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MedPAC recommends 3.3% raise to hospitals in 2021
CMS rejects Wyoming plan to lower air ambulance costs
HHS, Christus Trinity settle deaf patients' bias claims
Healthcare's worst get called out in the Shkreli Awards
Cleveland Clinic names inaugural chief research information officer
Louisiana health chief Dr. Rebekah Gee resigns
Minnesota looks to evolve its patient-safety reporting system
Despite progress, we're still waiting for a truly safer healthcare system
Alabama lawmakers push wage index reform
Alex Kacik
Alabama congressional members sent a letter to CMS Administrator Seema Verma on Friday to support the HHS' Office of Inspector General's recommendation to overhaul the wage index, something lawmakers say has jeopardized the state's rural hospitals.
The letter, which was signed by U.S. Senators Richard Shelby (D-Ala.) and Doug Jones (D-Ala.) along with U.S. Representatives Robert Aderholt (R-Ala), Mike Rogers, (R-Ala.), Mo Brooks (R-Ala.), Martha Roby (R-Ala.), Terri Sewell (D-Ala.), Bradley Byrne (R-Ala.) and Gary Palmer (R-Ala.), said that the wage index "is a fundamentally flawed and administratively burdensome system" that is negatively impacting the Alabama healthcare system. Legislators asked Verma to revamp the index as the CMS finalizes the proposed Inpatient Prospective Payment System rule in fiscal year 2020.
"Most recently, Georgiana Medical Center in Georgiana, Alabama, announced its plans to close, making it the thirteenth hospital in our state to close since 2011," the letter reads. "If left unaddressed, many more hospitals in Alabama could follow suit, and the wage index will continue to be a major contributor."
The index pulls wage, associated hour and wage-related cost data from hospitals' Medicare cost reports to set payments to hospitals. It also factors in the cost of living as it sets market-based payments, which means a larger hospital would impact an area's wage index more than a smaller facility.
That framework is flawed, resulting in at least $140.5 million in overpayments to 272 hospitals from 2014 to 2017, the OIG found.
Modern Healthcare examined the state of rural healthcare and Alabama's struggle to keep its rural hospitals open. Many are overleveraged as they face lower occupancy levels and higher operating costs.
The CMS lacks the authority to penalize hospitals that submit inaccurate wage data and Medicare administrative contractors' limited reviews don't always catch incorrect data, the report revealed. The wage index's rural floor and hold-harmless provisions decrease the tool's accuracy, the agency said.
Although the system is budget-neutral, which means that Medicare isn't overspending, some hospitals incorrectly receive too much money while others collect too little. Notably, that $140.5 million sum only reflects the findings of the agency's last five reports.
Alabama has been acutely impacted, Danne Howard, chief policy officer at the Alabama Hospital Association, told Modern Healthcare in November. The median rural hospital in Alabama operated at a negative 12.2% margin in 2016 and 88% were losing money. The wage index and number of uninsured in the state, which didn't expand Medicaid, are the two biggest contributing factors, she said.
Without comprehensive reform, which is the OIG's top suggestion, Alabama residents will lose access to care, Howard said.
"It will cause more closures, some of which are imminent," she said. "It's probably the most fragile of situations I have seen in my 23 years at the association."
GAO: Drug czar fails to deliver drug-control policy plan
Year in Review: Trump administration makes big push for transparency


This 3 bedroom, 1 bath home sits on a huge corner lot and has so much to offer. With over 1200 Sq Ft, this home has been updated to include ceramic tile flooring in the main areas, and carpet in the bedrooms and bonus room. The kitchen has been updated to include the cabinets and countertops. The bathroom contains a custom tiled shower and an updated vanity. The garage has been converted into a huge bonus room that could easily be made into a 4th bedroom with the addition of a closet.


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Home > Sport > Geraint Thomas slips to fifth in the Paris-Nice
Geraint Thomas slips to fifth in the Paris-Nice
Geraint Thomas lies fifth in the Paris-Nice after three stages
Team Sky's Geraint Thomas slipped a place to fifth in the third stage of the Paris-Nice race this afternoon.
Though Thomas's Sky team mates, including fellow Cardiff cyclist Luke Rowe, worked hard to help keep him in touch with the leaders on the flat stage, he dropped 8 seconds on the day.
Thomas, a former member of the Maindy Flyers junior cycling team, started the day placed fourth, 13 seconds behind 23-year-old Frenchman Nacer Bouhanni who remains in the lead after the end of today's racing.
Feillu Romain, Quemeneur Perrig and Julien Fouchard formed a breakaway early in the day, attempting to steal a stage win.
With 25km to go, the three riders lead the peloton by a minute and 30 seconds but all three were caught towards the end of the stage, which finished with laps of the Circuit de Nevers Magny-Cours racetrack.
John Degenkolb of Germany took the stage win in a sprint finish, while Matt Goss finished second.
Spaniard Jose Joaquin Rojas overtook Thomas in the general classification after securing a time bonus because of his third-placed finish.
The race will hot up in the general classification tomorrow as the riders begin tackling the mountainous stages, which will give Sky a chance to build a lead .
Thomas, who has won two Olympic gold medals on the track, was unexpectedly promoted to lead Team Sky in the Paris-Nice, after Richie Porte switched to ride the Tirreno-Adriatico when Chris Froome pulled out with a back injury last week.
Sky are looking to complete a hat trick of victories at the Paris-Nice, with Bradley Wiggins winning in 2012 and Richie Porte triumphing in 2013.
cycling, geraint thomas cycling wales, Paris-Nice
Turner says Cardiff can beat the Premier League drop
Gethin Jenkins to break record for Welsh caps
Work begins on latest phase of North Road Cycleway
Barker starts busy cycling season with World Champs win
Council makes improvements to 'booby trap' Taff Trail barriers
Myths, sausages and cyclists at Penarth Winter Festival

