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DC Entertainment chief explains why there's no shared TV, movie universe
@trentlmoore
Nov 18, 2016, 1:12 PM EST (Updated)
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Tag: DC
Tag: Arrow
Tag: The Flash
Tag: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice
As we gear up for the return of The Flash and Arrow in the next few weeks, many fans are still wondering why Warner Bros. and DC refuse to roll the beloved small-screen heroes into the big-screen Justice League. Well, now we have an answer.
DC Entertainment boss Diane Nelson chatted about the company's strategy during Variety's Entertainment and Technology Summit and noted that though the shared universe has "worked beautifully" for Marvel, they didn't feel it was the right approach for DC's properties. Across the gamut of DC projects, Arrow and Flash are a crossover anomaly. The studio also has Gotham and Supergirl on the small screen to go along with the shared film universe surrounding Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.
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So why not put all those eggs into one super-basket? According to Nelson, the studio feared a shared universe would hamper the company's "talent drive" approach by "handcuffing [the] creators into trying to work with the same storyline or force them to hold back characters or introduce certain characters." Which, yeah — fair point.
The Fox series Gotham has gone buck wild with the Batman villain roster, and has even featured some of the same canon villains as Arrow and The Flash (albeit reimagined). The unconnected approach has also give The CW's superhero universe the freedom to introduce its own versions of the Suicide Squad, Ra's al Ghul and other mid-tier hitters in the DC lineup. If this were a shared universe, virtually all of those would've certainly been off limits. I love Marvel's shared universe, but as I've argued before, it's probably not the right approach for DC at this juncture.
Having all these separate shows as self-contained versions of the DC universe gives much more freedom than something like Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. enjoys, though you have to admit that when Marvel crosses a storyline between the film and TV media, it can create a level of buzz and synergy that is hard to match. So to each their own.
What do you think? Are you pleased with DC's approach? Does Nelson's explanation make sense?
(Via Variety)


This seared grouper was highlighted in our Motts Channel Seafood e-newsletter July 13, 2018.
This recipe offers a light and refreshing dinner that incorporates the freshest fish and local summer veggies you can find anywhere on the coast.
Grouper lends itself well to any form of cooking. Because it is a lean fish, some basting is necessary while broiling or baking to keep the flesh moist. The heads are cartilaginous and produce a rich stock base (source: Freshfromflorida.com). Like most fish, grouper contains large amounts of protein, minimal amounts of saturated fat and no sugar. Can't get fresh grouper? Snapper and Mahi-Mahi make great substitutes.
So, why include fresh veggies on your summer seafood dinner plate?
1. They fight bloat: Vegetables are rich in fiber. Fiber which flushes out waste and gastric irritants and prevents constipation by keeping the digestive tract moving.
2. In addition, vegetables create a youthful glow: Vegetables prevent unwanted signs of aging and keep skin young and supple.
3. What's More, they reduce stress: Nutrients like magnesium and vitamin C are quickly depleted during stressful times. Luckily, many vegetables contain these very nutrients, as well as tension-reducing omega-3 fatty acids (Fish!) and B vitamins that fight anxiety and depression.
More more amazing recipes like this seared grouper recipe, please visit Alison's Recipe Box.
First, sprinkle fish with salt and pepper. Heat oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Next, cook fish 4 minutes on each side until browned and cooked through. Remove and keep warm.
Now, sauté zucchini and shallot 4 minutes or until crisp-tender. Stir in corn and garlic, and sauté 2 more minutes. Reduce heat to low, and stir in tomatoes, butter, and basil, cooking until butter is just melted. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Spoon vegetables onto serving plates, and top with fish.


Jakarta, May 21st, 2017 – PT Totalindo Eka Persada Tbk, commenced the Nagrak Rental Flats project Tower 1-5 in North Jakarta, as well as Penggilingan Rental Flats in East Jakarta. The company won the projects in the first semester of the year. Based on the letter of award No: 588/-1.796.32 May9th, 2017 and No : 587/-1.796.32 May 9th, 2017, Totalindo has been officially appointed by the Provincial Government of DKI Jakarta as the contractor of the two projects worth IDR 377,785,670,900 and IDR 383,838,281,200. At this time, the company is establishing the work team, mobilizing heavy equipment and conducting field work. The two projects consist of 10 Towersand 2,295 units:1,275 units for Nagrak 1-5 project and 1,020 units for Penggilingan project (apbd.jakarta.go.id). It is recorded that more than 60 contractors, both state-owned and privately owned, participated in the auction of the projects. Totalinda was the only privately-owned construction company to win the offer. Each year, the need for shelter, especially of the Provincial Government of DKI Jakarta Flats, is estimated to be more than 28,000 units (source: jakarta.go.id). In 2017, the Provincial Government is planning to build 14,322 unit of Rental Flats (source: IRAI). Therefore, with full commitment, Totalindo is also actively participating in succeeding the Government program, especially in providing Flats for the lower middle class. In accordance with the commitment, The President Director of PT Totalindo Eka Persada Tbk, Donald Sihombing stated that winning the tender of the Provincial Government of DKI Jakarta project proves our commitment focusing on Governmental projects, as well as supporting the Government's a million houses program. Completing large-scale projects such as the Flats Construction Project in a year is nothing simple. Skillful work team and the completeness of equipment, both heavy and light, become vital. "This proves that Totalindo has the capability to compete with other large construction companies", said Donald Sihombing.
Winning those two projects, up to now, Totalindo has succeeded on signing contract for4 new projects worth over IDR 1.5 trillion. Thus, the company has achieved over 50% of the previously planned new contract target of the year, worth IDR 3 trillion.


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Whatever Happened To: The Earthrise Reboot
Earthrise was a sandbox MMORPG that some of you might vaguely recall from many, many years ago. It launched in 2011 under Masthead Studios and could best be described as an unmitigated disaster from the get go. The game just wasn't good, it offered manual aiming but neither the server or client performance to pull it off. Gameplay consisted of a laborious grind, the game seemingly punishing you for deciding to buy into it by tying its combat to one of the most dull systems in the genre while also forcing you to grind thousands of creatures to build your gear to grind thousands of creatures to build better gear.
Needless to say, the game died fast and one year later in 2012 Masthead Studios handed over control of the title to Silent Future who have been, well, mostly silent about the future of this game.
When we last talked about Earthrise, the MMO was gearing up for its closed alpha testing for a reboot under developer Silent Future. That news was over six years ago. Since then, the servers and website have gone up and down but the title has seemingly been abandoned in recent years. The last update on the game's Twitter and Facebook pages was from 2016, but the website itself has been dead for a couple of years now and the servers themselves have been offline for an indeterminate amount of time.
Interestingly, I happened to get a response from the official Facebook account for Silent Future confirming that the game has not been cancelled. As far as the game being actively developed, that is up in the air. I'm interested to see what Silent Future is going to do with Earthrise, since after seven years you might as well have just used the assets to try and build a new game. Earthrise was dated and functionally a dead end even back in 2011 when it launched, I can't imagine the MMO gamer base flocking back to the game that they universally rejected after such a long absence.
Posted in Editorials Tags: Earthrise, Earthrise MMO, Masthead, Silent Future
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Painted from life and just keeping it simple.
This artwork is sold and shipped to you by Dana Mallon, and will be packaged in a reinforced envelope. Artworks are dispatched within 7 working days from United Kingdom.


I am a painter and printmaker and have been making art for many years. I see making art as a voyage of discovery, both a personal journey and also an exploration of the process of art making, as materials and techniques are almost limitless.
I am of Chinese heritage, born in Singapore, but have lived in New Zealand since my teens. My art explores themes such as cultural identity, family ties and memories. My inspiration often comes from the heart and events that have touched and shaped my life.
I have exhibited in group exhibitions in both Auckland and Melbourne. I have a Master of Fine Art from RMIT University in Melbourne and have attended several workshops and periods of study with New Zealand and International artists.


McCall Ranch is nestled on 998 Acres at the junction of Big Sandy Creek and the Colorado River. The river frontage offers roughly 1.4 miles of mature Pecan Tree banks. Just five miles from downtown Bastrop, this Ranch has extensive development potential. From an Equine community utilizing the existing facilities, to a residential neighborhood – the possibilities are endless. Come see the vast potential this ranch has to offer.


