text:
Why the Right Lost the Missile Defense Debate
Joseph Cirincione
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No. 106, Spring 1997
by Joseph Cirincione
On March 21, 1996, then Senate majority leader Robert Dole and House speaker Newt Gingrich introduced the Defend America Act, mandating deployment by 2003 of a nationwide system of satellites, radars, and missile interceptors. Dole called it "one of the key defining pieces of legislation the Congress will consider this year," adding that "national missile defense must be America's top defense priority." Gingrich promised it would be "the most important national defense debate since Churchill argued for building radar." Conservative activists pressed Republican politicians for a resurrected "Star Wars" program. The Wall Street Journal lauded the bill in a series of editorials as did New York Times columnist William Safire. The entire conservative defense establishment was sure that this would be the wedge issue that would expose President Bill Clinton's weakness in "failing to defend America." Instead, the issue ricocheted back, exposing fault lines in the Republican party and damaging the credibility of its proponents.
The Birth of an Issue
The Republican leadership arrived at their strategy by listening to a group of conservative activists with roots in the Reagan years. The Heritage Foundation and the Center for Security Policy, in particular, pressed successfully to insert missile defense into the 1994 Contract with America. The Heritage Foundation assembled a study team headed by former officials from President Ronald Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative Organization (SDIO). It included directors Henry Cooper and James Abrahamson, systems architect Edward Gerry, Reagan science adviser William Graham, deputy assistant secretary of defense Frank Gaffney, and CIA deputy director Daniel Graham. The team's June 1995 report presented a plan for ending "the Clinton Administration's policy of intentionally leaving American cities and territory open to missile attack." The report argued that, for an additional expenditure of $7.3 billion--above and beyond the $19 billion budgeted for missile defense through the year 2001--America could develop and deploy "affordable, effective ballistic missile defenses." All that was lacking, the report stated, was "a proper understanding of missiles defenses and the political will to build them."
Proponents worked hard to supply the will. In an August 1995 letter to Senate Armed Services Committee chairman Strom Thurmond, Jeane Kirkpatrick and Jack Kemp wrote that "the development of missile defenses today is technologically and economically feasible." The only obstacles, they said, were "outdated arms control treaties." In 1995, missile defense became a central theme of the Republican-controlled Congress's criticism of the Clinton defense plan. Late in the year, the president vetoed the Defense Authorization bill over a provision mandating deployment of a national missile defense system by the year 2003. Congressional leaders, surprised by the president's strong stand, could not muster enough votes to override the veto. In January 1996, they were forced to strip out the controversial provision in order to win passage of the authorization act.
The Defend America Act was designed to trigger another veto and provoke a confrontation during the presidential campaign. A key architect of the strategy was Gaffney, head of both the Center for Security Policy and the Coalition to Defend America. "By tirelessly pushing results of his polls and studies of 'focus groups,' " the Wall Street Journal reported in April 1996, he "has convinced Republican leaders that backing a national missile defense can be a winning issue for them this fall." A March 7, 1996, memo to House Appropriations Committee chairman Robert Livingston from committee staffer Bill Inglee details the plan:
Following introduction, the Speaker's office has committed to schedule this measure for the floor and to have the whip organization fully work it. We should be able to win here in the House. The Senate will be tougher. . . . A veto is expected but the issue will be laid squarely on the President's doorstep. . . . Frank Gaffney is very upset about any reference to amending the [Anti-Ballistic Missile] treaty (he feels it legitimizes it) and has been trying to stir up people against it. . . . Notwithstanding Frank's concerns, I think you should cosponsor this so that we can use the leadership interest in this issue to push the [weapons of mass destruction] threat to the political foreground.
The strategy worked. By May 1996, missile defense had become a theme for conservative columnists, talk-show hosts, and editors. The Wall Street Journal, for example, promoted the legislation in a special editorial section on June 20, which featured calls for deployment from three former secretaries of defense--Caspar Weinberger, James Schlesinger, and Donald Rumsfeld--along with nuclear scientist Edward Teller and former CIA director James Woolsey. The Republican platform and candidate Dole embraced the issue. In the run-up to the election, more hearings were held, speeches given, and columns published on missile defense than on any other defense issue.
In June 1996, Dole quit the Senate and took the Defend America Act on the road. He fired off major speeches in California, Pennsylvania, and Texas devoted to missile defense. Gingrich made it a major part of his foreign policy speech to the Council on Foreign Relations in New York the same month. Meanwhile, independent polls and focus groups showed little public interest. Even Gaffney's focus groups began to backfire. Soon Republican candidates began walking away, convinced that they should not raise the issue in their campaigns.
At the Republican convention in August, candidate Dole made only a perfunctory mention of missile defense, pledging, "On my first day in office, I will put America on a course that will end our vulnerability to missile attack and rebuild our armed forces." He and his running mate, Kemp, barely mentioned the topic after the convention, even in their debates with Clinton and Vice President Al Gore. Congress pumped extra funds into the budget, but legislation mandating deployment of a system never made it out of the House. And the missile defense issue never made a difference in the campaigns.
Star Wars Flaws
The Defend America Act ignored five factors that history has shown to be crucial in determining the success of any major new defense program: the presence of a genuine threat, credible technology to answer the threat, military enthusiasm, adequate funding, and popular support. Not all are necessary. A program with a promising new technology can still survive the absence of a threat: The B-2 bomber is a case in point. Alternatively, the lack of both a threat and sufficient technology can be overcome if a military service pushes hard enough, as the Army did for their new Comanche helicopter. Sometimes, presidential will and popular support can sustain a program that lacks most of the other elements, as in the early years of Reagan's Star Wars program. Here, however, the attempted revival came up short on all accounts.
Low Threat
One problem was the absence of a credible threat to warrant a national missile defense program. The Cold War menace of thousands of Soviet nuclear warheads had been replaced by two types of dangers. The first was either an accidental or unauthorized launch of Russian missiles or a deliberate strike from China. The second was the possibility that some other state hostile to American interests would build or acquire nuclear weapons and missiles. Heritage Foundation foreign policy director Kim Holmes and analyst Baker Spring warned that "more than two dozen countries--including China, Russia, and a number of rogue states, such as North Korea, Iran and Libya--already possess, or are in the process of acquiring or developing, long- and intermediate range ballistic missiles. In short, the potential threat is real and is increasing rapidly."
Most of the congressional and conservative arguments for a crash program to field missile defenses stressed the rogue threat. "It won't be all that many years before a pirate in a place like Baghdad or Pyongyang gets hold of a nuclear bomb and the means with which to deliver it," warned then representative Bob Dornan (R-California) in floor debate. "When that capability exists, it will of course be too late to start slapping together a national missile defense." North Korea was singled out as the most serious threat, because it is the only rogue nation with a missile program that could threaten U.S. territory--within the next year or two, according to Livingston.
Government intelligence assessments, however, concluded that there are only two potential enemies in the world that currently can strike the continental United States with land-based ballistic missile warheads: Russia, which has 3,500, and China, which has seven. Officials believe the danger of an accidental or unauthorized launch--though worrisome--is low and that the certainty of a swift U.S. counterstrike is sufficient to deter any deliberate nuclear attack from either China or Russia. Moreover, the intelligence agencies all agree that it is unlikely that "any other country will acquire this capability during the next 15 years." Most missile-equipped countries, including Iran, Libya, and North Korea, have only Scud-like missiles with ranges of a few hundred kilometers+incapable of reaching the United States or Europe.
Huge leaps in technology are required to advance from the Scud technology, based on the German V-2s of World War II, to a modern intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). The single stage of a Scud puts out a thrust of 30,000 pounds, propelling the rocket 300 to 600 kilometers at a speed of 1 to 2 km per second. America's three-stage Minuteman III, with 202,600 pounds of thrust, can cross nearly 10,000 kilometers at a speed of 7 km per second. Expensive items such as advanced alloys, computer guidance systems, and sophisticated reentry vehicles are all necessary for such performance. According to a forthcoming book by the U.S. Nuclear Weapons Cost Study Project at the Brookings Institution, the United States has spent $266 billion (in 1996 dollars) to procure 6,135 missiles, and approximately $86 billion on more than 15,200 warheads for those missiles.
It is no wonder, then, that in 1993 a CIA report conducted during Woolsey's tenure concluded that
at a minimum, North Korea would require nearly 10 years to develop an ICBM capable of delivering a chemical or biological weapon warhead and 10 to 15 years to develop an ICBM to carry a nuclear warhead. However, the probability of North Korean ICBM development is currently low because of competing demands for dwindling resources among existing high priority military programs.
In a 1996 national intelligence estimate, all of the intelligence agencies reconfirmed this report, adding that the North Korean missile program "will move slower than we projected earlier." The 1996 intelligence estimate concluded that
nearly a dozen countries other than Russia and China have ballistic missile development programs. In the view of the Intelligence Community, these programs are to serve regional goals. Making the change from a short or medium range missile--that may pose a threat to U.S. troops located abroad--to a long range ICBM capable of threatening our citizens at home, is a major technological leap . . . . [I]n the next 15 years no country other than the major declared nuclear powers will develop a ballistic missile that could threaten the contiguous 48 states or Canada.
In other words, the likelihood that the Republicans' proposed missile defense program would be necessary was exceedingly low. As this estimate undermined their case, conservative advocates accused the Clinton administration of "politicizing" the intelligence assessment to hide the truth about the missile threat. Congress mandated a special panel to critique the assessment. It backfired.
In December 1996, the panel, headed by former Bush administration CIA director Robert Gates, testified that there was "no evidence of politicization" and that they were "completely satisfied that the analysts' views were based on the evidence before them and their substantive analysis." Moreover, the panel blasted as irresponsible the "unsubstantiated allegations challenging the integrity of intelligence community analysts by those who simply disagree with their conclusions, including by members of Congress." Finally, the panel agreed that the United States is unlikely to face an ICBM threat from the Third World before 2010 "even taking into account the acquisition of foreign hardware and technical assistance, and that case is even stronger than was presented in the estimate."
No Credible Technology