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Sharon E. Clahchischilliage (Navajo Nation) (born 1947 or 1948) is an American politician and a Republican member of the New Mexico House of Representatives, representing District 4 from 2013-2018, and District 5 beginning in 2022.

Early life and education
Clahchischilliage was born into a Navajo family, the daughter of Eleanor and Herb Clah in Farmington, New Mexico, and is a member of the Navajo Nation. Clahchischilliage attended the University of New Mexico, earned her BS in education from Eastern New Mexico University, and earned her MA in social work from the University of Pennsylvania.

Career
Clahchischilliage has had a variety of teaching and psychiatric social work experience, including as a special education teacher. Working on Indian and tribal health issues, including as Lieutenant, Commissioned Corps Officer, United States Public Health Service and for the Indian Health Service, Clahchischilliage became involved in large programs.

She entered politics when appointed as Tribal Affairs Officer, Children, Youth and Families (CYFD), Office of the Cabinet Secretary, The State of New Mexico. She has also served in top positions in the Navajo Nation (the largest federally-recognized tribe in the United States) as Acting Executive Director, Office of Government Development, Office of the Speaker, The Navajo Nation, 2010–present; and as Senior Programs/Projects Specialist, Division of Transportation, Navajo Nation. Her district includes part of West Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Personal life
She is married and has five children.

Elections
2012 To challenge District 4 incumbent Democratic Representative Ray Begaye, Clahchischilliage ran unopposed for the June 5, 2012 Republican Primary, winning with 958 votes and won the November 6, 2012 General election with 5,856 votes (61.4%) against Representative Begaye.
2002 To challenge incumbent Democratic Secretary of State of New Mexico Rebecca Vigil-Giron, Clahchischilliage was unopposed for the 2002 Republican Primary but lost the November 5, 2002 General election to Secretary Vigil-Giron.

References

External links
 Official page, New Mexico Legislature
 Campaign site

 Sharon E. Clahchischilliage, Ballotpedia
 Sharon E. Clahchischilliage, National Institute on Money in State Politics

21st-century American politicians
21st-century American women politicians
Schoolteachers from New Mexico
American women educators
Eastern New Mexico University alumni
Living people
Members of the Navajo Nation Council
Republican Party members of the New Mexico House of Representatives
Native American state legislators in New Mexico
Native American women in politics
People from Farmington, New Mexico
Place of birth missing (living people)
University of New Mexico alumni
University of Pennsylvania School of Social Policy and Practice alumni
Women state legislators in New Mexico
1940s births
People from San Juan County, New Mexico
21st-century Native Americans
21st-century Native American women
Candidates in the 2002 United States elections

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


This is a fearsome team. Up front -- Megan Rapinoe, Alex Morgan and Tobin Heath are the modern-day answer to the "triple-edged sword" of the 1991 World Cup. (That was Michelle Akers, Carin Jennings and April Heinrichs.) Lindsey Horan is an outstanding playmaker. Julie Ertz stops plays dead in midfield and can get into the attack. Rose Lavelle is one of several options for the third midfield slot.
On the bench, you have the great big-game veteran in Carli Lloyd alongside the youngster Mallory Pugh and Christen Press, who simply scores in bunches.
They'll need a couple of stern tests between now and next summer to make sure the defense is steady. But they have options to play alongside Becky Sauerbrunn.
You could say it was never in doubt, even before the qualifying tournament began. But tonight, it was certainly never in doubt. This is an outstanding team and World Cup favorite that simply took care of business tonight in a 6-0 win.
90 min: Two minutes of stoppage time. Only one goal and only three substitutions instead of the usual six (the other three were made at halftime), and no one wants to prolong this despite the Brown and Brian injuries.
88 min: Morgan Brian is down after a possible clash of heads. She was backing up to get her head to the ball and didn't really see a Jamaican player behind her. The USA has made all three subs. The ref seems content to watch the medical staff take a while with her on the field.
81 min: Through ball to Alex Morgan, who darts past Jamaican keeper Schneider. She drops to the ground rather easily, but we won't call it a dive because we're told there's no diving in women's soccer. PK awarded.
More worryingly for Jamaica, 16-year-old Jody Brown is being stretchered off after a tough shove from O'Hara.
The better news for the USA -- 10 minutes to France.
78 min: So are there any flaws in this U.S. team?
Maybe defensive depth? The outside backs are often busy attacking. They may rely too much on Sauerbrunn to clean up any danger.
Maybe they need to try more goalkeepers?
In any case, there's no question they are absolutely loaded at forward and in the midfield. We aren't even seeing Carli Lloyd or Mallory Pugh tonight.
71 min: CHANCE for Jamaica! Jody Brown, a 16-year-old playing in the USA at Montverde Academy, is sent through, and Sonnett doesn't cope with it well. But Becky Sauerbrunn, the best central defender in the world, gets the ball out of play. She concedes Jamaica's first corner kick of the game, which lands atop the goal.