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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
'How Democracies Die' Authors Say Trump Is A Symptom Of 'Deeper Problems' Harvard professors Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt are experts in what makes democracies healthy — and what leads to their collapse. They warn that American democracy is in trouble.
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'How Democracies Die' Authors Say Trump Is A Symptom Of 'Deeper Problems'
January 22, 20181:25 PM ET
Heard on Fresh Air
Harvard professors Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt are experts in what makes democracies healthy — and what leads to their collapse. They warn that American democracy is in trouble.
How Democracies Die
by Steve Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt
Steve Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt
This is FRESH AIR. I'm Dave Davies in for Terry Gross, who's off today. If watching President Trump and listening to American political discourse these days makes you feel something's gone wrong, our guests today will tell you it's not your imagination. Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt have spent years studying what makes democracies healthy and what leads to their collapse. And they see signs that American democracy is in trouble.
In a new book, they argue that Trump has shown authoritarian tendencies and that many players in American politics are discarding long-held norms that have kept our political rivalries in balance and prevented the kind of bitter conflict that can lead to a repressive state. Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt are both professors of government at Harvard University. Levitsky's research focuses on Latin America and the developing world. Ziblatt studies Europe from the 19th century to the present. Their new book is called "How Democracies Die."
Well, Stephen Levitsky, Daniel Ziblatt, welcome to FRESH AIR. You know, you write that some democracies die in a hail of gunfire. There's a military coup. The existing leaders are imprisoned or sometimes shot. Not - this is not the kind of death of a democracy that you think is most relevant to our purposes. What's a more typical or meaningful scenario?
STEVEN LEVITSKY: Well, the kind of democratic breakdown that you mentioned was more typical of the Cold War era, of a good part of the 20th century. But military coups, although they occur occasionally today in the world, are much, much less common than they used to be. And, in fact, the primary way in which democracies have died since the end of the Cold War, over the last 30 years or so, is at the hands of elected leaders, at the hands of governments that were often freely or close to freely elected, who then use democratic institutions to weaken or destroy democracy. And we're very hopeful that America's democratic institutions will survive this process. But if we were to fall into some kind of crisis, surely it would take that form.
DAVIES: And it doesn't typically happen the week or month after the elected leader takes power, right? It unfolds gradually.
DANIEL ZIBLATT: Yeah, that's right. I mean, that's one of the things that makes it so difficult, both to study and also as a citizen to recognize what's happening. You know, military coups happen overnight. I mean, they're sudden instances - sudden events. Electoral authoritarians come to power democratically. They often have democratic legitimacy as a result of being elected. And there's a kind of gradual chipping away at democratic institutions, kind of tilting of the playing field to the advantage of the incumbent, so it becomes harder and harder to dislodge the incumbent through democratic means.
And, you know, when this goes through the whole process, you know, at the end of the process - this may take years, it may take a decade. You know, in some countries around the world, this has taken as long as a decade to happen. At the end of that process, the incumbent is firmly entrenched in power.
DAVIES: And just to define what we're talking about, we're talking - when we say a democracy dies, we mean there is a circumstance in which there are relatively freely elected leaders and, at the end, what?
ZIBLATT: Yeah, so at the end of this process, it's hard - it becomes harder and harder - it takes different forms in different countries. I mean, so what's happened in Turkey over the last 10 years, essentially President Erdogan has entrenched himself in power, weakened the opposition, and so it's become harder and harder to dislodge him. So there may continue to be elections, but the elections are tilted in favor of the incumbent. The elections are no longer fair.
Through a variety of mechanisms, the president's able to stay in power and to withstand criticism, although public support may not fully be there. Media is - you know, there's kind of a clampdown on media and sort of a variety of institutional mechanisms that an incumbent can use to kind of keep himself in power.
LEVISKY: Right. As Daniel said, very often these days, the kind of formal or constitutional architecture of democracy remains in place, but the actual substance of it is eviscerated.
DAVIES: And does that describe Russia today? Is its democracy essentially dead?
LEVISKY: Yeah, well, I...
ZIBLATT: Yes.
LEVISKY: Russia was never really much of a democracy. If it was a democracy, it was one very, very briefly, so Russia's really at the other end of the spectrum in terms of the strength of its democratic institutions. But yes, Russia has the trappings of democracy. They still hold elections. They've got a Parliament. But in practice, it's an outright autocracy.
DAVIES: You have a chapter called "Fateful Alliances," and it's about circumstances - cases where a populist demagogue, who turns out to be an authoritarian, got help along the way from mainstream political figures or political parties. Do you want to give us an example of that?
ZIBLATT: Yeah, so in our book, we recount a couple of these kinds of scenarios. And it turns out that often the way elected authorities get into power is not just through elections and appealing to the public but by allying themselves with establishment politicians. The most kind of recent example of this that we - and we have this - describe this in greater detail in the book - is the case of Venezuela where Hugo Chavez, kind of with the aid of President Caldera, who was a longstanding politician and establishment politician in Venezuela, was kind of aided along the way in some sense by being freed from jail by President Caldera and his - he kind of gained in legitimacy and then eventually was able to come into power.
A similar story can be told about the interwar years, as well - and interwar years in Europe. So these are the most prominent cases of Democratic collapse, really, in the 20th century - Italy, Germany in the - Italy in the 1920s, Germany in the 1930s. In both of these cases, you have Mussolini coming along, who didn't really - you know, he had some support. But he was able to kind of increase his profile by being put on a party list by a leading liberal statesman Giovanni Giolitti, who included him on his party's list. And he gained in legitimacy. And suddenly, you know, here he was, a leading statesman, Mussolini himself.
And a similar story - this - you know, Hitler came to power in a similar alliance with mainstream conservative politicians at the end of the 1920s and into the 1930s - was famously placed as chancellor of Germany by leading statesmen in Germany. In each instance, there's a kind of Faustian bargain that's being struck where the statesmen think that they're going to tap into this popular appeal of the demagogue and think that they can control them. I mean, this is this incredible miscalculation. And this miscalculation happens over and over. And in each instance, the establishment statesmen are not able to control the demagogue.
DAVIES: And you note that there have been figures in American political history that could be regarded as dangerous demagogues and that they've been kept out of major positions of power because we've had gatekeepers - people who somehow controlled who got access to the top positions of power - presidential nominations, for example. You want to give us some examples of this?
LEVISKY: Sure. Henry Ford was an extremist, somebody who was actually written about favorably in "Mein Kampf." He flirted with a presidential bid in 1923, thinking about the 1924 race, and had a lot of support, particularly in the Midwest. Huey Long obviously never had the chance to run for president. He was assassinated before that.
DAVIES: He was the governor of Louisiana, right?
LEVISKY: Governor of Louisiana, senator and a major national figure - probably rivaled really only by Roosevelt at the end of his life in terms of popularity. George Wallace in 1968, and again in 1972 before he was shot, had levels of public support and public approval that are not different - not much different from Donald Trump. So throughout the 20th century, we've had a number of figures who had 35, 38, 40 percent public support, who were demagogues, who didn't have a strong commitment to democratic institutions, in some cases were quite antidemocratic, but who were kept out of mainstream politics by the parties themselves.
The parties never even came close to nominating any of these figures for president. What was different about 2016 was not that Trump was new or that he would get a lot of support but that he was nominated by major party. That's what was new.
DAVIES: Right. And you say that there were effectively, for most of American history, gatekeepers at the top of the political party - a process that tended to exclude these people that were more extreme. Describe what that process was like.
ZIBLATT: Yeah, so you know, through the 20th century, even going back to the 19th century, the way presidential candidates were selected has - this has changed over time. And really, only beginning in 1972 have primaries, which we now are all so accustomed to - where candidates are selected by voters - that's when that began is 1972 to be a really significant system. Before 1972, the system throughout the 20th century has often been described as dominated by smoke-filled back rooms where party leaders got together and tried to figure out who would be the best candidate to represent the party and who they thought could win.
You know, there's a lot to be criticized about this pre-1972 system. It was very exclusive. It, you know - it's often picked mediocre candidates. I mean, you can think of President Warren G. Harding, who looked like a presidential candidate but wasn't much of a president. This was somebody who was selected through the smoke-filled backroom. But the virtue of this system - if there is a virtue of it - is that it kept out demagogues.
DAVIES: So in - starting in 1972, there are multiple primaries in states that lead to the party's nomination. There are different state rules. But voters get some say in a lot of it. And you're right that there - but there was always sort of the invisible primary. That is to say you tended to be taken seriously if the party leaders gave you their nod or at least their approval to get in the game. So take us to Donald Trump in 2016. How did this pave the way for Trump?
LEVISKY: Well, the belief among political scientists - and I think it was true for a while - was that winning primaries was hard. This was particularly before the days of social media, when you needed the support of local activists. You needed the support, maybe, of unions in the Democratic Party. You needed the support of local media on the ground in each state in order to actually win primaries. You couldn't just get on CNN and expect to win a primary somewhere in the West because of what you - or what you tweeted.
You had to have some kind of an infrastructure on the ground. I'm talking about the 1970s, 1980s, even the 1990s. And so the belief among political scientists was you still needed the support of party insiders to win the primaries, to win - to cross the country and accumulate enough delegates, winning state by state by state. You really needed to build alliances with local Democratic or Republican Party leaders, committees, senators, congresspeople, mayors, et cetera.
That became less and less true over time in large part because the nature of media - the rise of social media and the ability of outsiders to make a name for themselves without going through that process, without going through that invisible primary. So Donald Trump demonstrated, you know, beyond any doubt in 2016 that at least if you have enough name recognition, you can avoid building alliances with anybody, really, at the state or local level. You can run on your own. You can be an outsider and win.
ZIBLATT: Yeah. I would add to that what's an interesting - differences exist between the Democratic Party and the Republican Party. The Democratic Party has superdelegates. And so there is built into the Democratic Party presidential selection process - continues to exist - this kind of element of gatekeeping. The Republican Party does not have superdelegates. And so one of the interesting kind of things to think about is, you know, had there been superdelegates in the Republican Party, would have Donald Trump actually won the nomination?
Would've he run? Would've he won? And so, you know, I think that's kind of an interesting thing to think about. And, you know, superdelegates are now up for debate within the Democratic Party after the Bernie Sanders-Hillary showdown. And so there's a lot of people who think superdelegates should be eliminated so that - this is kind of an ongoing issue of debate.
DAVIES: Right. And superdelegates are - they're typically elected officials or very prominent leaders or fundraisers in the party. But in the Democratic Party, there are - what? - like, 15 percent of the total delegates of the convention - something like that.
LEVISKY: Right. It's about 15 percent.
DAVIES: OK.
LEVISKY: It varies.
DAVIES: We're speaking with Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt. They are professors of government at Harvard University. Their new book is called "How Democracies Die." We'll continue our conversation after a short break. This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF JEFF COFFIN AND THE MU'TET'S "LOW HANGING FRUIT")
DAVIES: This is FRESH AIR. And we're speaking with Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt. They are both professors of government at Harvard. They study democracies around the world. Their new book looks at how Democratic institutions can be undermined by authoritarian figures. And it raises the question of whether President Trump is a threat to American democracy. You note that we have a Constitution, which is widely praised and revered. It's a set of rules, and it's actually pretty short. But you note that a set of rules, however well-crafted, aren't enough to ensure that democratic institutions prevail. You say there are norms of democracy that are just as important.
LEVISKY: The rules themselves, particularly in a very simple, short Constitution like that of the United States, can never get a - can never fully guide behavior. And so our behavior needs to be guided by informal rules, by norms. And we focus on two of them in particular - what we call mutual toleration, which is really, really fundamental in any democracy, which is simply that among the major parties, there's an acceptance that their rivals are legitimate, that we may disagree with the other side. We may really dislike the other side. But at the end of the day, we recognize publicly - and we tell this to our followers - that the other side is equally patriotic, and that it can govern legitimately. That's one.
The other one is what we call forbearance, which is restraint in the exercise of power. And that's a little bit counterintuitive. We don't usually think about forbearance in politics, but it's absolutely central. Think about what the president can do under the Constitution. The president can pardon anybody he wants at any time. The president can pack the Supreme Court. If the president has a majority in Congress - which many presidents do - and the president doesn't like the makeup of the Supreme Court, he could pass a law expanding the court to 11 or 13 and fill with allies - again, he needs a legislative majority - but can do it. FDR tried.
The president can, in many respects, rule by decree. If Congress is blocking his agenda, he can use a series of proclamations or executive orders to make policy at the margins of Congress. What it takes for those institutions to work properly is restraint on the part of politicians. Politicians have to underutilize their power. And most of our politicians - most of our leaders have done exactly that. That's not written down in the Constitution.
DAVIES: You know, it's interesting. I think one of the things that people say when people warn that Donald Trump or someone else could undermine American democracy and lead us to an authoritarian state is we're different from other countries in the strength of our commitment to democratic institutions. And I'm interested to what extent you think that's true.
ZIBLATT: Yeah. Well, so, you know, there's certainly this notion of an American creed where Americans have a long-standing commitment to principles of freedom and equality. And I think that's very real. And American democracy's older than any democracy in the world. The constitutional regime has been in place for hundreds of years. And this is - should be a source of some solace to us, that democracy's a - the older a democracy is, lots of political science research shows, the less likely it is to break down. And one of the reasons is a commitment of citizens to democratic norms. One thing, though, that kind of gives us kind of pause, and I think that, you know, there is a sub-current - and Steve mentioned this earlier - there is a sub-current in American political culture, and just even in the 20th century, you know, beginning with Henry Ford, you know, as we mentioned, Huey Long, Joe McCarthy, you know, all the way - George Wallace - all the way through Trump, there's a sub-current around 30 - you know, Gallup polls going back to the 1930s - around 30 percent of the electorate supporting candidates who often seem to have a questionable commitment to democratic norms.
LEVISKY: The creed to which Daniel refers and the initial establishment of strong democratic norms in this country was founded in a homogeneous society, a racially and culturally homogeneous society. It was founded in an era of racial exclusion. And the challenge is that we have now become a much more ethnically, culturally diverse society, taken major steps towards racial equality, and the challenge is making those norms stick in this new context.
DAVIES: And you do note in the book that the resolution of the conflicts around the Civil War and a restoration of kind of normal democratic institutions was accompanied by denial of voting rights and basic citizenship privileges to African-Americans in the South. So this hasn't exactly been a laudable course all the time.
ZIBLATT: Yeah, so this is this great paradox - tragic paradox, really - that we recount in the book, which is that the consolidation of these norms, which we think are so important to democratic life of mutual toleration and forbearance, were re-established, really, at the price of racial exclusion. I mean, there was a way in which the end of Reconstruction - when Reconstruction was a great democratic effort and experiment - and it was a moment of democratic breakthrough for the United States where voting rights were extended to African-Americans. At the end of Reconstruction throughout the U.S. South, states implemented a variety of reforms to reduce the right to vote - essentially, to eliminate the right to vote for African-Americans. And so after the 1870s, American democracy was by no means actually really a full democracy. And we really think that American democracy came - really, it was a consolidated democracy really only after 1965. I mean, that's a bit of a controversial view or unusual view for some. But really, it's clear that with the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act, that's at the point at which American democracy became fully consolidated.
DAVIES: Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt are professors of government at Harvard University. Their new book is called "How Democracies Die." After a break, they'll discuss their concerns about President Trump and his regard for critical norms of American democracy. Also rock critic Ken Tucker reviews British performer Charli XCX's new album, and Maureen Corrigan reviews the new book "The Perfect Nanny," based on a tragic, real event. I'm Dave Davies. This is FRESH AIR.
DAVIES: This is FRESH AIR. I'm Dave Davies in for Terry Gross, who's off today. We're speaking with Harvard professors of government Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt. They've studied the demise of elected democracies around the world. In a new book, they argue that too many American politicians, including President Trump, are violating long-held norms of American democracy, including a respect for the legitimacy of political rivals and a commitment to some restraint in political combat. Their book is called "How Democracies Die."
You know, you write that the erosion of these norms of democracy, these unwritten rules, which provide - the guardrails of democracy, in a way, that kind of protects us and keeps us on track - that they began to erode well before Donald Trump became president or was a candidate. When did it start?
LEVISKY: It's difficult to find a precise date. But we look at the 1990s and, particularly, the rise of the Gingrich Republicans. Newt Gingrich really advocated and taught his fellow Republicans how to use language that begins to sort of call into question mutual toleration, using language like betrayal and sick and pathetic and antifamily and anti-American to describe their rivals.
And Gingrich also introduced an era or helped introduce - it was not just Newt Gingrich - an era of unprecedented, at least during that period in the century, hardball politics. So you saw a couple of major government shutdowns for the first time in the 1990s and, of course, the partisan impeachment of Bill Clinton, which was one of the first major acts - I mean, that is not forbearance. That is the failure to use restraint.
DAVIES: And did Democrats react in ways that accelerated the erosion of the norms?
LEVISKY: Sure. In Congress, there was a sort of tit-for-tat escalation in which, you know, one party begins to employ the filibuster. For decades, the filibuster was a very, very little-used tool. It was almost never used. It was used, on average, one or two times per Congressional session, per Congressional period - two-year period - so once a year. And then it gradually increased in the '70s, '80s, '90s.
It was both parties. So one party starts to play by new rules, and the other party response. So it's a spiraling effect, an escalation in which each party became more and more obstructionist in Congress. Each party did - took additional steps either to block legislation, because it could, or to block appointments, particularly judicial appointments. You know, Harry Reid and the Democrats played a role in this in George W. Bush's presidency - really sort of stepped up obstructionism.
DAVIES: Did the executive orders that President Obama issued when the Republican Congress clearly was not going to cooperate with his agenda - do you think that that was, you know, a violation of the norm of forbearance?
ZIBLATT: Yeah, so this is exactly a part of the same process that Steve just described. So there's this kind of spiral, you know, which is really ominous, where one side plays hardball by holding up nominations, holding up legislation in Congress, and there's a kind of stalemate. And so the other side feels justified in using executive orders and presidential memos and so on. These also are - you know, have been utilized by Barack Obama. So there's a way in which politicians, on both sides, are confronted with a real dilemma, which is, you know, if one side seems to be breaking the rules, and so why shouldn't we? If we don't, we're kind of being the sucker here.
DAVIES: You know, you do seem to say that the Republican Party led the way and was more willing to violate these norms of democracy. Is that the case? And is there something about the Republican Party that makes it different in this respect?
LEVISKY: Yeah, we do think that's true. We think that the most egregious sort of pushing of the envelope began with Republicans, particularly in the 1990s and that the most egregious acts of hardball have taken place at the hands of Republicans. I'll just list four - the partisan impeachment of Bill Clinton, the 2003 mid-district redistricting in Texas, which was pushed by Tom DeLay, the denial - essentially, the theft of a Supreme Court seat with the refusal to even take up the nomination of Merrick Garland in 2016 and the so-called legislative coup pulled off by the Republican-controlled legislature in North Carolina in 2016. Those are among the most egregious acts of constitutional hardball that we see in the last generation, and they're all carried out by Republicans.
Yes, we believe the Republicans have become a more extremist party. For us, the most persuasive explanation has to do with the way our parties have been polarized along racial and cultural lines. And the way that our parties have lined up, with the Democrats being a party, essentially, of secular, educated whites and a diversity of ethnic minorities and the Republicans being a fairly homogeneous white, Protestant party, or white Christian party, the Republicans have basically come to represent a former ethnic majority in decline. You have many - certainly not all - but many Republican voters who feel like the country that they grew up with, or grew up in, is being taken away from them. And that can lead to pretty extremist views and voting patterns.
DAVIES: We're speaking with Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt. Both are professors of government at Harvard. They study democracies around the world. And their new book looks at how Democratic institutions can be undermined by authoritarian figures, and it raises the question of whether President Trump is a threat to American democracy.
So let's talk about Donald Trump as president. To what extent do you believe he has violated the norms that protect and preserve American democracy?
LEVISKY: Well, he has clearly violated norms. If there's one thing that Donald Trump does with consistency in politics, it's violate norms. But I should say, I mean, he has not violated Democratic rules much. I mean, our democracy remains intact. Donald Trump is very much - is a pretty authoritarian figure. But we've got real democratic institutions, and the rule of law has largely worked. The judicial system has largely worked. The media has been pretty effective. And so Trump hasn't been able to - has not crossed very many lines in terms of actual authoritarianism.
He's clearly violated norms. I think he's accelerated the process of norm erosion that we've just been talking about - that Daniel was talking about. And that's almost certainly going to be consequential in the future. But thus far, luckily, our system's been strong enough to prevent him from breaking any democratic rules.
DAVIES: But clearly, you argue that his, you know, his attempts to demonize the media and undermine its credibility to, you know, treat his opponents of all stripe as sort of not legitimate represents dangerous trends in democracy. Where do you think we're headed?
ZIBLATT: Yeah, so there's two real things that Donald - President Trump has done that make us worry. One is his politicization of the rule of law or of law enforcement intelligence. And so you know, we - in a democracy, law enforcement intelligence have to be neutral. And what he has tried to do with the FBI, with the attorney general's office is to try to turn law enforcement into a kind of shield to protect him and a weapon to go after his opponents. And this is something that authoritarians always do. They try to transform neutral institutions into their favor. And you know, he's had some success of it. There's been lots of resistance as well, though, from - you know, from Congress and from society and media reporting on this and so on. But this is one worrying thing.
A second worrying thing is - that you just described as well is his effort to - his continued effort to delegitimize media and the election process. So he - so one of the things that we worried about a lot in the book was the setting up - and we describe how - the process by which this happened - the setting-up of electoral commission to investigate election fraud.
And so it's - you know, the idea - he set this commission up to investigate a problem that really all evidence suggests does not exist. I mean, there's been this myth of election fraud in the United States for the last 15 years that's been pushed by all sorts of different groups. And he has taken the - he took on this mantle and set up this Federal Election Commission to try to collect evidence of election fraud, you know, voter ID fraud and so on. And really, again, no social scientific evidence supports that this is happening at all.
And many worried that this was really an effort to target voters, to disenfranchise voters who would be voting against Donald Trump and voting against Republicans. And so he kind of joined forces with people who've been working on this already. The stated goal was to clean up elections, which sounds like a wonderful thing. But the actual goal was to disenfranchise voters who would vote against Republicans.
So it turns out now in the last several months, this commission's been disbanded because of the - one of the major factors that led to the - to elimination of this election commission was that the states refused to cooperate. So here's where we see American federalism in action, and I think the checks and balances have worked well. And this has been now transferred over to the Department of Homeland Security. And so you know, in general, this is I think a good news stories. But we don't know what's going to happen next, and this continues to be a major risk, I think.
LEVISKY: We often get the response to our book that, well, you know, Donald Trump has been much more bluster than action. He's mostly been talk. But in practice, he hasn't done very much. And to a degree, that is true. But there are a lot of consequences to his talk and his words. And let me just point to two - the undermining of the credibility of our electoral process and of the free press, right? There are two - it's hard to think of two institutions that are more core, more fundamental to democracy than our elections and our free press.
And what Donald Trump has done by over and over again saying that - lying, saying that our elections are fraudulent, that the election was fraudulent, that 11 million illegal immigrants voted, that the election was not truly fair, free and fair is to convince a very large number of voters, a very large number of Republicans that our elections actually are fraudulent - and the same thing with the media.
He has convinced a fairly large segment of our society that the mainstream media - that the establishment media is conspiring to bring his government down, is purposefully lying and making stuff up such that a fairly large number of Americans no longer believe anything but Fox News. In the long term, it's hard to imagine how that's healthy for a democracy.
DAVIES: Well, Daniel Ziblatt, Steven Levitsky, thank you so much for speaking with us.
LEVISKY: Thanks for having us.
ZIBLATT: Thank you.
DAVIES: Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt are professors of government at Harvard University. Their new book is called "How Democracies Die." Coming up, Ken Tucker reviews "Pop 2," the latest album from British performer Charli XCX. This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF PRINCE SONG, "THE BALLAD OF DOROTHY PARKER")