The Defend America Act was also based on the premise that, as the bill states, "the United States possesses the technological means to develop and deploy defensive systems that would be highly effective in countering limited ballistic missile threats to its territory." Senator Thad Cochran (R-Mississippi) said bluntly in May 1996, "Our nation is vulnerable because President Bill Clinton refuses to allow the defensive systems to be built that would protect America." Gingrich asserted that "most Americans don't realize today that while we have the science and we have the engineering, we have not turned that into capability." Members of Congress were repeating what conservative proponents had told them. It is an article of faith among such groups that Star Wars would have worked if not for the politicians who prevented its deployment.
Effective defense against long-range missiles remains elusive, however. In tests conducted by the Department of Defense since 1982, only two hits were achieved in 13 attempts against a variety of targets and a range of interceptor systems. At this point U.S. forces cannot reliably intercept even the short-range Scuds encountered in the Persian Gulf war. Patriot missiles hit few, if any, Scuds, according to independent assessments conducted by the Israeli Defense Force, congressional investigators, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology scientists. The Patriot missile, equipped with a new "multi-mode" seeker, failed in two out of three intercept tests conducted after the war. The Army found it "operationally unacceptable." The new replacement interceptor missile, the ERINT, will not be fully tested and deployed until 1999.
Potentially more threatening than Scuds are medium-range missiles that travel up to 3,000 kilometers. No nation hostile to the United States currently has such missiles, but this is the threat represented by systems reportedly under development in North Korea. Both the administration and the Congress favor developing systems to intercept these missiles, with Congress trying to force a faster development and deployment schedule. So far, tests of the most promising candidates, the Army's Theater High-Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system and the Navy Upper Tier system, have been disappointing. While both systems are technically feasible, THAAD has failed in all three of its test intercept attempts, and the Navy has gone zero for two. These were tests against specially designed targets, with known trajectories and characteristics, well within the expected performance range of the systems. These test failures have implications for national missile defense, as both use the types of "kill vehicles" (the front-end seekers and guidance systems that would actually intercept the targets) that have been proposed for the national defense systems as well. As of this writing, the next THAAD test is set for February 1997. Still years away are tests that would put missile defenses up against realistic threats that employ warheads with decoys or jammers or that take minor twists and turns as they reenter the Earth's atmosphere to evade defenses.
Countermeasures are the Achilles' heel of all efforts to intercept ballistic missiles. They remain one of the major unsolved technical barriers to effective missile defense despite decades of effort. It is far easier and cheaper to deploy simple and effective countermeasures against defenses than it is for the defenses to respond.
This situation is one of the main reasons for Department of Defense pessimism about current technologies to defend against Chinese and Russian long-range missiles. If everything worked, a system of 100 ground-based interceptors with space-based sensor satellites might be able to intercept a few warheads. However, Deputy Secretary of Defense John White reported to Congress last June,
if the number of threats increases or the complexity of the threats increases then this basic system is likely to provide poor protection of the U.S. This poor protection is due partly to a lack of sufficient discrimination capability against complex threats, which will cause the interceptor inventory to be depleted by shooting at warhead decoys, allowing some real warheads to penetrate the defense. . . . The system is not designed to protect against an unauthorized launch which might contain a large number of warheads (e.g., a full load of warheads from a Russian [strategic ballistic missile submarine]).
In short, the best we could hope for is a system of "less than 100 per cent capability against a handful of reentry vehicles that are essentially cooperating, that is, are absent countermeasures," according to House National Security Committee staffer Douglas Necessary. "The biggest disservice we could do," he says, "would be to lull the American people into a false sense of security by deploying a placebo."
Moreover, deploying the type of thin national defense now feasible, whether at one site or several--ground-based or sea-based--would likely trigger unintended consequences. A plausible Chinese response, for example, might be to protect the perceived deterrent value of its nuclear weapons by equipping them with countermeasures to overcome the defenses or by speeding up China's planned ICBM modernization program to increase the quantity and quality of its missiles. Chinese analysts are already debating such moves. It was precisely to avoid such situations that President Richard Nixon negotiated the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty in 1972.
Military Opposition
The absence of a threat and the lack of adequate technology might have been overcome had the military strongly supported the program. But the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) firmly opposed a crash program for national missile defense. In January 1996, the JCS wrote that with "Russia and China as the only countries able to field a threat against the U.S. homeland, the funding level for [national missile defense] should be no more than $500 million per year and [theater missile defense] should be no more than $2.3 billion per year." Such funding levels would allow a "balanced and proportional" program that could meet war-fighting needs and still "save dollars that can be given back to the Services to be used for critical recapitalization programs." In other words, the JCS did not want to divert critical funds into a program that promised little real defense against a threat that might not develop for decades.
Ignoring this advice, in 1996 the Congress added $855 million to the president's $2.8 billion request for ballistic missile defense, boosting the amount earmarked for national missile defense from $508 million to $833 million. The president acceded to the funding increase in September as it was part of the overall spending bill for the Department of Defense and included a pay raise for the troops. In 1997, the president could try to rescind or reprogram these funds for other defense programs.
The administration, based on the Joint Chiefs' advice, had its own "3 plus 3" plan to develop a national missile defense system within three years and, if necessary, to then deploy the system within the next three years. If, as expected, the threat had not materialized, research would continue. Most of the funds in this almost $3 billion per year effort would be devoted to developing defenses against the near-term threat posed by Scud-type missiles and to the development of THAAD and other medium-range interceptors.
President Clinton summarized his approach and criticized the congressional plan at the Coast Guard Academy in May 1996:
Those who want us to deploy this system before we know the details and the dimensions of the threat we face I believe are wrong. I think we should not leap before we look. I believe this plan is misguided. It would waste money. It would weaken our defenses by taking money away from things we know we need right now. It would violate the arms control agreements that we have made and these agreements make us more secure. That is the wrong way to defend America.
Military leaders agree with the president. Each service is willing to develop a missile defense system with the essentially free money provided by the separate Ballistic Missile Defense Organization account but has spent little of its own budget on such efforts. The services' concerns are maintaining force structure, modernizing essential weaponry, and defending against the existing short-range missile threats to deployed troops. Moreover, they do not want the unnecessary deployment of a national defense system to derail existing nuclear arms reduction efforts. JCS chairman John Shalikashvili wrote then senator Sam Nunn (D-Georgia) in May 1996 that the Defend America Act might cause changes to or withdrawal from the ABM treaty, triggering Russian withdrawal from the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) process. "I am concerned," he wrote, "that failure of either START initiative will result in Russian retention of hundreds or even thousands more nuclear weapons thereby increasing both the costs and risks we may face."
Budget Busting
The budget-busting potential of the entire missile defense program ultimately led to its doom. Proponents had anticipated House passage of the Defend America Act in May 1996, until a required cost estimate from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) landed like an incoming Scud. The CBO estimated that the bill's requirement for a "highly effective defense of all 50 states . . . augmented over time to provide a layered defense against larger and more sophisticated ballistic missile threats" would cost up to $60 billion for the deployment of ground-based interceptors, tracking stations, satellite sensors, and hundreds of yet-to-be-invented space-based interceptors and space lasers. A July 1996 CBO report showed that the total cost of the proposed systems could reach $116 billion over 20 years, including operation and support costs.
Freshmen Republican deficit hawks in the House revolted. They refused to support a major new government program, even for national defense. After a turbulent Republican caucus session, the leadership was forced to pull the legislation from floor consideration. Despite efforts to reintroduce the bill, they could never muster sufficient support. Many members felt betrayed; they had been led to believe that the program would be virtually cost-free.
The Heritage Foundation study had stated that its elaborate system would require only $7.3 billion over requested missile defense budgets through the year 2001--about what the Senate and House had planned to add to the missile defense accounts. Gaffney underbid that estimate, saying that for $2 to $3 billion, Aegis destroyers and cruisers could be upgraded with effective antimissile interceptors. When the sponsors of the Dole-Gingrich bill were asked at their March 21 press conference for cost estimates, they could not answer at first. Finally, they said "four to five billion [dollars] between now and the end of the decade." They should have known that the types of systems they were proposing had always been estimated to cost tens to hundreds of billions of dollars. For example, SDIO officials had testified in 1991 that a system similar to that proposed in the Defend America Act--the Global Protection against Accidental Launch System put forth by President George Bush--would cost $90 billion to develop, deploy, and support for more than 15 years. The simple anti-ballistic missile system the United States built and deployed near Grand Forks, North Dakota, in the early 1970s cost $22 billion in 1996 dollars. (It was shut down by the Ford administration after only a few months because it was militarily ineffective and considered not worth the cost of operating.) The Strategic Defense Initiative program itself, directed largely by the authors of the Heritage study, consumed nearly $44 billion between 1983 and 1993 without producing any deployable systems or technological breakthroughs. Overall, according to the Brookings study, the country has spent more than $100 billion in current dollars on missile defense efforts since the mid-1950s (plus $17 billion on the Patriot system, developed separately by the Army as an antiaircraft system).
Public Apathy
The greatest weakness in the attempted Star Wars revival was that the public did not feel threatened. Unlike during the 1980s, when Reagan promised a technological shield that would protect America from Soviet missiles "just as a roof protects a family from rain," the public now had little fear of foreign threats. Just 3 per cent of the Americans polled in May 1996 thought it was likely that the United States would be attacked by nuclear missiles in the next five years.
Defense and foreign affairs overall were not much on voters' minds in the '96 campaign. Thus, there was no national anxiety that could be exploited to propel an expensive and controversial program over the objections of military and intelligence leaders and a budget-cutting Congress. Warnings of a "missile defense gap" and that "Mr. Clinton's opposition to a missile defense is one of the most negligent, short-sighted, irresponsible and potentially catastrophic policies in history," as Dole claimed in June, did not resonate with voters.