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La Jolla Playhouse Reception & Play Feb. 23, 2023
La Jolla Playhouse: "THE OUTSIDERS" February 23, 2023 @ 6:30 pm
Based on the Novel by S.E. Hinton and Francis Ford Coppola's Motion Picture.
The story that defined a generation has been reimagined as a groundbreaking musical.
TICKETS: Promo Code: UNIVERSITY https://lajollaplayhouse.org/ivy/
Theater ticket includes:
6:30 pm reception with FREE appetizers, wine, beer, soda
7:15 pm panel discussion – artistic chat
8:00 pm play
Tickets $70
Area 1 seating. $2 Facility Fee.
BUY TICKETS TODAY: https://lajollaplayhouse.org/ivy/
February 23, 2023 at 6:30pm - 10pm
La Jolla Playhouse
Alex Szabo, President CAASD


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Kwasi Okyere Wriedt (Hamburg, 10 juli 1994) is een Ghanees voetballer die als spits speelt. Sinds de zomer van 2020 is hij in dienst van Willem II, waar hij een contract heeft tot 2023.

Clubcarrière
Wriedt speelde bij verschillende clubs in Duitsland, voor hij in 2017 verkaste naar Bayern München, waar hij vooral in het tweede elftal speelde. Daar scoorde hij in het seizoen 2018/19 maar liefst 24 keer in 34 wedstrijden.

Op 25 november 2018 maakte Wriedt zijn debuut in de Bundesliga. Hij viel in de met 3–1 verloren uitwedstrijd tegen Borussia Mönchengladbach in de 68e minuut in voor Sebastian Rudy.

In 2020 vertrok hij naar Willem II, uitkomend in de Eredivisie.

Interlandcarrière
Wriedt maakte op 30 mei 2018 zijn debuut voor het Ghanase nationale voetbalteam, in de wedstrijd tegen Japan. Hij viel in de 82e minuut in voor Emmanuel Boateng.

Erelijst
 Bayern München
DFL-Supercup: 2017, 2018
Bundesliga: 2017/18, 2018/19, 2019/20
DFB-Pokal: 2018/19

 Bayern München II
3. Liga: 2019/20
Regionalliga Bayern: 2018/19

Individueel
3. Liga Speler van het Seizoen: 2019/20
3. Liga Topscorer: 2019/20

Ghanees voetballer


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Home / News Release / Scudder Falls Bridge Replacement Project Travel Advisory for Week of Dec. 5
Scudder Falls Bridge Replacement Project Travel Advisory for Week of Dec. 5 Only Minor Travel Impacts Expected Next Week As Work Continues off I-295 on NJ Side of Scudder Falls Toll Bridge
EWING, NJ – The Scudder Falls Bridge Replacement Project remains on track to reach "substantial completion" on December 15, but some lane and ramp closures will be needed next week to achieve that construction target date.
Motorists should expect the following travel restrictions during this week:
Continuing weekday closures of the Route 29 southbound bypass lane that crosses beneath the Scudder Falls (I-295) Toll Bridge with traffic diverted through nearby service ramps and roundabouts at the I-295/Route 29 interchange (Exit 76). When implemented, this lane closure will be in effect 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. It will enable work crews to install guiderails and asphalt.
Continuing around-the-clock closure of the NJ Route 175 entry ramp to I-295 southbound. This long-term ramp closure is currently scheduled to end by Wednesday, Dec. 8 – weather permitting.
Daytime closures of Route 175/Upper River Road to through traffic in the vicinity of the I-295 approach bridge over Route 175, the Delaware & Raritan Feeder Canal, and the Route 29 northbound bypass. The closures would be implemented 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Affected motorists are advised to use nearby Route 29 as a detour route; access will be maintained for local residences. The travel restriction will enable workers to complete various tasks on the overhead I-295 approach bridge.
The full schedule of currently scheduled possible project-related travel restrictions for the week of Dec. 5 is as follows:
I-295 NB and the Scudder Falls Toll Bridge (PA-Bound) – Possible off-peak lane closures 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6, to Friday, Dec. 10.
I-295 SB – Possible off-peak lane closures 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6, to Friday, Dec. 10.
Route 29 SB Bypass Lane – Daytime closures with traffic diverted through adjacent interchange roundabouts, connector lane and ramps, 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6, to Friday, Dec. 10. (CLICK HERE TO VIEW DETOUR MAP)
Route 29 NB Bypass Lane – Possible short-term flagging and stoppages 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6, to Friday, Dec. 10.
I-295/Route 29 interchange ramps – Possible flagging/slowdowns for striping 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6 to Friday, Dec. 10
Route 175/Upper River Road – Daytime with detour via nearby Route 29 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6, to Friday, Dec. 10.
Route 175/Upper River Road entry ramp to I-295 SB – Continuing 24/7 closure. DETOUR: Use the southern roundabout at the nearby I-295/Route 29 interchange to access the on-ramp for I-295 SB. (CLICK HERE TO VIEW DETOUR MAP) (UPDATE: This closure is now projected to end on or about Dec. 8, weather permitting.)
I-295 WB – Possible off-peak lane closures 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6, to Friday, Dec. 10.
I-295 SB and the Scudder Falls Toll Bridge NJ-Bound – Possible off-peak lane closures 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6, to Friday, Dec. 10.
Taylorsville Road – Right or left lane closures and/or flagging 9 a.m. to 6 a.m. (next day) Monday, Dec. 6, to Friday, Dec. 10.
I-295/Taylorsville Road interchange ramps – Possible flagging/slowdowns for striping 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6 to Friday, Dec. 10
River Road/PA Route 32 – Brief traffic stoppages possible in the vicinity of where River Road/PA Route 32 crosses beneath the Scudder Falls (I-295) Toll Bridge, 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, Dec. 6, to Friday, Dec. 10.
Important Note: All aforementioned scheduled travel restrictions are subject to change due to weather, emergencies, traffic, and equipment/materials mobilization. Motorists are urged to allow extra time to reach their destinations, reduce speeds and exercise caution when travelling through project work areas.
Weekends – Aside from the current continuous closure of the Route 175 access ramp to I-295 SB in New Jersey, no other project-related lane closures are scheduled for the weekends of Dec. 4-5 and 11-12.