text:
http://havanajournal.com/business/entry/cimex-president-admits-that-cuba-is-having-trouble-paying-its-bills/
HavanaJournal.com: Cuba Business
Cimex President admits that Cuba is having trouble paying it's bills
Posted May 22, 2009 by publisher in Cuba Business.
(Publisher note: See my comments in bold below)
By Jeff Franks | Reuters
A cash crunch is causing one of Cuba's largest business corporations, Cimex, to put off payments for some products, but the bills eventually will be settled, the head of the state-owned company said on Thursday.
Eventually? Just like the Russian debt from the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s will eventually be settled?
Cimex President Eduardo Bencomo also said Cuba had not yet seen an increase in remittances sent by Cuban Americans to their families on the communist-ruled island, after U.S. President Barack Obama lifted restrictions on them last month.
and the Cuban government was expecting this money so they could pay bills? I thought remittances went to the Cuban people.
Cuba has been struggling through a liquidity crisis in recent months that has provoked complaints from foreign businesses that they are not getting paid for their products.
Some foreign diplomats have said they feared Cuba was on the brink of insolvency.
I don't think this is anything new and I don't think the Cuban government really cares.
Cimex is a sprawling conglomerate with annual sales above $1 billion. Its businesses include a network of shops selling goods in Cuban convertible pesos, real estate operations and food services, and the processing of remittances.
Bencomo acknowledged the liquidity squeeze, telling reporters at a press conference that payments for certain imported items such as air conditioners and other equipment had suffered "some delay." But he said "the will of the country" was to meet its financial obligations.
"We had an amount of money in the bank for external payments and we've been paying out," he said. "The will is to keep paying ... the country will keep paying, without doubt.
The "will of the country" and the "will is to keep paying". Anyone want to buy Cuban debt or give Cuba a loan with the "will" from the Cuban government to pay you back?
"If more people come (to visit Cuba), there will be more money and we will be able to pay what we haven't paid," Bencomo said.
Really? Now he is saying that if tourism is off then Cuba cannot pay its bills?
Cuba's economy has been crippled by the global financial crisis and three hurricanes that struck last year, causing $10 billion in damage, according to the Cuban government.
It blames a U.S. trade embargo imposed since 1962 for many of its problems. But Cuban President Raul Castro has said Cuba needs greater productivity and called for a pay system that rewards the best workers.
Right. Communism has nothing to do with the fact that Cuba's economy has always been terrible? What about the fact that Cuba gets free oil and all kinds of credits from dozens of countries around the world and all business ventures on the island are joint ventures? But, it's all the Embargo's fault? Nice try, again but it's just a stupid old argument that no one believes.
On April 13, Obama lifted restrictions on Cuban American travel and remittances to Cuba, which he said was a signal to the island that the U.S. wants to end hostilities that began after Fidel Castro took power in a 1959 revolution.
Bencomo said remittances had shown no increase since Obama eased the embargo and in fact were below what they were this time last year. "The impact of that declaration still has not been felt," he said.
While there were signs U.S. agencies were becoming more relaxed in their enforcement of the embargo, Bencomo said it appeared Obama's message of change had not been fully transmitted to the U.S. bureaucracy.
That I agree with. OFAC has not released the revised rules yet on Cuban American travel and remittances.
But, he said, Cuba is beginning to see an increase of U.S. business people coming to the island anticipating that soon they may be able to sell their wares freely.
"The future could be promising, it is still uncertain," Bencomo said. (Reporting by Jeff Franks; Editing by Pascal Fletcher and Dan Grebler)
On May 22, 2009, grant wrote:
This was a report or was it propaganda? Ignorance of the reality of the cuban economic system is no excuse for this distrortion. Cuba earns 20 % on dollar(US) amounts sent to Cuba by americans and 10% on other currencies. Monies owed to the USSR are not valid debts and will not be paid. Canada has a two way trade with Cuba of 1.6 billion a year with Cuba selling to Canada about 850 million a year.
On May 22, 2009, Simpatic wrote:
After reading Fidel Castro, Inc, A Global Conglomerate, I would tell those foreign investors and diplomats, that all they need to do is ask Castro to make a withdrawal from one of his bank accounts that he has money stashed away in. You will not find money in his Cuban banks, but you will be able to find money in his other hidden bank accounts, located in various countries around the world. After reading this article, it's very clear to me that Castro has kept his people poor and enslaved. He has been stealing from Cuba for close to 50 years now and with that money, he has built his fortune. I am sick of hearing about how poor Castro is. That's what Castro wants us to think and that is what his American and Canadian business associates want us to think.
American politicians are being influenced by group of highly politically connected attorneys and consultants that are experts in Cuban affairs and business advisement. They want the embargo to end without any political changes in Cuba. Many of these attorney and consultants have served as ex-diplomats or have served under former presidents in regards to U.S. Cuban relations. They are very happy doing business with the Castro brothers because they have formed relationships with them and they already have their business plan in place with them. They don't care about ending the embargo for humanitarian reasons. They want the embargo to end, in order to make more money for their investors, but they want it to end without any real political change. They just want to be able to ship daiquiri mix to Cuba because their tourist is thirsty. They want internet availability and good cell phone signals; not because the average Cuban has a laptop or cell phone, but because they don't want tourist that are staying at their resort to complain about not being able to get internet access or reception for their blackberries.
What I find so clearly unethical about these people is that some of them were going around the country buying the old U.S. Certified Claims, and they were buying these claims for almost nothing. They know that Castro has money because they are not stupid what he's been doing, yet they are telling these claimants and our politicians, that the claims are only worth pennies on the dollar because of the Cuban debt. What is dangerous about these people is that they are so well positioned having worked for our government in the past, that everyone (especially U.S. politicians) believes them. If you ask the U. S. State Department about the Cuban Claims, they will send you the Landau report. Pages 31-33 is all about the U.S. Certified claims and it is written by the attorney that represented a foreign company that was buying the Cuban claims.
It does not sit right with me that someone like this is trying to screw Americans and Cuban-Americans for their claims. They have been patiently waiting close to fifty years to get restitution for what Castro stole from them, and now Castro has figured out away to get out of paying them back. These attorney and consultants are doing Castro's dirty work for him. Castro claims that there is no money to pay restitution for the claims because of the terrible burden of the U.S. embargo. That's his story and he is sticking to it. That is also the story that his old American and Canadian ex-diplomat friends are helping him legitimize. I also get tired of the argument to forget about those old claims. Those claims were not just from large corporations. Most of the claims belonged to individual families that lost everything. They were told that the embargo cannot end without restitution of their claims, so they can't just forget about those old claims because it's what we they have been hoping and praying for, for a long time.
These people don't care about the Americans and Cuban Americans that lost everything some 50 years ago, nor do they care about the Cuban people who have been suffering under the tyranny of Castro's self-serving kingdom. They want to help Castro out by getting rid of the claims, which have been an obstacle and old problem for ending the embargo. By getting rid of the claims, they clear the way for their investments, and Castro and he will favor and reward them with more investment opportunities when the embargo end. These attorneys and consultants also represent off shore hedge funds that are buying the claims. They say these hedge funds are buying claims because they specialize in buying and trading debt. I think the claims are being bought more as an insurance policy for their foreign investors. It's is better to build a resort or golf course on land that has no past claim on it, and if they can buy the old claim for next to nothing, it's just considered a small expense to protect their investment.
If you know anyone that has a U.S. Certified Cuban Claim, please make sure they read this. Knowledge is power and we must not let this small but highly influential group of self-serving scoundrels continue to do what they are doing. The embargo should end, but not without justice for the Cuban people and a fair resolution for the claims. There needs to be a democratic change in Cuba before the embargo ends. If the embargo ends without kicking out the Castro brothers, then they win and have accomplished everything that they set out to do, which is to continue stealing and oppressing the Cuban people. Get the Castro brothers out of Cuban, but not before seizing their assets and foreign bank accounts. They need to pay back the money they have been stealing from the Cuban people to rebuild their country and to restore their dignity, and Castro needs to pay fair restitution for the Americans and Cuban-Americans who he stole from so many years ago. Please remember that a crime is a crime. It does not make any difference if it happened yesterday or fifty years ago, just ask the victims that it happened to.