Editorial opinion was also overwhelmingly against the program, eclipsing scathing attacks on the president from conservative publications and commentators, including Safire and Irving Kristol. The New York Times, Washington Post, and Boston Globe were influential voices, and papers from members' home towns also weighed in against missile defense. "Now, here's Dole & Co.," said the Chattanooga Times, "seeking another $20 billion for that gold-plated rat hole, lest we become vulnerable to North Korea or Libya, a truly screwball idea." In the battleground state of Florida, the Miami Herald editorialized, "One of the most wasteful items [of the defense budget] is the $4 billion earmarked to construct a missile defense system by 2003. This dubious 'Son of Star Wars' could wind up costing as much as $54 billion before it finally could be deployed." Even out in the Republican West, the Idaho Falls Post Register noted, "It doesn't make any sense to be cutting budgets for students, the elderly and low-income families so that the Pentagon can have billions more to develop a missile defense system that will be outdated by the time any nation poses a threat."
Nongovernment organizations formed their own "Coalition to Reduce Nuclear Dangers" to conduct a public education campaign. They faxed, published, debated, and organized. They conducted their own focus groups and widely distributed the results: Even though most people thought America already had a missile defense system, when told that it did not, they were much more concerned about threats from terrorists than about nuclear missile attacks. The coalition's polls backed these findings. Fewer than three in 10 Americans supported the Defend America Act. Some of the Republican candidates brought to focus groups run by Gaffney were discouraged. "I'm reluctant to make it an issue because of the education effort required to make it stick with the electorate," one told the Washington Post.
The Clinton Plan
Democratic members of Congress and independent analysts had worked closely with the administration to help frame the debate and synthesize the various elements of the president's efforts to counter the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. In the end, they produced a policy approach that enjoyed the support of nearly all congressional Democrats, including important players such as Congressmen Ron Dellums (California), John Spratt (South Carolina), and Chet Edwards (Texas), as well as Senators Nunn, Carl Levin (Michigan), and Byron Dorgan (North Dakota). The key was to see missile defense as much more than a hardware program. As then national security adviser Anthony Lake summarized, "Rather than simply focus on what one analyst called 'the last 15 minutes of the problem'--the time it takes for a distant warhead to reach America's shores--we have worked hard in the here and now to reduce the chance of attack."
The administration laid out three lines of defense against missile attacks. "Our first line of defense is to prevent the spread of weapons and missile technology through a range of arms control and nonproliferation treaties, export controls and sanctions," said then secretary of defense William Perry. These include the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty, the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaties, the Framework Agreement with North Korea freezing that nation's nuclear program, the new Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), and the Missile Technology Control Regime and other export controls. Included also is a program that now intercepts missiles on the ground: The Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction program, named after its sponsors, Senators Nunn and Richard Lugar (R-Indiana), has provided more than $1.5 billion to the states of the former Soviet Union to help destroy missiles, disassemble warheads, and improve the security of nuclear storage facilities. Adroit diplomacy and Nunn-Lugar funds convinced Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine to give up thousands of nuclear warheads, missiles, and bombers that they had inherited from the Soviet Union and to join the NPT as non-nuclear weapon states. "History will record the prevention of four new nuclear weapons states from emerging out of the wreckage of the Soviet empire," Nunn has said, "as one of the greatest achievements of the decade, and as laying an important foundation for a post-Soviet world."
The second line of defense, according to Perry, "is to deter the use of these weapons by maintaining strong conventional and nuclear forces and the willingness to retaliate." The only remaining logical role for nuclear weapons is as a deterrent against the use of nuclear weapons by others. The overwhelming conventional armed forces of the United States can destroy any foe that uses or threatens to use weapons of mass destruction. Conventional forces can also be employed to seek out and destroy missiles before their launch.
Finally, Perry noted, if these two lines fail, "we must also have a third line of defense--a program to deploy systems to defeat the threat by shooting down missiles of mass destruction." This was the administration's "3 plus 3" program. Together, the three lines of defense provided a compelling plan, promoted by the administration and defended vigorously in committee hearings and floor debates by Democratic congressional leaders.
Faced with united Democrats, divided Republicans, military opposition, budget pressures, and a skeptical public, Senate and House supporters of "Defend America" conceded defeat. Last August, Senator Jon Kyl (R-Arizona) complained, "I've never thought this was a big political winner. It's too complicated, the threat is not easy enough to perceive." On September 18, with only two weeks remaining in the session, Senate majority leader Trent Lott (R-Mississippi) threw in the towel.
The Future Missile Shield Debate
The Republican leadership was ill-served by its self-appointed advisers. Their extreme positions on missile threats and technology proved as wrong and misguided as their reactionary prescriptions for America's defense. This small group of hard-right advocates seems to have a hammerlock on key congressional staff and committee leaders, having urged them to oppose START II's reduction of nuclear arsenals, the Chemical Weapons Convention's ban on poison gas, and the CTBT's block on new nuclear weapons development. Trapped in Cold War thinking, Heritage analysts even urged senators to eliminate funding for the Nunn-Lugar program in order to fund more B-2 bombers. The Senate rejected that advice, voting 100 to 0 to increase funds for this vital program, but conservative lobbying against other efforts to reduce the proliferation threats continues, as does lobbying for increases in defense spending.
There may well be efforts by pragmatic moderates in both parties to pull the congressional leadership back from its opposition to these treaties and programs, which are popular with the public and supported by military leaders. If so, these moderates should carefully review the sweeping defeat of the 1996 Defend America campaign. The Defense Department's three lines of defense proved to be much more practical than a Star Wars revival, and the intelligence agencies were ultimately much more reliable than conservative advocates. Still, funding needs to be reconciled with rhetorical priorities.
With congressional and executive-branch nurturing, significant breakthroughs could be achieved in substantially reducing the number of nuclear weapons in the world, securing Russian nuclear materials from theft or illicit sale, and frustrating rogue states' attempts to import nuclear weapon and missile technologies. Restructuring the missile defense program would save funds and accelerate the deployment of effective defensive systems. As Representative Spratt points out, "it is not for lack of funding but lack of focus that we do not have anything to deploy."
The first priority must be to deploy an effective defense against the threats that U.S. troops and allies are most likely to encounter. Fielding a thoroughly tested and improved Patriot system should help to defend against almost all current missile threats. Missiles with ranges of more than 1,000 kilometers are only a potential threat. Still, work should proceed at a measured pace on THAAD-type systems to counter them. These systems should be considered prototypes that are not to be rushed into the field against threats yet to materialize. Only after they prove themselves against real-life targets and countermeasures should such systems be deployed. Ending unnecessary duplication in both these areas could save billions. Officials should now choose one from the five systems being developed to counter Scuds. Similarly, there seems to be little logic in developing both an Army THAAD and a Navy Upper Tier.
In the fiscal 1997 budget, if the president chooses to keep the extra funds that Congress added into the ballistic missile defense accounts, he should use them to purchase additional test items and to develop a more robust test program. The easiest way to prove that defenses are technically feasible and ensure that American troops are getting the best protection possible would be to thoroughly test all proposed systems against multiple targets that employ the sort of countermeasures and sharp reentry maneuvers that the Scud missiles exhibited during the Gulf war as they broke up upon reentry. National security is not well served by fielding systems that work only against cooperative targets under ideal conditions.
While conservatives lost the debate last year, they have not quit the field. In January 1997, Senate majority leader Lott introduced the National Missile Defense Act as one of 11 Republican priorities for the new Congress. His former colleague, Secretary of Defense William Cohen, has endorsed the administration's "3 plus 3" plan. With more than $4 billion per year devoted to what is now America's largest defense program, parochial interests are propelling missile defense systems forward to production. Ideological agendas, potentially lucrative contracts, and genuine concern will continue to fuel proposals for at least a limited national missile defense system. It is critical that any renewed debate over missile defenses not stall bipartisan action on measures that will eliminate these deadly weapons before they can be launched.
Published in FOREIGN POLICY 106 (Spring 1997). Release date Sunday, March 2, 1997. Copyright 1997 by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
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Golden State warning cites repeat violation
Golden State Medical Supply CEO James Stroud found himself the recipient of a howler in late April. Whether he's a fan of the Harry Potter series and knows of the magical letter that begins yelling when opened, there's no mistaking the FDA's intent in Warning Letter 35-11.
The letter details several manufacturing violations, but it is perhaps most distinguished by two elements. First is the agency's refusal to consider comments made by the company in response to the FDA inspector's findings. The comments were late--"received more then [sic] 15 business days after the Form FDA 483 was issued," the warning letter says, without revealing whether it couldn't or wouldn't consider the late submission.
The point may be noteworthy given the timeline. The inspection occurred between Jan. 19 and Feb. 2; the company response letter date was Feb. 25, while the warning letter date was April 26. That's 17 business days between the company's receipt of the Form 483, assuming it was issued on the last day of the inspection; 16 days if you exclude President's Day, Feb. 21.
So the matter boils down to one business day over a process that spans 27.
But, rules are rules. And that brings us to the second distinguishing characteristic of this warning, an admonition concerning the company's failure to investigate deviations during a product review: "This is a repeat observation from the December 15, 2010 inspection."
Now the late letter is cast in a different light, compared with the company's apparent inaction to a violation cited nearly 20 weeks earlier.
- see Warning Letter 35-11
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A majority of Growthpoint's tenants contribute to the communities in which they operate and a number are leaders in ethical and environmental responsibility such as Linfox, Hydro Tasmania and Symbion Health.
Growthpoint's major Securityholder, GRT, is included in the JSE's Socially Responsible Investments Index.
Growthpoint Properties Australia's sole form of income is rent or rent equivalents sourced from real estate it owns*. Accordingly, none of Growthpoint Properties Australia's income is currently derived from Riba or interest and this is not expected to change given our strategy of being a "pure landlord"*.
Please note that this information is being provided to assist those seeking information for Shariah compliance purposes and is based on the information requested by its current and prospective Securityholders. Growthpoint Properties Australia does not have in-house Shariah compliance expertise nor has it taken external advice to prepare this statement.
Please email the Company Secretary at info@growthpoint.com.au if you require more information.
*Excluding transactional services and administration. Please note that bank interest on bank accounts has been excluded as this is (1) minimal and (2) negative once borrowing costs are included.