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Catching Up with Philomena McPhee-Brown '69, M.S. '01
Retired professor and alumna Philomena McPhee-Brown – known fondly among her colleagues as "Phil" or "McPhee" among students – had a lasting impact on the Thomas College Education program and its graduates. Though she now spends her days at home in Turner, Maine, or enjoying the sunshine in Florida where she likes to swim and golf, she worked tirelessly for just under 30 years to support students who themselves wanted to become teachers.
Before joining Thomas College as a faculty member, Philomena earned her own Thomas degree at the former Silver Street campus, majoring in Business Education. Following graduation, she taught for ten years at Lewiston High School before moving to New Jersey to pursue her master's degree. It wasn't long before she returned to Maine and received a call from Dick Begin at Thomas College.
"The College was relaunching its Business Education program," she recalls, and wanted her help. "For 12 years, I was a department of one." Then, in 2000, former Head of Admissions Rob Callahan led the charge to expand the school's market and offerings, including in education, by adding an Elementary Education degree. Philomena, along with fellow now-retired associate professor Ellen McQuiston and current professor Dr. Wally Alexander, helped to establish the program.
As one of her areas of focus, Philomena supervised the student teaching program, helping to connect bright Thomas students with area schools. In more recent years, she partnered with her colleagues to help lay the foundation for what is now the Center for Innovation in Education.
"Part of what kept me teaching for so long was the camaraderie among Thomas faculty and working with students I knew I could help," she says. "To hear from alumni now, knowing that I made an impression on them – that gives me great satisfaction."