Why the wallpaper in bathroom is so rare? Because there is an opinion that such a kind of finish is not designed for the bathroom and for this purpose they traditionally use ceramic tiles or plastic panels. It's a delusion. There are many types of wallpaper, which will please you by their aesthetic and functionality.
How to choose the right wallpaper for bathroom? First you need to decide which area of bathroom you are going to cover with wallpaper. The less surface will be in contact with water, the greater will be your choice. For example, wallpaper on a non-woven base is not subjected to deformation under the influence of moisture, while wallpaper on paper basis is more vulnerable from this point of view. In any case, you cannot go wrong by choosing a moisture-resistant wallpaper for the bathroom in accordance with the recommendations of this article!
Limited choice of wallpaper. Not all wallpapers can be used as bathroom finishes. Paper-based wallpaper simply with a printed pattern without a special coating is not suitable for these purposes. Paper under the influence of high humidity and temperature can cause mold and fungus.
Using a water-soluble paste can help to peel off the wallpaper, which entails the need to seal the seams of the wallpaper.
But the wallpaper for the bathroom has a number of undoubted advantages. Choosing modern, moisture-resistant wallpaper for the bathroom can avoid the above problems and give the bathroom design with unique and original wallpaper due to a wide variety of colours and ornaments. In our assortment, there is no just printed wallpaper. All the types of wallpaper we offer for the bathroom, whether on paper or non-woven base, have a decorative, and in this case also a protective waterproof coating: vinyl, cork or metal. In other words - it's washable wallpaper. To repair the bathroom is also widely used paint veneer, which is a highly moisture resistant material and non-deformable, it will perfectly strengthen the walls and prevent the appearance of cracks or the formation of fungus. Despite the excellent performance of moisture-resistant wallpaper for the bathroom, they are still not recommended for use near sinks, faucets and mixers.
High cost and the need to attract specialists for installation.
Limited choice of colours and ornaments.
Long, time-consuming process of dismantling and replacement.
The process of finishing the bathroom wallpaper is very simple. You can easily do this job yourself.
Huge selection of bathroom design options with wallpaper.
Now you can see that it is a great idea to buy wallpaper in the bathroom, which has a number of undoubted advantages!
Thanks to the online store PROFhome.co.uk you can buy wallpaper for the bathroom without leaving home. View photos of the bathroom wallpaper, read characteristics. All questions regarding the price of wallpaper for the bathroom, design and payment can be asked in the customer support. Professional managers will advise you and help you arrange the delivery. Fast delivery of goods is carried out all over the world. Delivery times can be settled with the manager. Please note that the price of the bathroom wallpaper in the catalog is indicated per one roll. Have a good shopping!