text:
Q: Flask-Admin: Export CSV I am trying to export a ModelView's data to CSV. Activating can_export = True as recommended in the docs does nothing.
I inspected my Flask-Admin installation, and even though it was the latest version (1.3.0), the source is different, so I downloaded and installed the master.zip available on GitHub.
Now, the Export button appears on my View, but clicking it generates BuildError: ('tableview.export_csv', {}, None)
I tried manually pasting the source's export_csv method into my class (which seems kludgy), but all I get is an empty CSV file.
How can I let the user download a CSV with the table view data?
My code for reference:
class DataTable(Secure):
    def __init__(self, modelclass, session, **kwargs):
        super(DataTable, self).__init__(modelclass, session, **kwargs)
        self.can_export = True
        self.column_filters = [c[0] for c in self._list_columns]
# Add view to menu
admin.add_view(DataTable(modelclass, name='TESTE', category=u'TEST'))

A: Solved:

*

*There were multiple versions of Flask-Admin installed: All of these were 1.3.0, but Flask-Admin's code on GitHub changed without changing the version number. I manually deleted offending folder my environment's site-packages.

*Flask-Admin's master.zip on GitHub does not contain the exact code as the website. This is not obvious, and I only found out because I needed a feature that was listed in the Documentation, but did not actually exist on master.zip, only on the Web version.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
# ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
#
# Copyright Microsoft Corporation
# Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
# you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
# You may obtain a copy of the License at
# http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
# Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
# distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
# WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
# See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
# limitations under the License.
# ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

<#
.SYNOPSIS
Tests getting diagnostic settings
#>
function Test-GetAzureRmDiagnosticSetting
{
    try
    {
        # Test
        $actual = Get-AzureRmDiagnosticSetting -ResourceId /subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourcegroups/insights-integration/providers/test.shoebox/testresources2/pstest0000eastusR2 -name service

		Assert-NotNull $actual "Null result #1"

		Assert-AreEqual "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/montest3470" $actual.StorageAccountId
		Assert-AreEqual "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.ServiceBus/namespaces/ns1/authorizationrules/ar1" $actual.EventHubName
		Assert-AreEqual 1            $actual.Metrics.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $true        $actual.Metrics[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "00:01:00"   $actual.Metrics[0].Timegrain
		Assert-AreEqual 2            $actual.Logs.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $true        $actual.Logs[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog1"   $actual.Logs[0].Category
		Assert-AreEqual $true        $actual.Logs[1].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog2"   $actual.Logs[1].Category
		Assert-AreEqual "workspace1" $actual.WorkspaceId
		Assert-Null $actual.ServiceBusRuleId
		Assert-AreEqual "service"    $actual.Name

        $actual = Get-AzureRmDiagnosticSetting -ResourceId /subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourcegroups/insights-integration/providers/test.shoebox/testresources2/pstest0000eastusR2

		Assert-NotNull $actual "Null result #2"
		$actual = $actual[0]

		Assert-AreEqual "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/montest3470" $actual.StorageAccountId
		Assert-AreEqual "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.ServiceBus/namespaces/ns1/authorizationrules/ar1" $actual.EventHubName
		Assert-AreEqual 1            $actual.Metrics.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $true        $actual.Metrics[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "00:01:00"   $actual.Metrics[0].Timegrain
		Assert-AreEqual 2            $actual.Logs.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $true        $actual.Logs[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog1"   $actual.Logs[0].Category
		Assert-AreEqual $true        $actual.Logs[1].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog2"   $actual.Logs[1].Category
		Assert-AreEqual "workspace1" $actual.WorkspaceId
		Assert-Null $actual.ServiceBusRuleId
		Assert-AreEqual "service"    $actual.Name
    }
    finally
    {
        # Cleanup
        # No cleanup needed for now
    }
}

<#
.SYNOPSIS
Tests setting diagnostics
#>
function Test-SetAzureRmDiagnosticSettingUpdate
{
    try
    {
	    $actual = Set-AzureRmDiagnosticSetting -ResourceId /subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourcegroups/insights-integration/providers/test.shoebox/testresources2/pstest0000eastusR2 -StorageAccountId /subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/montest3470 -Enabled $true

		Assert-AreEqual $actual.StorageAccountId "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/montest3470"
		Assert-AreEqual "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.ServiceBus/namespaces/ns1/authorizationrules/ar1" $actual.EventHubName
		Assert-AreEqual 1           $actual.Metrics.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $true       $actual.Metrics[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "00:01:00"  $actual.Metrics[0].Timegrain
		Assert-AreEqual 2           $actual.Logs.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $true       $actual.Logs[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog1"  $actual.Logs[0].Category
		Assert-AreEqual $true       $actual.Logs[1].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog2"  $actual.Logs[1].Category
		Assert-Null $actual.ServiceBusRuleId
		Assert-AreEqual "service"   $actual.Name
    }
    finally
    {
        # Cleanup
        # No cleanup needed for now
    }
}

<#
.SYNOPSIS
Tests setting diagnostics
#>
function Test-SetAzureRmDiagnosticSettingCreate
{
    try
    {
	    # assumes there is no diagnostic settting called service for the given resource
	    $actual = Set-AzureRmDiagnosticSetting -ResourceId /subscriptions/9cf7cc0a-0ba1-4624-bc82-97e1ee25dc45/resourceGroups/system-sas-test/providers/Microsoft.KeyVault/vaults/myCanaryKeyVaultCUSEAUP -StorageAccountId /subscriptions/9cf7cc0a-0ba1-4624-bc82-97e1ee25dc45/resourceGroups/vnet-east-test/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/vnetcnarytestcuseuap2 -Enabled $true

		Assert-AreEqual $actual.StorageAccountId "/subscriptions/9cf7cc0a-0ba1-4624-bc82-97e1ee25dc45/resourceGroups/vnet-east-test/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/vnetcnarytestcuseuap2"
		Assert-AreEqual 1            $actual.Metrics.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $true        $actual.Metrics[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "AllMetrics" $actual.Metrics[0].Category
		Assert-AreEqual 1            $actual.Logs.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $true        $actual.Logs[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "AuditEvent" $actual.Logs[0].Category
		Assert-AreEqual "service"   $actual.Name
    }
    finally
    {
        # Cleanup
        # No cleanup needed for now
    }
}

<#
.SYNOPSIS
Tests setting diagnostics
#>
function Test-SetAzureRmDiagnosticSettingWithRetention
{
    try
    {
	    $actual = Set-AzureRmDiagnosticSetting -ResourceId /subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourcegroups/insights-integration/providers/test.shoebox/testresources2/pstest0000eastusR2 -StorageAccountId /subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/montest3470 -Enabled $true -RetentionEnabled $true -RetentionInDays 90

		Assert-AreEqual $actual.StorageAccountId "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/montest3470"
		Assert-AreEqual "workspace1" $actual.WorkspaceId
		Assert-AreEqual "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.ServiceBus/namespaces/ns1/authorizationrules/ar1" $actual.EventHubName
		Assert-AreEqual 1           $actual.Metrics.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $true       $actual.Metrics[0].Enabled "Metrics[0]"
		Assert-AreEqual "00:01:00"  $actual.Metrics[0].Timegrain
		Assert-AreEqual $true       $actual.Metrics[0].RetentionPolicy.Enabled "Metric[0].RetentionPolicy"
		Assert-AreEqual 90          $actual.Metrics[0].RetentionPolicy.Days
		Assert-AreEqual 2           $actual.Logs.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $true       $actual.Logs[0].Enabled "Logs[0]"
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog1"  $actual.Logs[0].Category
		Assert-AreEqual $true       $actual.Logs[0].RetentionPolicy.Enabled "Logs[0].RetentionPolicy"
		Assert-AreEqual 90          $actual.Logs[0].RetentionPolicy.Days
		Assert-AreEqual $true       $actual.Logs[1].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog2"  $actual.Logs[1].Category
		Assert-AreEqual $true       $actual.Logs[1].RetentionPolicy.Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual 90          $actual.Logs[1].RetentionPolicy.Days
		Assert-Null $actual.ServiceBusRuleId
		Assert-AreEqual "service"   $actual.Name
    }
    finally
    {
        # Cleanup
        # No cleanup needed for now
    }
}

<#
.SYNOPSIS
Tests setting diagnostics for categories only
#>
function Test-SetAzureRmDiagnosticSetting-CategoriesOnly
{
    try
    {
	    $actual = Set-AzureRmDiagnosticSetting -ResourceId /subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourcegroups/insights-integration/providers/test.shoebox/testresources2/pstest0000eastusR2 -StorageAccountId /subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/montest3470 -Enabled $true -Categories TestLog2

		Assert-AreEqual $actual.StorageAccountId "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/montest3470"
		Assert-AreEqual "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.ServiceBus/namespaces/ns1/authorizationrules/ar1" $actual.EventHubName
		Assert-AreEqual 1            $actual.Metrics.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $false       $actual.Metrics[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "00:01:00"   $actual.Metrics[0].Timegrain
		Assert-AreEqual 2            $actual.Logs.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $false       $actual.Logs[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog1"   $actual.Logs[0].Category
		Assert-AreEqual $true        $actual.Logs[1].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog2"   $actual.Logs[1].Category
		Assert-AreEqual "workspace1" $actual.WorkspaceId
		Assert-Null $actual.ServiceBusRuleId
		Assert-AreEqual "service"    $actual.Name
    }
    finally
    {
        # Cleanup
        # No cleanup needed for now
    }
}

<#
.SYNOPSIS
Tests setting diagnostics for categories only
#>
function Test-SetAzureRmDiagnosticSetting-TimegrainsOnly
{
    try
    {
	    $actual = Set-AzureRmDiagnosticSetting -ResourceId /subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourcegroups/insights-integration/providers/test.shoebox/testresources2/pstest0000eastusR2 -StorageAccountId /subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/montest3470 -Enabled $true -Timegrains PT1M