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'Talk About Clusterf---': Why Legal Weed Didn't Kill Oregon's Black Market
Legalization was supposed to take care of the black market. It hasn't worked out that way.
Photos by Natalie Fertig/POLITICO
By NATALIE FERTIG
Updated: 01/21/2022 04:45 PM EST
Natalie Fertig is a federal cannabis policy reporter for POLITICO.
CAVE JUNCTION, Ore. — The first unlicensed cannabis grow popped up near Gary Longnecker's remote Southern Oregon home seven years ago. Now there are six farms surrounding the densely-forested property.
"Last night I woke up at 12:30 with gunshots. [Then again] this morning, seven o'clock," Longnecker said as he and I walked his land in November. "That's them intimidating all of us neighbors to keep out of their face."
A Vietnam veteran and former firefighter, Longnecker retired to the woods of southern Oregon almost 30 years ago to get some peace and quiet, but that's not exactly what he's found. Historically a logging community, the residents of the Illinois Valley near Cave Junction are still drastically outnumbered by trees — and they prefer it that way. In most places, you could yell at the top of your lungs from your front door without another soul hearing. Many people in the county own a gun, and typically aim them at deer or bears — not their neighbors. But since the cannabis farmers moved in (none of whom appear to be licensed based on state records), Longnecker says he's had bullets whiz by his head when working outside, and regularly hears gunshots in the middle of the night.
Top: Gary Longnecker (right) and his neighbor, Gordon Lyford, give a tour of the illegal cannabis grows bordering Gary's property outside Cave Junction, Ore. Illegal grows are popping up all over Cave Junction, in neighboring town Grants Pass, and throughout Southern Oregon.
Trash and toilet paper are littered around the thin wire fence that separates his forested land from each cannabis farm. As Longnecker gave me a tour of his property, a few people could be seen moving around on the property through the scattered pine trees and partially-deconstructed hoop houses. Longnecker's partner called out to them in broken Spanish, since she believed most of the workers were Hispanic. No one answered.
A few moments later, shots rang out.
Aerial shots of Gary Longnecker's property. | Courtesy of Christopher Hall
"So that's called intimidation," Longnecker said as we hurried away. It's a word that I heard often when I spoke with residents about their marijuana-growing neighbors.
Over the last two years, there's been such an influx of outlaw farmers that southern Oregon now rivals California's notorious Emerald Triangle as a national center of illegal weed cultivation. Even though marijuana cultivation has been legal in Oregon since 2014, Jackson County Sheriff Nate Sickler says there could be up to 1,000 illegal operations in a region of more than 4,000 square miles. The Oregon Liquor and Cannabis Commission, which oversees the state's $1.2 billion legal cannabis industry, estimates the number of illicit operations is double that.
Local law enforcement officials believe that people from every U.S. state and as many as 20 countries have purchased property in Jackson or Josephine counties. Cartels roll in and offer long-time residents as much as a million dollars in cash for their property, and hoop houses follow soon after the sale is complete. Residents have become accustomed to hearing Bulgarian, Chinese, Russian and even Hebrew spoken at the grocery store.
Law enforcement around Oregon has seized tens of thousands of marijuana plants from unlicensed cannabis farms over the past two years. Chen Shu-Momg (bottom, left) and Qike Wen (bottom, right) were arrested as a result of the raid on The Red Mountain Golf Course in June 2021. The two men arrested at the bust, Qike Wen and Chen Shu-Momg, were released on bail and there is not a court date listed. | Top and center: AP Photos; Bottom: Josephine County Jail
"Two weeks ago, we took down a Bulgarian operation and in the same week an Argentinian operation," said Josephine County Sheriff Dave Daniel, adding that they've also recently dealt with Chinese- and Mexican-run oufits.
"A lot of these organizations, before the legal market came into effect, would grow in the forest lands — they'd be up in the hills," explained Obie Strickler, a licensed cannabis grower in Josephine County. "Now they're … right out in the open."
What is happening in the woods of the southern Oregon represents one of the most confounding paradoxes of the legalized marijuana movement: States with some of the largest legal markets are also dealing with rampant illegal production — and the problem is getting worse. Oklahoma, where licenses to cultivate medical marijuana are some of the easiest to get in the nation, has conducted more than five dozen raids on illicit grows since last April. In California, meanwhile, most of the state continues to purchase cannabis from unlicensed sources — straining legal operators already struggling with the state's high taxes and fees.
It wasn't supposed to be this way.
Josephine and Jackson Counties are incredibly rural, and many people move to this region to live closer to trees than to other people. This lack of human activity, along with taking precautionary measures like installing tall plastic sheeting (bottom left), helps the illicit farms remain hidden in plain sight. The top photograph depicts a licensed cannabis farm, while the bottom two were taken at allegedly illegal farms.
One of the underlying promises for legalizing cannabis was that legalization would make the illegal drug trade, with all its attendant problems of violent crime and money laundering, disappear. But 25 years into the legalization movement, as 36 states have adopted some form of legalized marijuana, the black market is booming across the country. Legal states such as Oregon and California — which have been supplying the nation for nigh on 60 years — are still furnishing the majority of America's illegal weed.
Oregon's weed is some of the cheapest in the nation, and Oregonians predominantly purchase weed from licensed dispensaries. Economist Beau Whitney estimates that 80-85 percent of the state's demand is met by the legal market. But most of the illicit weed grown in southern Oregon is leaving the state, heading to places where legal weed is still not available for purchase such as New York or Pennsylvania — or where the legal price is still very high, like Chicago and Los Angeles. In Illinois, which legalized medical marijuana in 2013, only about a third of the demand for cannabis is satisfied by legal dispensaries, according to Whitney. Differences in tax rate and regulations plays the major role in differences from state to state, Whitney explains. Unlicensed growers aren't paying any fees or taxes, and they can afford to keep their prices at least 20 percent lower than legal weed — the benchmark Whitney says is the difference in consumers purchasing legal versus illegal products.
"It all comes down to economics," said Whitney. "If you reduce the price, then there's no, or little, or less, incentive [for consumers] to participate in [the] illicit market because you're getting the price that you want … that's the tipping point."
A sign for a marijuana dispensary sits along the Redwood Highway in Cave Junction, Ore.
The macro-economics of the marijuana market are small consolation to residents of Oregon, who say they are caught in a regulatory gap between state law, which fully legalized cannabis in 2014, and federal law, which still considers cannabis to be as illegal as heroin. The one exception in federal law is for hemp, a low-THC cannabis plant which looks virtually identical to the naked eye. Officials say that some of Oregon's illegal farms are masquerading as hemp producers to escape federal oversight. There are just more than 1,000 licensed marijuana and hemp farms in Jackson and Josephine counties, but a recent test of the region's hemp farms found that more than half were illegally growing marijuana — not the low-THC hemp.