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          <input disabled type="text" ng-model="book.title">

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Originally formed in February 2003, Forever Never are a metal band from Billericay, UK. They describe their main influences as being "anything good, from any genre".
"Aporia", and the subsequent self-titled second album both received much critical acclaim upon their releases in March 2006 and April 2009 respectively for its "song writing craft and sheer power (Both Kerrang! 4/5)".
Take Me Out is quite funny, isn't it. It's got him from Phoenix Nights being northern and funny with his catchphrases and whatnot. It's got 30 pretty girls in a line who dance and whoop and choose whether they wish to procreate with a man whose entrance music could define his life.
At 8pm this Saturday, 10 March 2012, that man will be a bona fide heavy metaller. Renny Carroll from Essex metallers, Forever Never.


text:
Worldwide Harmonized Light-Duty Vehicles Test Procedure, WLTP, är en internationell testmetod för fordon motsvarande personbil och lätt lastbil avsedd för laboratorietest. Den trädde i kraft 2017 och ersatte då NEDC, New European Driving Cycle. Proceduren är framtagen under ledning av europeiska FN-kommissionen FN:s ekonomiska kommission för Europa. Den fokuserar på harmoniserade tester för att jämföra koldioxidutsläpp, bränsleförbrukning, miljöfarliga utsläpp och räckvidd. Den har en speciellt framtagen körsekvens, WLTP-körcykel, som belastar bilen i olika temperaturer samt simulerar olika terrängförhållanden och trafikförhållanden.

Testbeskrivning
Tester genomförs enligt fastställda regler som är indelade olika klasser, beroende på fordonens effekt/vikt-förhållande, PWr, i enheten kilowatt per ton, kW/ton. Indelningen är gjord i tre olika klasser:

 Klass 1 – fordon med lågt effekt/vikt-förhållande, PWr, mindre än eller lika med 22.
 Klass 2 - fordon med effekt/vikt-förhållande större än 22 och mindre än eller lika med 34.
 Klass 3 - fordon med högt effekt/vikt-förhållande, större än 34.

Hastigheter i WLTP:s körcykler
Medelhastigheterna för körcykelns olika klasser är enligt följande:
Medelhastighet, förutom stoppen, är 35,6 km/h för WLTC Klass 1
Medelhastighet, förutom stoppen, är 42,4 km/h för WLTC Klass 2
Medelhastighet, förutom stoppen, är 53,5 km/h för WLTC Klass 3
Medelhastighet, inklusive stoppen, är 28,5 km/h för WLTC Klass 1
Medelhastighet, inklusive stoppen, är 35,7 km/h för WLTC Klass 2
Medelhastighet, inklusive stoppen, är 46,5 km/h för WLTC Klass 3

Källor

Externa länkar
 UNECE Transport Division/World Forum for Harmonization of Vehicle Regulations (UN/ECE/WP29)