		Assert-AreEqual $actual.StorageAccountId "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/montest3470"
		Assert-AreEqual "workspace1" $actual.WorkspaceId
		Assert-AreEqual "/subscriptions/1a66ce04-b633-4a0b-b2bc-a912ec8986a6/resourceGroups/montest/providers/Microsoft.ServiceBus/namespaces/ns1/authorizationrules/ar1" $actual.EventHubName
		Assert-AreEqual 1            $actual.Metrics.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $true        $actual.Metrics[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "00:01:00"   $actual.Metrics[0].Timegrain
		Assert-AreEqual 2            $actual.Logs.Count
		Assert-AreEqual $false       $actual.Logs[0].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog1"   $actual.Logs[0].Category
		Assert-AreEqual $false       $actual.Logs[1].Enabled
		Assert-AreEqual "TestLog2"   $actual.Logs[1].Category
		Assert-Null $actual.ServiceBusRuleId
		Assert-AreEqual "service"    $actual.Name
    }
    finally
    {
        # Cleanup
        # No cleanup needed for now
    }
}

# TODO add more complicated scenarios after we have a definitive subscription

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


End-user companies are still focused on products to fill their security gaps, rather than policies to make sure the gaps never open.
Voice control poses risk to Vista users, if they're really, really incautious; Symantec takes to YouTube to publicize zero-day flaw.
A new module in Q1 Labs' QRadar monitor could help VoIP service providers maintain security and quality of service on IP telephony networks.
IM and chat clients pose phishing and malware threats, so security managers are using new software to lock out the bad guys without cutting off employees or customers.
A December attack breached an unspecified number of customer records from a number of TJX stores in the U.S., Canada, Puerto Rico and Ireland.
Most worry about risks that apply to Skype and other consumer products, not enterprise VoIP; good network security equals good VoIP security.
End-user companies love the idea of network access control systems, but technological and process snags are stopping deployments in their tracks.
Rather than contract as filters improve, the mail filtering market is expanding along with the explosive growth of spam, spim and botnets.
Microsoft will complete its turnaround on its position about third-party security products by releasing in SP1 rich APIs ISVs can use to tie in to base Vista security.
Security experts warn that spammers are harvesting personal information from public sites and using it to make phishing attacks more targeted and effective.
Worms that use IM as transport are staging record numbers of attacks on U.S. corporations.
Microsoft is still defending Vista security amid charges from McAfee and Symantec, blaming "IE 7 flaw" in Outlook Express instead.
Microsoft made major improvements in Vista security, but those features could actually put off customers who'd rather use third-party software and their existing security policies.
Microsoft defers to security ISV complaints; will improve access to Vista kernel.


text:
14 Cities in LA County Issue No-Confidence Resolutions Against Soros-Backed DA
May 25, 2021 Winter Watch Around the Web, Crime, Politics, US News 0
By Vanessa Serena | 20 May 2021
THE EPOCH TIMES — Fourteen cities in Los Angeles county have issued no-confidence resolutions against District Attorney George Gascón, claiming his policies have gone too far.
Diamond Bar's city council passed a no-confidence motion during its May 18 meeting, with some councilmembers wishing to address Gascón's perceived leniency to horrific crimes throughout the county.
"Gascón is making it less safe for our residents and businesses," Diamond Bar Mayor Nancy Lyon told The Epoch Times. "He's more concerned about the criminals than the victims. You can't do special enhancements on things like hate crimes, elder abuse, child physical abuse, trauma, [or] human trafficking.
"Even if they're 17 1/2 years old and they committed a double murder and tortured people, they can't be tried as an adult. … and he's no longer going to seek the death penalty in any case."
The residents' response to the agenda item was "overwhelming," Lyon said, adding that she's never seen the community more involved. While most residents were in favor of the no-confidence vote, a few voiced opposition to it. […]
Faux Democracy & Voting Fraud
George Soros Skullduggery
'Decolonize your bookshelf': Leaked documents show defense contractor Raytheon uses critical race theory
July 9, 2021 Winter Watch 2
Illegal Foreign Voting in Virginia Covered Up by Soros-Backed Democratic Officials, Says Report
Antifa Calls for 'National Border Resistance' in Texas, Demands White 'Accomplices' Pay for 'Marginalized People' to Get There
Two Freemasons' Lodges Operating Secretly at Westminster
'Black Baron' Tank Ace Michael Wittmann: The Greatest Unsung Soldier of All Time
Cecil Rhodes and His Warmongering Buggery Hegemony
The Dönmeh: The Middle East's Most Whispered Secret (Part I)
Prostitution, Blackmail and the Presidency


Most development organizations and research institutions now recognize the importance of including gender analysis and research in their work. This course will enable participants to develop an understanding of key gender concepts and the methods that can facilitate the design, collection and analysis of gender-sensitive data.
Sessions will link theory to practice, facilitate sharing of experience and incorporate individual and collective learning. Mentoring support will be given to all participants as a follow-up to the course.
Basic concepts of gender and gender research.
Understanding intra- and inter-household relations, social institutions and processes of social change and well-being.
The epistemological foundations of social science research.
Evaluating alternate methodologies (longitudinal) research, panel datasets, case studies and methods.
Developing a research design using quantitative and qualitative methods to access different data.


I would put Demandbase here along with firms like Active Conversion, Hubspot, iHance, Leadlander, Sales Genius, and Zoominfo. (I'm PS – You included HubSpot in the list of "outbound" marketing systems, and I just wanted to make clear that the complete opposite is true – HubSpot is an inbound marketing system. Finally, for those that don't know me by name – I want to point out I am 100% biased since I work at HubSpot. I have checked out Hubspot and LeadLander.
4) "Pure play" lead management – this group is lead by Eloqua , but there are a LOT of firms throwing their hat into this ring including Vtrenz, Hubspot, Manticore, Market2Lead, Marketo, LoopFuse, einsof, iHance, Precience, among many others.


Gordon Strachan said he had all but decided before the final Euro 2016 qualifier with Gibraltar he would stay on as Scotland manager.
Strachan's side finished fourth in their qualifying group behind Germany, Poland and the Republic of Ireland.
However, Strachan was sure he wanted another chance to try and lead Scotland to their first finals since France 98.
"I was 80 or 90% sure that I wanted to do it again," Strachan told BBC Scotland's Sportsound.
There were doubts over Strachan's future after Scotland failed to beat Poland in their penultimate qualifier, which meant their European Championship hopes were over before the final game.
That did not stop Strachan being given a hero's reception by the Scotland support during the 6-0 win in Faro.
"There's no doubt about it the European Championships are going to be worse off without us being there."
Strachan, 58, also believes his team are better than many of the sides who qualified for the finals in France next summer.
"I would say definitely, absolutely definitely," said Strachan. "It just so happens you can be in a tougher section. Second and third in our group couldn't beat us.
"We were 10 seconds away from beating Poland, and Ireland never beat us, but they produced results against Germany.
"Wales have got (Gareth) Bale and (Aaron) Ramsey who are two world class players. If you take (Robert) Lewandowski out of the Poland team, we qualify."
Scotland lost just three times in the group - twice to world champions Germany. Strachan though feels it was the 1-0 defeat to Georgia in Tbilisi that made the difference, but said he would not have done anything differently.
"It came down to seven passes against Georgia," he said. "People say we could have played quicker - no we couldn't. When teams play everyone behind the ball you have to take your time, because you can not move the ball quickly if they do not come at you quickly, it's impossible to do that.
"For anyone to say otherwise is nonsense. I'll take anyone to a training session and show you how to slow a game down.
"We played in the first half against Georgia like we did against Poland. The difference being (Steven) Fletcher's pass got to (Ikechi) Anya and Anya's pass made it to (Shaun) Maloney. We got to where Anya was seven times against Georgia but we could not produce the pass."
The World Cup qualifiers begin in September with Scotland facing England, Slovakia, Slovenia, Lithuania and Malta in their attempt to make the tournament in Russia, and Strachan has challenged players on the periphery of the squad to prove they are worthy of a place.
"I will not just put people in who, one, do not deserve a Scotland cap, and secondly are not better than the ones we've got already," he said.
"People will be given a chance, but people have been given a chance before by coming to the squad, but if you're not better (than the ones already in the squad) then you can't stay in the squad."


Shhh dads, please, keep it down!
Go back inside the sports bar, onto the golf course, into your fishing boats, or downstairs into your man cave. I realize there are only a few places men spend their time, but hide wherever you can, lest the brain trust at Baby Einstein figure out that there is indeed such a thing as a man cave, or that dads even exist. Don't blow this, or you might end up having to (swallow hard) raise your children.
Think I exaggerate? I dare you to visit babyeinstein.com and try to find a dad cuddling-with-child. Although I can't say I covered every page, I did come across one lone male somewhere buried in the "For parents" section. However, the ratio must be something like 1,000,000-to-1.
Either Baby Einstein is run entirely by women, or a by management staff who foolishly believes women make all purchase decisions, or their stock photography database simply includes no males. Who am I kidding, it's probably all of the above.
Albert Einstein's name is synonymous with intelligence, but I think even he'd be scratching his head over this stuff.


text:
package com.hjy.pinnedheaderlistview;

import android.content.Context;
import android.graphics.Canvas;
import android.util.AttributeSet;
import android.view.MotionEvent;
import android.widget.HeaderViewListAdapter;
import android.widget.ListAdapter;

/**
 * 支持索引滑动
 *
 * @author houjinyun
 */
public class IndexablePinnedHeaderListView extends PinnedHeaderListView{

	private IndexScroller mIndexScroller;

	/**
	 * @param context Context
	 * @param attrs 属性值
	 */
	public IndexablePinnedHeaderListView(Context context, AttributeSet attrs) {
		super(context, attrs);
		init();
	}

	private void init() {
		mIndexScroller = new IndexScroller(getContext(), this);
	}