"[They] easily danced into the hemp program and got administrative protection," said Oregon Liquor and Cannabis Commission Executive Director Steve Marks. "They inundated that program."
On top of that, there could be a thousand or more unlicensed grows that never bothered with a hemp license.
For Jackson County Sheriff Nate Sickler (top left, left) and Josephine County Sheriff Dave Daniel (top left, right), confusing legalities and a persisting illegal weed market have stymied their efforts to crack down on bad actors.
The impact of the booming illegal trade is being felt by overburdened law enforcement that can't keep up with the illegal operations that seem to sprout with abandon, but it is also exhausting the patience of residents who were key to making Oregon one of the first states to legalize medical marijuana in the late 1990s.
"The danger of what's going on and the fear and worry folks in southern Oregon are feeling about their safety cannot be overstated," Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the influential chairman of the Finance Committee, told POLITICO in December. "And it's all the more reason why federal cannabis prohibition is just not working."
Nicole Rensenbrink, a 62-year-old social worker, travels daily along a curving two-lane road that weaves between groves of tall trees and dozens of farms before finally passing the local high school. Along her seven-minute commute to work, she passes 14 marijuana cultivation or processing sites. She's not an expert, but she can tell that many of them are illegal by the lack of proper signs and the number of hoop houses that exceed the legal limits. But it's the unforeseen consequences — the damage to the environment, not to mention a general fear for her safety — that most troubles her.
A gray fall day along Northeast Sixth Street in Grants Pass, Ore.
"I and my husband both voted for cannabis legalization. I'm liberal, [an] old hippie type. I don't want people to go to jail for smoking pot or dealing a little weed." Rensenbrink said. "But I regret it. At this point, I really regret it."
People have grown marijuana illegally in southern Oregon for at least half a century. It was easy to conceal illicit activity in private woods and national forests when the nearest human could easily be a few miles away. But there's nothing hidden about what's going on now.
The Red Mountain Golf Course, a 24-acre plot of land just outside Grants Pass, the county seat, sold for just over half a million dollars in June 2021. Three months later, Josephine County Sheriffs and Oregon State Troopers raided the former golf course and seized more than 4,000 marijuana plants and arrested two people on charges of felony marijuana manufacture. It wasn't an isolated incident. Around the same time, law enforcement seized 380 pounds of processed marijuana stuffed in a car abandoned at the scene of a crash. Cops also seized 7,600 marijuana and hemp plants, 5,000 pounds of processed marijuana and $210,000 in cash from two grow operations just outside Cave Junction. Two men were arrested and held for unlawful manufacture of a marijuana item and other charges.
While these eye-popping figures draw headlines, the raids are just a cost of doing business for the cartels, according to law enforcement officials. Many buy or lease six or seven properties, knowing that some might get shut down by the police. Like any smart entrepreneurs, the cartels budget for those losses.
"They know that the resources for law enforcement and our ability to combat this issue [are such that] they can overwhelm us," Daniel said.
The proliferation of unlicensed cannabis farms is scaring local residents and scarring the landscape. Personal wells have run dry and rivers have been illegally diverted. Piles of trash litter abandoned grow sites. Locals report having knives pulled on them, and growers showing up on their porches with guns to make demands about local water use. Multiple women say they've been followed long distances by strange vehicles. Locals regularly end conversations with an ominous warning: "Be careful."
Debbie, who retired from the Napa County Sheriff's Department in California, has little faith in Josephine County's law enforcement. Debbie, who requested her last name not be used for fear of reprisal from the drug dealers, says that officers didn't show up when ten gun shots whizzed past her husband's head while he was sitting on the porch, or when the neighbor's pit bulls chased her from the mailbox back up to her own home. When Debbie reported her neighbors to the sheriff's department, they asked her to photograph the license plates of the growers next door, but she was spotted taking pictures.
"[The growers] stalked me and chased me all the way down Placer Road," she said.
The problem has gotten so bad that residents and local officials have called for the Oregon National Guard to be called in. Democratic Gov. Kate Brown hasn't taken that step yet, but in December she called a special session in which lawmakers approved $25 million to address Oregon's illicit grows. $20 million of that funding is designated for law enforcement to increase staff and resources, while $5 million is dedicated for oversight of water use and water theft.
Earlier in the year, the legislature passed a bill, sponsored by Republican state Rep. Lily Morgan, that increased penalties for growing cannabis illegally and gave state regulators the authority to investigate hemp growers.
Jackson County Sheriff Nate Sickler says the tougher rules for hemp cultivation and the money lawmakers funneled to local enforcement efforts are an excellent start.
"If we're able to get our positions funded, I really think we can make a significant impact [on] illegal marijuana," said Sickler. "Are they going to go away? It's probably never going to happen."
The illicit market isn't just a law enforcement problem, however; it's actually having an effect on the environmental health of the region.
Chris Hall has spent months surveilling cannabis farms in Josephine County's Illinois River Valley from the air. The community organizer with the Illinois Valley Soil & Water Conservation District is compiling a map of illicit grows checked against state licensing information.
On a weekday afternoon in November, Hall explored the debris-filled Q Bar X Ranch site, taking photographs for his records. In August, it took about 250 law enforcement officers — called in from state and federal agencies — to raid the ranch. Officials seized 200,000 marijuana plants and found more than 130 workers at the site, according to the Josephine County Sheriff's department.
At the main site, a new fence with "no trespassing" signs warned off curious visitors. Behind that fence were the ruins of a massive cannabis operation: multiple white hoop houses, now in tatters; ramshackle buildings where workers likely lived; PVC pipes, tarps, buckets, and empty containers of fertilizer and pesticides.
The proliferation of unlicensed cannabis farms is scarring the local landscape. Personal wells have run dry, creek beds have been covered in black plastic, and piles of trash litter abandoned grow sites.
Down the road, the second site was in an even greater state of disarray. Huge gashes had been cut into the earth, and a crevice was filled with bottles of fertilizer and pesticides. The banks of a stream were laden with what seemed like the contents of an entire convenience store snack and soda section.