Standarder och konventioner
Bilar

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
Plaza for Braves bridge removed to save money
Dan Klepal, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
After making the long trek across the bridge to SunTrust Park, pedestrians were going to be treated to a park-like plaza with manicured landscaping, a fountain of water cascading down steps, benches and an elevator to get back up to the bridge.
All of that is gone now, victim of the political desire to keep the bridges' cost under $10 million.
A new $9.4 million estimate for the 1,100-foot bridge over Interstate 285 has scrapped the North End Plaza, for a savings of approximately $900,000. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution obtained the new budget under Georgia's Open Records Act.
The project is actually two bridges — a major span over the interstate that will carry pedestrians and, eventually, a circulator bus; and a shorter, pedestrian-only bridge skipping over Circle 75 Parkway.
The bridges will connect Cobb's business hub with the Braves $1 billion stadium and mixed-use developments, and are considered critical safety elements to keep pedestrians off busy Cobb Parkway and away from traffic moving in or out of the stadium development.
Jim Wilgus, Cobb's interim transportation director, told the AJC last month that the plaza was "value engineered" out of the project. What will take its place?
"There is a set of stairs," Wilgus replied through email. The stairs appear to be two flights in construction documents.
The engineering team designing the two bridges found savings in other places too, according to the new budget: $311,000 from other landscaping; $310,000 from the construction budget for the interstate bridge; and $71,000 from retaining walls.
However, a lot of those savings could be put right back in the project — a line item on the new budget shows "optional" LED architectural lighting at $700,000 that is not part of the cost estimate.
The document says the budget represents 90-percent of the construction plans.
Commissioner Bob Ott, who represents the stadium area, said he doesn't think anyone at the county knows what the final price will be. He called it a "political bridge" because it has been controversial and Commission Chairman Tim Lee has promised that it would not cost more than $9 million.
"All I know is that as a commissioner, I have not seen a budget for the project," Ott said. "I would hope that next week the commissioners will be shown it."
It was difficult for the AJC to get the cost estimate.
The newspaper reported in October that a preliminary budget for the project showed two bridges and cost estimates $2.2 million more than the $9 million price tag Lee had said would not be exceeded.
The AJC made a request for all bridge-related documentation again this year, after commissioners approved the bridge's design in January. The newspaper received 950 pages of documents with only three pages dealing with cost — the same three-page preliminary budget that the newspaper reported on in October.
That led the newspaper to make another request, specifically asking for bridge cost estimates, to which the county provided a power point presentation shown to commissioners — not detailed estimates of the various costs for construction materials.
"We did not ask for or receive a detailed cost estimate before the (commission) meeting," Wilgus said in an email, referring to the engineering consultant designing the bridge.
The newspaper then asked why the county had not requested an estimate of detailed costs, why there was no documentation of the costs outlined in the power point, and how engineers were able to come up with a credible budget if there were no detailed estimates.
Wilgus responded with the updated budget, which includes detailed line items showing the cost of materials to be used for building the roadway, drainage, signage, security, lighting, landscaping, walls and both bridges.
The Cumberland CID has agreed to provide $5 million for bridge construction; the county plans to use Federal Transit Administration funding for its share.
Those costs do not include $800,000 for the engineering firm or land purchases that will be necessary before the bridges can be built. The county is currently in negotiations with two land owners. Commissioners last week delayed a decision on a transportation department request to allow the county to force the sale of land through a court action, if the negotiations fall apart.
Wilgus said he anticipates contracts for bridge construction to be let in April. The county hopes it will be open a year later in time for the first pitch in the new stadium.
Go here to see a video of the bridge's design.
Bridge timeline:
November 2013: Cobb Commission Chairman Tim Lee announces in the Marietta newspaper the plan to build a bridge over I-285, connecting the new stadium with the county's convention and performing arts centers. The announcement comes one day after the Braves announce their intent to move to Cobb County. Lee incorrectly tells the newspaper that the bridge is part of the stadium construction budget and won't be an extra expense.
May 2014: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports that the bridge's future is in doubt after the cost estimate rose to $9 million, from $3.5 million. "I don't think anything about the bridge is certain at this point," Cobb transportation director Faye DiMassimo tells the newspaper.
July 2014: In front of a throng of reporters, Lee again says that bridge construction will not require any local tax dollars.
November 2014: The AJC reviews hundreds of pages of documents obtained through the state's open records law, which show county taxpayers would fund at least half of bridge construction costs, and that to save money the bridge would no longer carry a transit vehicle.
January 2015: The county issues a request for proposal for bridge design that asks for a double-deck bridge that could carry the transit vehicle on the bottom span and pedestrians on the top. The county offered a 2-percent bonus if the engineering firm finished its work in time for construction bids to be opened by October. The plan is to have the bridge ready by March 2017. County officials say the budget is still $9 million.
May 2015: The AJC reports that right-of-way costs will add an estimated $2 million to the cost of the bridge, and that the nearly $1 million for design and engineering is also not included in the county's construction estimate. Bridge engineers not associated with the project say construction alone could easily top $12 million.
July 2015: Commissioners approve a preliminary design for the bridge that is a single span and will carry both pedestrians and transit vehicles.
July 2015: The AJC is the first to report that engineers say bridge construction can not be completed until September 2017, or the last month of the Braves inaugural season in SunTrust Park. The newspaper also reports that a parking deck near the convention center will have to be reinforced for transit vehicles to access the bridge. The cost for the parking deck reinforcement is unclear.
July 2015: Some members of Cobb Galleria Authority, which oversees the county's convention and performing arts centers and must approve bridge construction, express concern at the impact of the bridge on their businesses.
September 2015: The Georgia Department of Transportation declines to provide any financing for the bridge. The document shows the parking deck reinforcement would cost an estimated $3.5 million, which also was not included in the county's $9 million cost estimate. Commission Chairman Tim Lee says the county's portion of the bridge will be funded with Federal Transit Administration money.
September 2015: Lee announces that the bridge will not be open for any part of the Braves first season in SunTrust Park, but vows that it will be built.
October 2015: The AJC obtains the first detailed budget for the bridge project. It shows the I-285 span costing $9 million and a second span, over Circle 75 Parkway to SunTrust Park for pedestrians only, costing an additional $2.2 million. There was no estimate for purchase of right-of-way.
December 2015: The first hint that the bridge project may be back on track: Derek Schiller, the Braves executive vice president of sales and marketing, tells a business group that the team is "optimistic" that the bridge will be complete in time for the Braves first pitch in the new ballpark.
January 2016: The Cumberland CID approves providing $5 million for bridge construction at a special meeting. Members say the infusion of cash could help the project be completed by April 2017. County Commissioners approve the bridge design and are told the budget is $9.8 million, without any documentation of those costs.
February 2016: County transportation officials confirm that the North End Plaza has been removed from the project budget, and say contracts will be let in April. The county hopes it will be open a year later in time for the first pitch in the new stadium.