	@Override
	public void draw(Canvas canvas) {
		super.draw(canvas);
		if(mIndexScroller != null) {
			mIndexScroller.draw(canvas);
		}
	}

	/**
	 * adapter must implement SectionIndexer interface.
	 */
	public final void setAdapter(ListAdapter adapter) {
		super.setAdapter(adapter);
		if(mIndexScroller != null)
			mIndexScroller.setAdapter(adapter);
	}

	@Override
	protected void onSizeChanged(int w, int h, int oldw, int oldh) {
		super.onSizeChanged(w, h, oldw, oldh);
		if(mIndexScroller != null)
			mIndexScroller.onSizeChanged(w, h, oldw, oldh);
	}

	@Override
	public boolean onTouchEvent(MotionEvent ev) {
		if(mIndexScroller != null && mIndexScroller.onTouchEvent(ev))
			return true;
		return super.onTouchEvent(ev);
	}

	@Override
	public void setSelection(int position) {
		ListAdapter adapter = getAdapter();
		if(adapter instanceof HeaderViewListAdapter) {
			position += ((HeaderViewListAdapter) adapter).getHeadersCount();
		}
		super.setSelection(position);
	}

	public IndexScroller getIndexScroller() {
		return mIndexScroller;
	}

}


Following the first small non-coding RNA identification in 1993, accumulated knowledge on the biogenesis, homeostasis and functional roles of microRNAs in different physiological and pathophysiological conditions has been discovered. MicroRNAs act through epigenetic regulation of gene expression. MiR-34a is a member of the MiR-34 family that is involved in p53 pathways, and is implicated in cell death/survival signaling. MiR-34a is associated with G1 cell cycle arrest, senescence and apoptosis, thereby possessing a tumor suppressor activity. Deregulation of MiR-34a has been reported in several types of cancers. MiR-34a downregulation has been correlated with cancer multidrug resistance (MDR), which is a major challenge for successful cancer chemotherapy. MiR-34a mimetic agents have been shown to attenuate drug resistance in different cancer cell lines. This review focuses on the in vitro, experimental and clinical findings dealing with the role of miR-34a downregulation in MDR, and potential therapeutic opportunities arising from this role of miR-34a.
Keywords: Cancer, chemotherapy, MicroRNA, miR-34a, multidrug resistance.
Keywords:Cancer, chemotherapy, MicroRNA, miR-34a, multidrug resistance.
Abstract:Following the first small non-coding RNA identification in 1993, accumulated knowledge on the biogenesis, homeostasis and functional roles of microRNAs in different physiological and pathophysiological conditions has been discovered. MicroRNAs act through epigenetic regulation of gene expression. MiR-34a is a member of the MiR-34 family that is involved in p53 pathways, and is implicated in cell death/survival signaling. MiR-34a is associated with G1 cell cycle arrest, senescence and apoptosis, thereby possessing a tumor suppressor activity. Deregulation of MiR-34a has been reported in several types of cancers. MiR-34a downregulation has been correlated with cancer multidrug resistance (MDR), which is a major challenge for successful cancer chemotherapy. MiR-34a mimetic agents have been shown to attenuate drug resistance in different cancer cell lines. This review focuses on the in vitro, experimental and clinical findings dealing with the role of miR-34a downregulation in MDR, and potential therapeutic opportunities arising from this role of miR-34a.


text:
MDEpiNet.org
The Comprehensive Coalition to improve medical device safety
CRN Community of Practice
Patient Partners
Sharon-Lise T. Normand, PhD
Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, MA
Stakeholder Council Member, MDEpiNet
Dr. Normand is Professor of Health Care Policy (Biostatistics) in the Department of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School and Professor in the Department of Biostatistics at the Harvard School of Public Health. Together with Dr. Fred Resnic, Lahey Hospital & Medical Center, she co-directs the MDEpiNet Methodology Center where statistical methodology for assessing medical device safety and effectiveness is developed and applied.
Dr. Normand's research focuses on the development of statistical methods for health services and outcomes research, primarily using Bayesian approaches, including the evaluation of medical devices in randomized and non-randomized settings for both pre- and post-market assessments, causal inference, provider profiling, evidence synthesis, item response theory, and latent variables analyses. Her application areas include cardiovascular disease, severe mental illness, hip degeneration, and medical technology diffusion. She served on several task forces for the American Heart Association and the American College of Cardiology, was a consultant to the US Food and Drug Administration's Circulatory System Devices Advisory Panel after serving a four-year term on the panel, was a member of the Medicare Evidence Development and Coverage Advisory Committee, and is Director of Mass-DAC, a data coordinating center that monitors the quality of all adult cardiac surgeries and coronary interventions in all Massachusetts' acute care hospitals.
Dr. Normand was the 2010 President of the Eastern North American Region of the International Biometrics Society and the first Vice Chair of the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute's Methodology Committee (2010-2012). She earned her Ph.D. in Biostatistics from the University of Toronto, holds a Masters of Science as well as a Bachelor of Science degree in Statistics, and completed a post-doctoral fellowship in Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School. She is a Fellow of the American Statistical Association, a Fellow of the American College of Cardiology, a Fellow of the American Heart Association, and an Associate of the Society of Thoracic Surgeons. In 2011, Dr. Normand was awarded the American Statistical Association Health Policy Statistics Section's Long Term Excellence Award; in 2012, the American Heart Association's Distinguished Scientist Award; and in 2013 elected to the Society for Research Synthesis Methodology.
Abelson, Jonathan
Armstrong, Richard A.
Azzone, Vanessa
Banerjee, Samprit
Barham, Britt
Baskin, Kevin
Behrendt, Christian
Berlin, Jesse
Berliner, Elise
Blake, Kathleen
Brar, Sandeep
Brennan, J. Matthew
Briggs, Emma
Brindis, Ralph
Campbell, Bruce
Caños, Daniel
Chughtai, Bilal
Clifford, Tammy
Cowley, Terrie
Cronenwett, Jack L.
Curfman, Gregory
Daniel, Gregory W.
Debus, E. Sebastian
Donath, Katia Shimabukuro
Dressen, Roberta A. "Bobbie"
Drozda, Joseph P.
Durack, Jeremy C.
Edwards, Fred H
Eloff, Benjamin C.
Etkin, Caryn
F-H
Farb, Andrew
Fearnot, Neal E.
Feigal, David
Feinglass, Shamiram
Flack, Marilyn Neder
Franklin, Patricia
Fraser, Blair A.
George, Elisabeth
Gilfillan, Richard J.
Goodney, Philip
Gross, Thomas
Hall, Ralph F.
Helwig, Amy
Henninger, Joshua
Hewitt, Kathleen
Ho, Martin
Hsu, Serena Wei-Chun
Hu, Jim
Jalbert, Jessica
Kong, David
Kessler, Larry
Knezovich, Jeffrey
Krucoff, Mitchell
Kuntz, Richard E.
Laschinger, John C.
Lauer, Michael
LaViolette, Paul
Lewallen, David G.
Lim, Christina
Loyo-Berrios, Nilsa
Mack, Michael
Maddern, Guy
Mao, Jialin
Marinac-Dabic, Danica
Matheny, Michael
Mauri, Laura
McCauley, Janet
McCollister-Slipp, Anna
McCourt, Brian
McCulloch, Peter
Meltzer, Andrew
Merino, MD
Milsom, Jeffrey
Mitchell, Kristi
Morales, Jose Pablo
Morice, Marie-Claude
Naftel, David C.
Nellisen, Robert G. H. H.
Normand, Sharon-Lise
Pappas, Gregory
Parkinson, John
Patrick-Lake, Bray
Paul, Subroto
Paxton, Liz
Plouhar, Pamela L.
Reed, Terrie
Resnic, Frederic
Rising, Josh
Robbins, Susan
Ross, Eve
Rowland, Stephen
Rumsfeld, John S.
Sase, Kazuhiro
Schrag, Dwight
Schwartz, Lisa
Secunda, Jeffrey
Sedrakyan, Art
Selby, Joe V.
Shein, Mitchell
Sheldon, Murray
Simonyan, Vahan
Skapik, Julia
Slipp, Anna McCollister
Smith, Scott R.
Stein, Kenneth M.
Steliac, Marta
Su, L. Joseph
Tcheng, James
Thatcher, Robert J.
Thompson, Gary
Torosyan, Yelizaveta (Lisa)
Waksman, Ron
White, Roseann S.
Wise, Leslie
Yeh, Robert W.
Yeo, Heather
Zuckerman, Diana
Mission with login
The mission of the MDEpiNet Public Private Partnerships is to develop and implement innovative methods and national/international infrastructure for robust studies and surveillance to improve our understanding of medical device safety and effectiveness throughout device life-cycle. Our main objectives are to improve how medical device information is utilized throughout the life cycle of a device and to synthesize evidence on how medical devices are used throughout their life cycle. To accomplish our mission and objectives we have brought together an array of diverse stakeholders, including other government agencies, academia, health care industry organizations, and patient and consumer groups. These stakeholders bring to the table strategic resources, skills, and expertise from a variety of domains and requires participation from all . Read More...
WordPress is a content management system and should not be used to upload any PHI as it is not an environment for which we exercise oversight, meaning you the author are responsible for the content you post. Please use this system accordingly.