"You want to talk about clusterfuck, here it is," Hall said, shaking his head as he saw that the creek bisecting the grow site was lined with plastic. "The [creek] bed is the most sensitive natural habitat that we have," Hall said. "To line it with plastic, particularly black plastic, is to kill everything underneath it."
Hall was hired because the soil and water district was inundated with complaints from local residents about the negative impacts on their water sources. The $5 million that Morgan's bill recently allocated for water-resource issues is meant to address this problem.
Reclaiming land and waterways after illicit growing occurs, though, is an expensive and complex undertaking. A U.S. House member proposed allocating $25 million in last year's federal budget for shuttering and reclaiming grow sites on national forest land, though it was removed from the final bill. Even if that funding eventually gets approved, it could only be used to target a small sliver of the illicit grows in Josephine and Jackson counties, since most are on private property.
"If this was going on [closer to Eugene or Portland], you better believe the state of Oregon would stomp this out in a hot second," Hall said — but added that many of the region's residents are famously resistant to government intervention, especially from the state capitol four hours north. "You know, sometimes you get what you asked for. … [Southern Oregonians] have been telling [the state government] to leave you alone, so we're gonna just leave you alone."
There are as many suggested solutions to southern Oregon's weed problem as there are factors creating it. Some say tweaks to federal and state hemp regulations — and more money for law enforcement — will get the illicit grows under control. Others argue that only federal decriminalization will solve the problem, because it would reduce the market for illicit weed.
Anti-legalization advocates, meanwhile, point to Oregon's woes as proof that legalization doesn't live up to its promise of eliminating the illicit market.
"Legalization exacerbates the issue of illicit growing operations because it increases the demand for the product," Kevin Sabet told POLITICO. "With more users emerging throughout the state, more sellers — both legal and illegal — begin working to match the supply. The state has done little to curb demand because it has little incentive to do so."
Debbie driving across a bridge that has recently been reinforced in Sunny Valley, Ore. She says the bridge became dangerous to drive across after an illicit grow that popped up across from her home began driving large trucks over it.
On the last point, John Hudak of the Brookings Institute says that the rampant illicit operations in Oregon aren't likely to be replicated in more densely-populated states like Connecticut or Rhode Island.
"I don't think there's a direct connection between legalization and this situation happening," said Hudak, an expert on cannabis policy who also volunteers as part of the Coalition for Cannabis Policy, Education, and Regulation — a think tank funded in part by Molson Coors and Constellation Brands (which owns Corona). Constellation Brands has already entered the cannabis beverage market.
"There's sort of geographic aspects to why it thrives in certain states," Hudak added. "This is more likely to happen on a large scale in larger states with rural spaces than it would be in smaller, urban states."
Instead, Hudak argues that the illicit market will continue to thrive in legal states as long as cannabis remains federally illegal. It isn't clear when full legalization could happen, though — if ever. A federal decriminalization bill proposed in 2021 by Wyden, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J) has only been seen by the general public in draft form. and it isn't clear when it will be formally introduced in Congress. The draft version of that decriminalization bill would levy high taxes against the cannabis industry, which Whitney, the economist, argues would push prices higher and give illicit growers continued market access.
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) speaks during a news conference to introduce a draft of the Cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act in the Capitol on July 14, 2021 in Washington, D.C. | Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call via AP
Cautionary tales like Oregon's won't move the federal needle, either, Hudak cautions. The lawmakers who understand the impact of the federal-state cannabis policy gap, he says, are the ones who already support legalization. Moreover, there have already been many other stories about the problems created by the policy gap — such as the impact siloed markets have on the environment or the inability of cannabis farmers and store owners to get reliable insurance to cover looters or forest fires — and federal policy has remained the same.
The problem, cannabis advocates say, is not that legalization has failed. Rather it's that the country hasn't legalized enough. Until many more states — and the federal government — decide to legalize cannabis, those advocates say, the illicit weed problem is going to continue, even in legal states. The patchwork of still-illegal states — including some of the country's most populous — creates too-tempting a market for illicit growers.
"We don't have a [moonshine] business in the country … that is challenging Budweiser or Grey Goose," Hudak said. "Alcohol is widespread legal. And until we get on that same page with cannabis, this is going to be a continuing problem."
The OLCC's Marks, though, argues that blanket legalization won't solve all of the problems because hemp and marijuana will still be regulated separately at the federal level — hemp through the Department of Agriculture and marijuana through the FDA or the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau.
"Frankly, the federal government has plenty of responsibility and accountability for the regulation of legal hemp and THC," Marks said. "Making regulators bifurcate the plan under an old federal definition of marijuana and a newer one of hemp is creating unaccountability, craziness and a bad market."
Oregon tweaked its hemp rules this year to make THC testing more enforceable. Meanwhile, the 2023 farm bill is up for discussion in Washington, D.C. this year, but there has not been much chatter on Capitol Hill about making hemp oversight more stringent.
Economist Beau Whitney argues that focusing on hemp regulations is a misplaced solution because many cartels don't bother to hide behind hemp licenses.
Workers at an unlicensed grow across the road from Longnecker's home burn plastic and other debris from their operation.
"They're focusing in on small hemp farmers instead of the real problem, which is international cartels," Whitney said. "Until there's some way in which to have a coordinated enforcement against the illicit cartels, this is going to perpetuate."
While experts and lawmakers in Salem and Washington, D.C. go back and forth over the solutions, southern Oregonians will continue to live with the impact of divergent cannabis laws.
"The people in Salem and the people in Grants Pass don't understand that we're living under this intimidation," Gary Longnecker said, talking about the Oregon state capital and his county's seat of government. "To sit here and be ignored by the people who are supposed to represent you, not even get a staff member to call you back, is so, so frustrating," he said. He's glad that Oregon's legislature adopted tougher rules for hemp growers, but doesn't think it's nearly enough to solve the problem.
"You can't just keep throwing a little bit of money out [here], because … it's like whack a mole. Take this one out, and four more pop up over here."
CORRECTION: A previous version of this report misstated Steve Marks' title. He is the executive director of the Oregon Liquor and Cannabis Commission.


