem et ha-ger], for you were strangers in the land of Egypt." Rabbinic commentators on these two verses (as well as the 34 other verses referring to the ger) disagree on whether the word "ger" refers to an alien resident (ger toshav) or to a convert (ger tzedek). The major medieval commentator, Abraham ibn Ezra, systematically interprets the word as referring to a Gentile foreigner. His is not the majority view, but it is not a radical outlier in the tradition either. A cursory examination of traditional interpretations of the mishnaic notion of "ahavat ha-briot" (love of human creatures) will yield numerous sources—medieval and early modern—that apply it to all of humanity. Perhaps the best proof that Hurwitz's preaching of universal love of humanity was not quite as radical as Ruderman suggests is the simple fact that, unlike other claims that Hurwitz makes, there is very little evidence that it provoked any critical reaction from traditionalists, despite its status as a best-seller in their world. Indeed, it may well be that this very section contributed to the popularity of the book in traditional circles.
Hurwitz's biblical namesakes, Pinchas and Eliyahu, are the tradition's paradigmatic religious zealots. Indeed, in rabbinic and kabbalistic literature, they are merged, so that Eliyahu is presented as having been the reincarnation of Pinchas. Hurwitz played on this tradition when he signed himself with the rabbinic formula "Pinchas zeh Eliyahu" (Phineas, i.e., Elijah) and described himself as a zealot for the honor of the Torah, but he also describes his given name as delegating to him the role of harbinger of peace and human brotherhood. And indeed, in one of the ironic twists of the Bible, Eliyahu the zealous prophet becomes, in Malachi 3:24, the herald of universal peace at the end of days. This twist is extensively interpreted and developed in rabbinic literature, where Elijah becomes an angel of peace and salvation. Thus, Eliyahu, "the angel of the covenant" (malakh ha-brit) is also assigned to welcome the (male) newborn with the "covenant of peace" (brit shalom) at circumcision. Hurwitz did not, of course, choose his name, but, as a close reading of Sefer ha-Brit reveals, he chose to pursue the destiny it encapsulated.
Yitzhak Y. Melamed
Yitzhak Y. Melamed is the Charlotte Bloomberg Professor of Philosophy at Johns Hopkins University, the author of Spinoza's Metaphysics: Substance and Thought, and the editor, most recently, of Eternity: A History (both from Oxford University Press). He is currently working on a book about Spinoza and German idealism.
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