The New Eve Fertility Method for Getting Pregnant After a Miscarriage or Stillbirth.
What a pleasure it is to welcome Bridget Osho, who has just released her new book, The New Eve Fertility Method for Getting Pregnant After a Miscarriage or Stillbirth. Bridget is more than a writer, she's a woman with a mission to help other women overcome the difficulties facing them after pregnancy loss. For any woman who has undergone this traumatic experience, this book, and perhaps the institute she founded in the UK, Cherie Mamma, may be a wonderful new direction to consider. Welcome Bridget!
Q: What is the Cherie Mamma Institute?
A: The Cherie Mamma Institute is an organization designed to help women heal from pregnancy loss so that they can conceive healthy babies. We do this by helping them create healing lifestyles and regain their natural feminine balance, usually disrupted by pregnancy loss.
The primary mission of the Institute is to help women who have lost pregnancies grow healthy and happy families. Part of our mission also includes research into the understanding and prevention of pregnancy loss and bringing the topic into the public domain so that it stops being a taboo subject.
Q: When you lost a pregnancy at seven months gestation, that event changed your life on many levels. What would you say has been the most profound lesson you've learned in your journey so far?
A: My pregnancy loss led to me to seek a deeper meaning to my life, my calling, and the calling of every woman. I have learned so many life lessons on this journey, but I think that the most profound lesson I have learned is that every woman is called to achieve her emotional, mental, and physical potential. Once she does this, she can be happy and fulfilled.
I believe that it is not just that women can have it all, it is that women need to have it all, and many fertility problems would be prevented if women achieved optimal physical, mental, and emotional well-being. We cannot give what we do not have. Out of the fullness of potential we can become mums, grow our families, and make an impact in the world. That is why it is so important that women who have lost their pregnancies are given the support they need to heal and become the best versions of themselves.
Q: What unexpected lessons have you learned from the women you've helped?
A: I have learned that it is not enough to know what to do to help them, you also have to know how to help in a way that empowers them. Many women who have been trying to conceive or lost pregnancies would do anything to have their healthy babies, but after trying different solutions for so long with little success, they can start to lose faith in themselves, which translates to loss of faith in other solutions.
It is an unconscious way of protecting themselves from false hope. In order to help them—and this applies to everybody who needs any form of transformation, such as weight loss, career growth, etc.—one needs to help them believe in themselves again. People need to believe that what they want can still happen for them and they cannot give up. It is about empowering them with hope.
Q: When you wrote your latest book, The New Eve Fertility Method, what were you hoping to accomplish that the Institute couldn't or hadn't?
A: I am well aware that not every woman who needs to heal from pregnancy loss will be able to get direct support through the Institute. Through the book, more women will get to know that they can truly heal from pregnancy loss and grow their families.
Q: Could you explain what a rainbow and an angel baby are?
A: An angel baby is what some people call babies who have been lost during pregnancy. They are believed to be little angels in heaven. Some people go as far as to see them as their little guardian angels who are alive, well, and happy. It is a great source of comfort to families who have lost pregnancies if they believe in life after death. I know this helped me a lot when I lost my pregnancy. It still does.
A rainbow baby is what some people call babies conceived after a pregnancy loss and who was born alive and healthy. It denotes the rainbow after a storm in the same way we see rainbows in the sky during/after the rain.
Q: What is the difference between the method you outline in the book and other methods women may have tried?
A: There are two major differences between the New Eve Fertility Method and many other methods.
The first is the emphasis on the totality of what goes into making a woman herself. Too often other fertility methods and approaches focus mainly on the woman's body. The New Eve Fertility Method is based on the principle that when a woman loses a pregnancy, it is her whole world that has been affected; from her mind, to her emotions, to her body, her relationships, and even her work. This method focuses on helping her to pick up the pieces in all these aspects of her life so that she can truly heal.
The second difference that sets The New Eve Fertility Method apart is the emphasis on trying to heal naturally. Our bodies are naturally designed to conceive and give birth to healthy babies. It is when our natural balance is compromised that fertility becomes a struggle. For many women, this imbalance can be corrected naturally, and even when medical solutions are needed, a natural approach can make them even more effective.
Q: Writing a non-fiction book is quite an undertaking. What have you learned about the processes of non-fiction writing and publishing that you didn't know before?
A: There is a lot more to writing a book than having ideas! For one, you need to make sure that you can guide a reader from little or no knowledge on the topic to being very knowledgeable. It means you need to be able to put yourself in the shoes of your reader.
Another thing is that you cannot do it on your own, you need at least another pair of eyes to read your work and you also need to have an effective marketing plan, otherwise your book will not get into the hands of the people who really need it.
Q: What do you estimate is the success/failure rate for women who come to you and the Institute for help?
A: It is difficult to look at my work in terms of rates, since women who approach us have different needs. Some women need to heal physically, e.g. improve their menstrual cycles. Some women need the emotional support to help them heal from pregnancy loss. While we support women to conceive healthy babies, our primary focus is to help them heal emotionally, physically, and mentally from pregnancy loss.
To this end, we have had women whose menstrual cycles have resumed after months of no periods, women who have conceived and delivered healthy babies, and women who feel that they have been given a new lease of life and hope.
Q: What would you say is the biggest misconception many women and health care providers believe about fertility and conception that is not true?
A: I think the biggest misconception that women and health care providers have is ignoring the influence of lifestyle in conception efforts. I have found that there is a large dependency on medications and/or supplements and not enough on wholesome diets, stress management, mental healing, and so on. I believe this is the reason so many women struggle with little success to conceive.
Q: Have you encountered any push-back from the medical community, or are they supportive of your efforts to help educate women regarding fertility and conception?
A: I have not experienced any push-back from the medical community. I am not expecting to, since my work does not replace their work. If anything, our work complements theirs. Most women who need medical solutions will benefit from the support the Institute gives in terms of stress management, natural diets, and exercises, among other things. I have had the support of a few doctors who understand what I am doing and know that women benefit from it.
Q: In your book you address fear and guilt. In your opinion, how prevalent are these feelings in women who have not been able to successfully carry a pregnancy to term? Is it a reflection of societal or personal issues?
A: Fear and guilt are very prevalent in women who have experienced pregnancy loss. There is the fear that they might never carry a baby to term and never have a baby. There is also the guilt that something they did or didn't do contributed to the loss of their baby, since they were their baby's primary caregivers.
In my opinion, the fear and guilt that many women after pregnancy loss experience is largely a reflection of their understanding that as a mother they feel responsible for their children. That is not a bad thing. Every mum feels this way. Most women would feel guilty if their children had an accident at home, even if it was clearly not their fault. The problem arises when the woman is not able to move on from that guilt and recognize that these problems are not their fault.
I think society can help women with this. The fact that women find it hard to talk about pregnancy loss exacerbates the fear and guilt. They can come to believe that something is really wrong with them and they just might be bad mums.
Q: What's next for you, Bridget?
A: Simply to reach out to more women who can benefit from the New Eve Therapy Method. I am working on collaborating with more people to spread the message to every woman who has lost her pregnancy and let her know that she can still create the family she wants. I hope to do so by guest-posting, interviews like this one, seminars, and joint venture programs.


Talking down to older adults is not only disrespectful, it can be detrimental.
"Elderspeak" occurs when an older adult is spoken to as if they are a child or a pet with limited understanding. This phenomenon is not uncommon in interactions with health care workers, service personnel, neighbors, or even family members. In a recent article in the Chicago Tribune, Anna I. Corwin, an anthropologist and professor at St. Mary's College of California in Moraga, noted that elderspeak "sounds like baby talk or simplified speech" and is, in fact, a symptom of how older adults are often perceived.
According to Becca Levy, a researcher on a study on the effects of elderspeak at Yale University, the practice "sends a message that the (elder) is incompetent and begins a negative downward spiral for older adults who react with decreased self-esteem, depression and withdrawal." Elderspeak has also been shown to increase the likelihood of challenging behaviors in those with dementia and is correlated with poorer health outcomes is general.
In its guide "Communicating With Older Adults," the Gerontological Society of America says you don't need to change your vocabulary to use simplified words. As a general rule, older adults maintain their existing vocabulary or continue to improve it. They have no greater problem understanding complicated words than do members of other age groups.
The solution is straightforward: speaking to an elder should be no different than speaking to any other adult. Word choices matter. Instead of 'honey' or 'dear', elders want to be addressed with a title and their last name: "Ms. Smith" or, with permission, by their first name. Often times people are unaware of behaviors and style of communication; taking time to reflect on speech will enhance and foster respectful and empowering relationships.


The international South Caucasus media forum entitled "The role of the media in building confidence in the region" will be held in Tbilisi on September 4-7, where lectures of prominent figures of journalism and political science for young journalists and observers will be featured.
The forum will bring together leading experts in the field of the media industry, journalists, government officials and bloggers from Georgia, Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia. The main topic of discussion during the forum will be the features of the regional political culture, traditions and current trends in the activities of the media of the South Caucasus states, the political and legal foundations of their status, as well as the potential of media communities in overcoming conflicts and strengthening stability in the region.
The main speakers will be Deputy Chairman of the Union of Journalists of Russia, Alexei Vishnevetsky, ITAR-TASS Military Observer Victor Litovkin, President of the International Council of the Association of Russian Society Researchers (AIPRO-XXI) Gennady Bordyugov and Deputy Head of Sputnik Georgia Tato Lashishvili.


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An ancient Buddhist tower in east China's Jiangsu Province, which was a world wonder during the medieval ages, will enshrine part of the skull bone of Sakyamuni, the founder of Buddhism.
The Buddha's remains, or sarira, would be worshipped in the tower after workers rebuild the tower by the end of 2011, said Kong Li, an official with the city government of Nanjing on Thursday.
The rebuilding work is to begin at the tower's original site this year, more than 150 years after it was destroyed. A ruins park would also be built at the same location, said the official.
He did not reveal the budget for the project.
The Porcelain Tower of Nanjing, also known as "Bao'en Temple", which means "Temple of Gratitude", was ranked one of the Seven Wonders of the World during medieval times.
The tower was first built during the reign of Chinese Emperor Yong Le (1403-1425) in the Ming Dynasty for his mother. But it was completely destroyed during the war between the Qing Imperial Court and the Taiping rebels in 1856.
According to historical records, the construction of the nine-story, 78-meter-tall tower took nearly 20 years, using 100,000 workers. The tower was octagonal in shape with 97 feet in diameter, covered with white and shining porcelain bricks interlaid with colorful bricks and stones.
The holy remains to be enshrined in the Porcelain Tower were unveiled in June this year. Uncovered from an underground chamber of the Porcelain Tower, the sarira is now enshrined in Qixia Temple in Nanjing.
It is said that 2,500 years ago, Sakyamuni's disciples recovered one skull bone, four teeth, two collar bones and 84,000 particles of relics from the cremation pyre of Sakyamuni.
"Among these relics, the skull bone is highly sacred for Buddhists," said Master Xue Cheng, vice president of the Buddhist Association of China.
The skull bone of Sakyamuni was brought to China as tribute by Danapala, an eminent monk from India, during the Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127 A.D.), said Hua Guorong, deputy head of Nanjing City Museum.
A glimpse of Tianchi Lake in "Buddha Light"


The recent Tipperary Festival feature on Tipperary Mid West Community Radio Interviewer David Condon was very lovely and generous, but I think we all have the same feeling about our own voices. 🙂 Be kind, while I go hide in a corner!
Here is how we make our Wakey Wakey Lemongrass soap. One of Clonfadda Soaps best sellers. The fresh zingy scent of lemongrass essential oil, in a lovely hard bar that is kind and gentle to skin.