text:
JAMA Internal Medicine
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Table. The Diagnostic Modalities Considered by the Senior Resident or Hospitalist to Have Been Most Useful in Patients Who Were Correctly Diagnosed Based on Initial Clinical Data Available on Admission
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Hampton JR, Harrison MJG, Mitchell JRA, Prichard JS, Seymour C. Relative contributions of history-taking, physical examination, and laboratory investigation to diagnosis and management of medical outpatients. Br Med J. 1975;2(5969):486-4891148666PubMedGoogle ScholarCrossref
Sandler G. The importance of the history in the medical clinic and the cost of unnecessary tests. Am Heart J. 1980;100(6, pt 1):928-9317446394PubMedGoogle ScholarCrossref
Kirch W, Schafii C. Misdiagnosis at a university hospital in 4 medical eras. Medicine (Baltimore). 1996;75(1):29-408569468PubMedGoogle ScholarCrossref
Reilly BM. Physical examination in the care of medical inpatients: an observational study. Lancet. 2003;362(9390):1100-110514550696PubMedGoogle ScholarCrossref
Schattner A. Simple is beautiful: the neglected power of simple tests. Arch Intern Med. 2004;164(20):2198-220015534154PubMedGoogle ScholarCrossref
Knockaert DC, Dujardin KS, Bobbaers HJ. Long-term follow-up of patients with undiagnosed fever of unknown origin. Arch Intern Med. 1996;156(6):618-6208629872PubMedGoogle ScholarCrossref
van Dijk N, Boer KR, Colman N, et al. High diagnostic yield and accuracy of history, physical examination, and ECG in patients with transient loss of consciousness in FAST: the Fainting Assessment study. J Cardiovasc Electrophysiol. 2008;19(1):48-5517916139PubMedGoogle Scholar
Schmitt BP, Kushner MS, Wiener SL. The diagnostic usefulness of the history of the patient with dyspnea. J Gen Intern Med. 1986;1(6):386-3933794838PubMedGoogle ScholarCrossref
Schattner A. Rivitalizing the history and clinical examination. Am J MedIn pressGoogle Scholar
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Paley L, Zornitzki T, Cohen J, Friedman J, Kozak N, Schattner A. Utility of Clinical Examination in the Diagnosis of Emergency Department Patients Admitted to the Department of Medicine of an Academic Hospital. Arch Intern Med. 2011;171(15):1393–1400. doi:10.1001/archinternmed.2011.340
Research Letter
Utility of Clinical Examination in the Diagnosis of Emergency Department Patients Admitted to the Department of Medicine of an Academic Hospital
Liza Paley, MD; Taiba Zornitzki, MD; Joel Cohen, MD; et al Joshua Friedman, MD; Natalia Kozak, MD; Ami Schattner, MD
Author Affiliations Article Information
Author Affiliations: Department of Medicine A, Kaplan Medical Center, Rehovot and the Hebrew University Hadassah Medical School, Jerusalem, Israel.
Arch Intern Med. 2011;171(15):1393-1400. doi:10.1001/archinternmed.2011.340
The claim that high-quality history and physical examination are diagnostic for most patients is based on old studies and ambulatory patients.1,2 We examined in a prospective study the utility of basic clinical information available on admission for the diagnosis of adult patients admitted to the department of medicine.
All consecutive patients newly admitted from the emergency department (ED) to 1 academic department of medicine over 53 days were prospectively included in the study. Planned admissions or readmissions were excluded. A senior resident (SR) with 4 years' training (L.P.) examined all patients within 24 hours of admission, including a full history taking, physical examination, and review of ancillary test findings done at the ED (basic hematology and chemistry tests, urinalysis, electrocardiography [ECG], and chest radiography [CXR]). Additional tests (troponin, C-reactive protein, and international normalized ratio) and computed tomography or ultrasonography (when preformed), medical charts from previous admissions, and all medications and vital signs were also reviewed. The SR then determined her main diagnosis at the highest degree of resolution possible (eg, syncope due to orthostatic hypotension) and indentified the modalities that were most helpful in making the diagnosis (eg, history + ECG). Once determined, the diagnosis was sealed and unknown to others. A hospital physician (HP) then repeated the same procedure, with no other data, and did not communicate the results. Participating HPs were active hospitalists and medical educators with 20 years' experience or more and were not involved in the care of the study patients. At least 1 month after discharge, the SR verified the patient's final diagnosis for the index admission by checking discharge summaries and records of any further hospital visits and called the patient's primary physician. These data were collected by the SR without being aware of her own or the HP diagnosis. The main diagnosis of the SR or HP compared with the final diagnosis constituted the primary outcome. Secondary outcomes included the value of different elements (history, physical examination, and basic tests) for the diagnosis and the prevalence and impact of imaging studies performed in the ED (other than CXR) on diagnosis. An experienced statistician analyzed the results.
Altogether, 442 eligible admitted patients (mean [SD] age, 66.9 [17.7] years; 51.4% male) were evaluated. Previous comorbidities were common (mean [SD] number, 1.8 [1.4]; 100 of 442 had none) including hypertension (57%), diabetes mellitus (34%), coronary disease (26%), stroke (16%), renal dysfunction (estimated glomerular filtration rate <60) (35%), and chronic lung disease (14%). Mean (SD) length of hospital stay was 4.5 (7.2) days. All patients had basic blood and urine tests performed in the ED, but only 15.5% had an ancillary test other than ECG and CXR (computed tomography, 11.8%; ultrasonography, 3.7%). The SR examined all patients within mean 14 hours of admission, spending approximately 40 minutes per patient (HP, ≤25 minutes). Follow-up and final diagnoses were obtained at a mean (SD) 2.0 (0.7) months after discharge and included a wide, diverse spectrum of illnesses typical of a department of general internal medicine. The SR was correct in 354 of 442 diagnoses (80.1%). The HPs made correct diagnoses in 373 patients (84.4%). They made identical correct diagnoses in 327 cases (73.9%); both were wrong in 42 patients (9.5%) (P = .04). The modalities considered to have been most useful in establishing the diagnosis were similar for both (Table). The patient's history emerged as the key element in formulating diagnosis either alone (approximately 20% of all diagnoses), in combination with the patient's examination (another 40%, approximately), or in addition to the basic tests with or without the physical examination (33%). The examination or basic tests alone were very seldom helpful. Used in conjunction, the physical examination doubled the diagnostic power of the history (19.5% to 39.0%; Table). The basic tests added a further 33%. Imaging was infrequently used in the ED (mainly head computed tomography) and had added little to determining diagnoses, being considered valuable in approximately 1 in 3 patients who had computed tomography performed.
Research continues to support the enduring value of the history and physical examination in diagnosis3-5 and in deciphering problems with multiple diagnostic alternatives.6-8 However, our study was the first to our knowledge to examine prospectively the value of the basic clinical methods for the diagnosis of the whole heterogeneous population of patients requiring an emergency admission to a general department of medicine.
We found that more than 80% of newly admitted internal medicine patients could be correctly diagnosed on admission and that basic clinical skills remain a powerful tool, sufficient for achieving an accurate diagnosis in most cases. Notwithstanding the great clinical diversity, 90% of all correct diagnoses were accomplished on presentation through a combination of the history, physical examination, and basic tests (excluding imaging studies) (Table). The use of this combination correctly diagnosed 3 of 4 admitted patients (329 [SR] and 347 [HP] of 442 consecutive admissions were properly diagnosed by the history, physical examination, and basic tests alone, or in combination [Table]). History was the most potent single tool identified. Its combination with physical examination of the patient alone was diagnostic in 60% of all admissions. Integrating the results of basic laboratory tests further increased the diagnostic yield (Table). The fact that a relatively small number of patients had ancillary investigations beyond ECG and CXR had no adverse effects on clinicians' performance. In contrast, the incorporation of the basic test results in the diagnostic considerations was found to be crucial because they were implicated in a third of all diagnoses. The SR performed nearly as well as the HPs, possibly owing to her 4 years' experience in the same department. One in 10 patients was misdiagnosed by both the SR and HPs, but diagnosis was achieved either during admission (for the majority of the patients) or after discharge and no patient harm occurred. Our results do not mean that sophisticated studies need not be used after admission, but they do suggest that their choice should be guided by the clinical data on presentation.5,9 In conclusion, 4 of 5 of internal medicine inpatients could be accurately diagnosed close to their admission on the basis of little other than the traditional clinical information. Physicians may count more on their clinical faculties when making decisions about patients.
Correspondence: Dr Schattner, Department of Medicine A, Kaplan Medical Center, Rehovot and the Hebrew University Hadassah Medical School, POB 1, Rehovot 76100, Israel (amiMD@clalit.org.il).
Author Contributions:Study concept and design: Schattner. Acquisition of data: Paley, Zornitzki, Cohen, Friedman, Kozak, and Schattner. Analysis and interpretation of data: Paley, Zornitzki, and Schattner. Drafting of the manuscript: Paley and Schattner. Critical revision of the manuscript for important intellectual content: Zornitzki, Cohen, Friedman, Kozak, and Schattner. Statistical analysis: Schattner. Study supervision: Zornitzki, Cohen, Kozak, and Schattner.
Financial Disclosure: None reported.
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The Beerhunter: Turnpike Two-Stop
by Hunter Styles | Apr 10, 2017
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Two worthwhile breweries off exit 9
The naturalist John Muir once observed that "when one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world." I'm no bearded environmental philosopher, but I do like to kick back with a pint sometimes and dwell on our interconnectedness.
In the realm of craft beer, brewers and buyers often muse on the national and international history of the craft — but that must square, for many of us, with a desire to farm, grow, brew, and drink close to home. Wearing my Beerhunter hat, I do my best to test that balancing act. Valley beer is a singular thing, but tug on it a bit, and you find it's attached to the rest of the world.
With a few far-flung exceptions, I try to cover only those points of New England craft beer culture that are easily accessible from the Valley, and comfortably covered by an afternoon drive. That's what took me off the Pike last week to poke around the town of Sturbridge, just off exit 9. My goal: to check out two breweries here, practically within shouting distance of each other, that play a role in Worcester County's expanding craft beer scene.
First I stopped in at Rapscallion Brewery. After a high-speed hour heading east on the Pike, it felt strange to pull off onto a winding drive down a narrow country road toward Rapscallion's woodsy campus. The rustic red building, which resembles a large sugarhouse, sits alongside a pretty pond and a disc golf course, which is open seven days a week from sunrise to sunset.
This playful summer-camp atmosphere is at the heart of Rapscallion's mission. The brewery and taproom site is all about hanging out and relaxing, as opposed to the quicker, more meal-driven turnover at the company's restaurant, located an hour east in Acton. There's food here in Sturbridge, too: thanks to the food truck parked outside Thursdays to Sundays, visitors can grab sandwiches, salads, buffalo chicken tenders, burgers, and cheese plates (you're also welcome to BYO-food).
On the Saturday night I stopped in, the brewery — which offers flights and full pours, plus 32-ounce cans and 64-ounce growlers — had hit a lively stride, with music and laughter filling the several connected rooms. Much like a ski lodge, it's a welcoming space no matter how long you plan to stay: in addition to wi-fi, the bar has wine, cider, kombucha, and non-alcoholic drinks like house-made root beer. It's not hard to picture killing a couple of hours here among friends.
What I can't promise from Rapscallion is a revelatory craft beer experience. I tried a flight of four beers: a black IPA and a rye IPA (both mainstays here) as well as a porter and a "Munich Dark" lager. The IPAs were both too bitter for my taste, with little body and not much to recommend them (although the black IPA is more drinkable by default, given its smokier profile). The porter, similarly, came off watery. When I return here, I'll be ordering a pint of the Munich Dark, which is — as promised — dark, sweet, malty, and easy to enjoy.
Rapscallion seems to have found its crowd, but to this traveler, the quirkier and more intriguing scene is at Homefield Brewing, just a few minutes down the road and located in the basement of a small antiques shop.
If getting a beer at Rapscallion feels like drinking at a sugarhouse, stopping by Homefield feels like crashing a rich but easy-going neighbor's wine cellar. As I walked in, a jazz quintet called Dozer and the Homewreckers was warming up, and saxophone riffs filled the small room. It's more compact in here than at Camp Rapscallion, but also more low-key.
Homefield was founded quite recently – in 2015. In terms of American craft beer innovation, that puts it a few waves ahead of Rapscallion, which is actually a rebranding of Concord Brewery, founded back in 1995. You can taste the difference. Homefield's four beers on tap — which you can purchase as a flight — are all creative, complex, and highly enjoyable.
Serenity is a hazy, dark-orange ale loaded with citrus and pine notes. Optimism, a drier and more hoppy version of Serenity, has a nice sharp Mosaic finish. Emphathy, a chocolate rye with piney hops, is big and flavorful — not, as I feared, thick and cloying. And Mantra, a dark-roasted barley ale infused with maple, falls on the sweet side, but it's well-made and nicely balanced.
These are earthy, rooty beers, which is fitting for a self-professed "field to glass" brewery. Everything at Homefield feels humble and handcrafted — even the owners' business cards, stacked at one end of the nice long wooden bar, are printed on the plain cardboard inside of cut-up old cereal boxes. And the menu, which features tons of local ingredients, jumps from cheeses and fruits to lacto-fermented veggies, salmon bacon, and smoked bluefish paté. Rapscallion's vibe is appealingly sporty — who wouldn't want to play some disc golf on a warm summer night? — but Homefield Brewery is the real hidden beer gem of Sturbridge.
The Beerhunter appears monthly. Contact Hunter Styles at hstyles@valleyadvocate.com.