"Trotskyism has become more relevant than Stalinism to advance the cause of the proletariat" — Dr Bhattarai in "Red Spark," 2009.
Voting in favour of Dr. Bhattarai today were the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum Nepal, the CPN (ML-Socialist), the Rastriya Janamorcha, the CPN (Unified), the CPN (United), the Samajbadi Janata Dal, the Nepal Pariwar Dal, the Nepal Sadbhawana Party (Giri), the Rastriya Janamukti Party and the Nepal Democratic Socialist Manch, besides his party the UCPN (Maoist).
Likewise, NC leader Poudel received votes from the CPN-UML, the CPN-ML, the Rastriya Prajatantra Party, the Rastriya Janashakti Party, Independent MP Baban Singh and other fringe parties, including his own party NC. Nepal Workers and Peasants Party and the Rastriya Prajatantra Party Nepal did not take part in the voting today.
The amended regulations of the Legislature-Parliament however provide that the MPs cannot abstain from the voting and can do so only with a valid reason for absence. The regulations was amended after 16 rounds of elections held last year for the post of the Prime Minister failed to bear any result as MPs were allowed to stay neutral. Announcing the result, Speaker Subas Nembang wished Dr. Bhattarai success in achieving a national consensus and realizing lasting peace and a new constitution.


text:
Development Update: Tuesday, October 21
LOS ANGELES (thefutoncritic.com) -- The latest development news, culled from recent wire reports:
Looking to keep track of all the various projects in development? Click here to visit our signature "Devwatch" section. There visitors can view our listings by network, genre, studio and even development stage (ordered to pilot, cast-contingent, script, etc.). It's updated every day!
BUNKER HILL (TNT) - Bridget Moynahan ("Six Degrees") has joined the cast of the drama pilot, about a cop (Donnie Wahlberg) who returns to the Boston neighborhood he grew up in. She'll play Erin, the sister-in-law of Wahlberg's character, who has a love-hate relationship with him stemming from the death of her cop husband. Walon Green is behind the Warner Horizon Television-based hour, which Jon Avnet is attached to direct.
GLEE (FOX) - "Nip/Tuck" alum Jessalyn Gilsig has joined the cast of the drama pilot, about Will (Matthew Morrison), a Spanish teacher at an Ohio high school who has the daunting task of taking over the school's glee club, which has become a heaven for outcasts. She'll play Terri Schuester, whom the casting notice details as follows: "30ish, attractive, Midwestern, a former glee club member. She was Will's high school sweetheart - but now she's married to him and living in an apartment that regularly erupts in conflict. Determined to have a baby, she's also determined to be married to a man with an income, a future, and a backbone - but all Will has at the moment is a stubborn determination to have fun while going broke. Working at Sheets N' Things, a company that might be going toes up any hour now, she's taking on extra shifts to pay the bills, and wants Will to carry his share of the economic responsibility by taking on a real job with a real company, and leaving the Glee Club kids to fend for their odd selves. Terri's quite adamant about this, because she is pregnant." Cory Monteith, Jayma Mays and Lea Michele also star in the 20th Century Fox Television-based hour, which Ryan Murphy co-created alongside Brad Falchuk and Ian Brennan.
GOOD VIBES (FOX) - Josh Gad ("Back to You"), Adam Brody ("The O.C."), Debi Mazar ("Entourage"), Olivia Thirlby ("Kidnapped"), Alan Tudyk ("Firefly") and Jake Busey ("Broken") have all signed on to lend their voices to the animated pilot presentation, about two high school surfer dudes who live near the beach in California. David Gordon Green is behind the 20th Century Fox Television-based project, which he's also executive producing alongside Good Humor Television's Tom Werner and Mike Clements and animator Brad Ableson. As for specifics, Gad will play Mondo, an out-of-shape, shaggy-haired teen looking to master surfing and win over Jeena (voiced by Thirlby) - who thinks of Mondo more like a brother - while Brody is set as Woodie, Mondo's best friend. Busey then is playing Turk, Mondo's chief rival; with Mazar as Babs, Mondo's mother; and Tudyk as Lonnie, an old surf bum who doubles as the show's narrator. The show's table read is set for early November.
SINCERELY, TED L. NANCY (FOX) - "Ugly Betty" alum Kevin Sussman has landed the title role on the comedy pilot presentation, about a regular guy (Sussman) who, after suffering through too many faulty products and customer service mishaps, decides to take on the corporations by writing letters that "seek to avenge the consumer frustrations of people everywhere." Sussman's casting lifts said contingency off the pilot's production. Barry Marder, Chuck Martin, Gary Auerbach and Rob Lee are the executive producers of the Lionsgate Television-based project, which is based on the book of the same name.
UNTITLED KATHRYN HAHN PROJECT (FOX, New!) - Former "Crossing Jordan" co-star Kathryn Hahn has inked a talent holding deal with the network. The pact calls for FOX to cast her in one of its current properties or potentially develop one around her. It's understood the network isn't limiting her to comedy or drama.
UNTITLED VINCE VAUGHN PROJECT (FOX, New!) - Jim and Steve Armogida ("The Return of Jezebel James") have been tapped to pen a potential new comedy pilot for the network from actor/executive producer Vince Vaughn. The single-camera half-hour, which is set up at 20th Century Fox Television, revolves around a couple of young men who are just out of college and starting to experience the real world. Vaughn then will executive produce via his Wild West Picture Show Productions banner alongside his sister Victoria Vaughn.
WORST WEEK (CBS) - The Eye has asked for two more scripts of the freshman comedy, despite posting rocky numbers on Monday nights behind tentpole "Two and a Half Men." Last night's installment drew a 3.2 rating among adults 18-49 where it held just 63% of "Men's" lead-in.
Sources: Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, Reuters
· BACK TO YOU (FOX)
· BUNKER HILL (TNT)
· CROSSING JORDAN (NBC)
· DEVELOPMENT UPDATE (TFC)
· ENTOURAGE (HBO)
· FIREFLY (FOX)
· GLEE (FOX)
· GOOD VIBES (MTV)
· KIDNAPPED (NBC)
· NIP/TUCK (FX)
· OC, THE (FOX)
· RETURN OF JEZEBEL JAMES, THE (FOX)
· SINCERELY, TED L NANCY (FOX)
· SIX DEGREES (ABC)
· TWO AND A HALF MEN (CBS)
· UGLY BETTY (ABC)
· UNTITLED KATHRYN HAHN PROJECT (FOX)
· UNTITLED VINCE VAUGHN PROJECT (FOX)
· WORST WEEK (CBS)


This is an archive of The Wikipedia Signpost and the Esperanza Newsletter from October 2006 to November 2006.
1 Signpost updated for October 2nd.
2 Signpost updated for October 9th.
3 Signpost updated for October 16th.
4 Signpost updated for October 23rd.
5 Signpost updated for October 30th.
7 Signpost updated for November 6th.
8 Signpost updated for November 13th.
9 Signpost updated for November 20th.
10 Signpost updated for November 27th.
Signpost updated for October 2nd.
Signpost updated for October 9th.
Signpost updated for October 16th.
Signpost updated for October 23rd.
Signpost updated for October 30th.
Admin Coaching needs coaches!!! If you are an administrator, or even a generally experienced user, do consider signing up to be a coach.
Admin Coaching, now being coordinated by HighwayCello, is a program for people who want help learning some of the more subtle aspects of Wikipedia policy and culture. People are matched with experienced users who are willing to offer coaching. The program is designed for people who have figured out the basics of editing articles; they're not newcomers any more, but they might want some help in learning new roles. In this way, Esperanza would help keep hope alive for Wikipedia because we would always be grooming the next generation of admins.
The Tutorial Drive is a new Esperanza program! In an effort to make complicated processes on Wikipedia easier for everyone, Esperanza working to create and compile a list of tutorials about processes here on Wikipedia. Consider writing one!
A discussion on how Esperanza relates to the encyclopedia has been started; please add your thoughts.
Many thanks to MiszaBot, courtesy of Misza13, for delivering the newsletter.
The list of proposed programs has been updated, with some proposals being archived.
There is now a new program: the Tutorial Drive! Consider writing a tutorial on something you are good at doing on Wikipedia.
The suggestion of adding a cohesive look to all the Esperanza pages is being considered; join the discussion if you are interested!
In order to make a useful interlanguage welcome template, those involved in translation projects will be asked what English Wikipedia policies are most important and confusing to editors coming from other language Wikipedias.
A discussion of Esperanza's role in Wikipedia is being held, with all thoughts of all Esperanzians wanted!
Shreshth91 informed everyone that he will be leaving the Esperanza council as life is rather busy; his spot will be filled by the runner up from the last election, HighwayCello.
Although having the newsletter appear on everyone's userpage is desired, this may not be ideal for everyone. If, in the future, you wish to receive a link to the newsletter, rather than the newsletter itself, you may add yourself to Wikipedia:Esperanza/Newsletter/Opt Out List.
Signpost updated for November 6th.
Signpost updated for November 13th.
Signpost updated for November 20th.
Signpost updated for November 27th.
This page was last edited on 5 August 2018, at 05:29 (UTC).