Našim poslaním je rozvoj adrenalínových športov a podpora športovcov na Slovensku. Realizujeme športové projekty aj pre verejnosť.
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How does your city pay it's way Dennis? Just from residential and commercial taxes? The sustainable options often seem to cost more in Sim City. I keep on trying to build cities with parks and trees and wind power but inevitably I end up having to invite a casino to set up shop for a cash injection.
Yes, currently only from residential, commerical taxes. Looks like I balanced it somewhat and I make an income right now. I do already have an elementary school and a college, but I think the trouble that my offices complain is because I still don't have an university. Put if I would build the university now, I would start to make minus. There is still a lot of stuff that I can't afford at the moment. I remember when I played it during the free Steam weekend there were also toll houses in the game. I want to set some up soon but I remember this can mess up traffic 🙂 Also I don't have a metro, bus stations, airport or ferries yet, that's where I can earn later too. And touristic income is shows in the economy screen, but my two tourists per day don't make me money yet 🙂 I can push policies too, like the gambling you mentioned. So, all this is very similar ito Sim City.
It sounds like a cool game. I might have to check it out.
I've never seen Cities: Skylines in grainy black & white before. That really works! These are great photos.
I shall watch your progress. I've been hoping to find something that brings back echoes of the long-demised SimCity. I love building. I always found it very relaxing and I love that there are no battles to fight.


text:
Edward Worth, FRS, (1678– March 2d 1733) was an Irish politician, physician and book collector.

He was born into a prosperous Church of Ireland family, his father being John Worth (1648-1688), Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, who was a younger son of Edward Worth (1620-1669), Bishop of Killaloe and his wife Susannah Pepper. His father's eldest brother William Worth was an eminent judge. Edward's mother was named Comfort: she died in 1681. Edward was one of about ten children but only he and his brother Michael reached adulthood.

Worth studied medicine in Oxford (matriculated 1693), Leiden and Utrecht (MD 1701) before practising as a doctor in Dublin. A financial windfall from his uncle William helped him to establish a large book collection, bought from places such as London, the Netherlands, France and Dublin, in addition to those he had inherited from his father and grandfather. On his death the collection consisted of some 4,400 books, many on medicine, dating back in some cases to the fifteenth century. Worth left his library, then valued at £5,000, to Dr Steevens' Hospital in Kilmainham, of which he was a governor. The hospital built a special room to house the books, which remain there today. According to a 2008 Irish Times article, the books have been stored well and are in remarkably good condition.

Edward Worth was an important figure in the Dublin of his day. He was a friend and contemporary of such people as Jonathan Swift, and his library is remarkable, not only for its size and variety, but also for the condition of the books, some of which are hundreds of years old but appear almost new. Between 1715 and 1727, Worth sat in the Irish House of Commons for New Ross.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in January 1699.

Malicious gossip said that he was a very heavy drinker, especially in his last years." A perfect sot... put to bed drunk three times a day" was one comment after his death.

He is buried in the family tomb in St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin.

References

External links
Edward Worth Library official website

1678 births
1733 deaths
Politicians from County Dublin
17th-century Irish medical doctors
18th-century Irish medical doctors
Irish MPs 1715–1727
Members of the Parliament of Ireland (pre-1801) for County Wexford constituencies
Fellows of the Royal Society
Alumni of Merton College, Oxford


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O'Brien scored at World Cup: 'You don't realise the impact of such a tournament'
John O'Brien came to Amsterdam as a young American to make his dream come true. The former Ajax player, now a psychologist, is grateful for his time in the Netherlands and hopes 'his' countries do not meet in Qatar. "My heart says America, but I want to support both."
Correspondent: AFC Ajax
Photographer: AFC Ajax
#WC2022
Throughout its illustrious history, players from 51 nationalities have appeared for Ajax. Amazing players, many of whom have also played for their country. Their country is now playing in the finals with a whole new generation of footballers. Now that the 2022 World Cup is underway, we think this is a great time to hear from some of our former players once again. In this episode: John O'Brien.
We call O'Brien as he sits with his family in Hawaii. Due to the nine-hour time difference with the Netherlands, we speak with him on the island in the early morning. "I had to hurry because I just took a morning dip and surfed in the sea. Lovely."
The American who played in the Ajax squad between 1999 and 2005 still speaks excellent Dutch. "I feel like doing this interview in Dutch," O'Brien begins. He looks back at that period in Amsterdam with great pleasure. "Great. Becoming part of the Ajax squad as a young American felt really good. I played at a high level myself and was surrounded by great players. It was very special."
When he arrived in Amsterdam as a youth player, O'Brien was the only one who did not speak Dutch. "My teammates were very friendly and took a lot of interest in me. They thought it was a bit strange that an American came to play football in the Ajax youth team. It took a lot of getting used to, a different country and a totally different football culture. When we moved from De Meer to the ArenA it felt a bit more American," he laughs.
The defensive midfielder describes himself on the pitch as 'cool' and 'tough'. "Fire erupted in my body and kept going until I couldn't take it any more. Besides, I was quite shy at the time and often waited to see how things developed. I also really experienced top-class sport at Ajax. There were a lot of trainer changes and there was always a lot of pressure on the team. I experienced that as less pleasant. Over the years, I learned to deal with that, but in the beginning it took some getting used to."
During his time in Amsterdam, O'Brien was called up for the United States national team. "It meant a lot to me. I had a 'chip on my shoulder' when, as a fan, I always saw America lose against other countries. I wanted to show the world that America could win. Because of my experiences at Ajax, I always went to the national team with a lot of confidence. My ball skills had improved immensely."
The 2002 World Cup was a great tournament for the Americans. "I scored during the first game with Portugal. It was my first World Cup, I felt good, and it was a big stage. We won 3-2 and ended up going out in the quarter-finals against Germany. During that tournament, I was young and basically I didn't know what I was doing," O'Brien laughs. "I'm here and I'm just going to do it, I thought. You don't realise the impact of a World Cup."
Four years later, O'Brien was again active at a World Cup. "I was injured for almost four years, but was lucky to get to go. I ended up playing almost no football because I wasn't quite fit anyway. Between 2002 and 2006, my career went downhill."
The way Americans experience the World Cup now has changed enormously from his period explains O'Brien. "It is alive now, partly because we are participating this year, but also because we have quite a good team. There is hope because the next World Cup in 2026 will be held in the US, among other places. When I participated in the World Cup, the football press tried to transfer it to the general news in America. That was a challenge at the time. That's not the case now. There is enough attention now and everyone in America is following it."
'Player I wanted to be'
The United States is in the group with England, Wales and Iran at the World Cup in Qatar. O'Brien, who now works as a psychologist, follows them closely. "We have a good chance of going through, second behind England is realistic." He also follows the Netherlands. "I like players like Frenkie de Jong. He is a player I would have liked to be."
The Netherlands - United States fixture is realistic in the quarter-final. Who is O'Brien supporting? "I wouldn't like that, because my heart says America. But I don't think they will make it against the Dutch. I hope they meet someone else because then I can support both of them."
Rosales: 'Great seeing my former team mates shine at the 2010 World Cup'
An unfulfilled World Cup dream: as a youth international player for Argentina, Mauro Rosales won every trophy imaginable - even playing in the Copa América final against Brazil, but playing in the World Cup does not appear on the Argentinian's CV. The former Ajax winger suffered an ankle injury in 2006 playing in the Eredivisie against Willem II. And with that he waved goodbye to his dream of playing in the World Cup that year. Nevertheless, 41-year-old Rosales can look back on an amazing career and remains an enthousiastic supporter of the Argentine national team.
Joey Didulica: 'Let Louis win that Cup'
Former Ajax player Joey Didulica served as reserve goalkeeper during two final rounds. During the 2004 European Championship in Portugal and the 2006 World Cup in Germany, he was proud to be part of Croatia's squad. Over the next few weeks, the 45-year-old player's coach, along with his family, is completely flipping his day-night routine. He will sleep during the day and watch the matches at night; with a special focus on Croatia and the Netherlands.
World Cup contenders Álvarez and Sánchez's season in figures
Mexican grinta at the Johan Cruijff ArenA. This is what Amsterdam supporters have been enjoying for the past few seasons. Edson Álvarez has worn the hallowed Ajax jersey for more than 100 games and saw his bosom buddy Jorge Sánchez arrive in Amsterdam this summer. The Ajax duo will be in action with Mexico at the World Cup in Qatar. A good time to look back at the Mexican Ajax players' first half of the season.
#Álvarez
#Sánchez
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