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Meteorologist's forecast updated 20.4.2019 23:26.
Meteorologist's forecast updated 20.4.2019 23:26. Probability forecast updated 20.4.2019 23:09. How are forecasts made?
Sunrise today at 5:16. Sunset today at 20:37. Length of day is 15 h 21 min.


Home What's on LA CITTA' IN TASCA.
30 Aug-14 Sept. Looking for entertainment for your children until school starts? There will be two weeks of fun and games at the Parco degli Scipioni with the ninth edition of this event organised by the association Arciragazzi. It is aimed at children 3-13 and will offer art workshops on the art of Emanuele Luzzati, a mobile TV studio where the evening news will be prepared daily, workshops on Indian art and African dance, an international clown festival, puppets, music, treasure hunts and a play area for under 5s. The Biblioteca Centrale dei Ragazzi (Rome's library for children) will also be present, lending its books to read in the park or to bring back home. For info tel. Arciragazzi 0641733356, www.lacittaintasca.it.
Address Parco degli Scipioni (between Via di Porta Latina and Via di Porta S. Sebastiano).
Parco degli Scipioni (between Via di Porta Latina and Via di Porta S. Sebastiano).


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Good To Go pledges increasing in Nashville
Nashville's "Good to Go" program helps customers identify restaurants taking precautions during pandemic.
By: Kyle Horan
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — More businesses are signing onto a program intended to protect employees and customers in Nashville bars.
The "Good To Go pledge" is a program for businesses to train their staff to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
The volunteer program encourages businesses to learn about wearing masks, social distancing and other methods of protection against coronavirus.
So far, 600 businesses have signed up. The management at Ol Smokey Distillery said they're taking the rules very seriously.
"We said sure. Let's jump on board. Because we obviously, not only want our employees, but our visitors to feel comfortable and feel safe and have a good time," said Johnny Baker, director of sales for the distillery.
The business has erected plexiglass barriers around of the bars in the building. They've also placed directional arrows on the ground and signs around the business instructing patrons to social distance.
"With the mask ordinance, we're supplying masks to people if they need them. We're being very couth. We're not being ugly to people and for the most part, it's been well received," said Baker.
The business will ask patrons to leave who refuse to follow the mask policy, though. They want the business to be safe for everyone. They'll allow masks to be off to drink and eat.


The Cinque Terre is a little gem along the Riviera di Levante, where you can spend your holidays staying in a Farmhouse near the sea in the area of La Spezia , which is the province that hosts Monterosso al Mare, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola, Riomaggiore and where it is therefore possible to enjoy the Cinque Terre National Park, UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The Cinque Terre, with the dense plots of terraced rows, the dry stone walls with vegetable gardens and vineyards, the perched villages, the scenic paths, the coasts overlooking the sea with bays and inlets, make up a Wonderful and unique landscape. This is why the Cinque Terre National Park, on the UNESCO World Heritage list, was set up, together with Portovenere and to the Islands of Palmaria, Tino and Tinetto. In addition to the National Park, there is the Protected Natural Marine Area of the Cinque Terre, between Punta Mesco and Punta di Montenero, which has been established in order to protect the biodiversity of animal and plant species atypical.
We suggest you leave the car. The narrow roads of the 5 Terre are not easy by car and the parking lots are limited and external to the historical centers. You can reach them by sea or by train and once there, still move by train or by foot to fully appreciate the landscape and not impact on their delicate ecosystem - in order to discover the wonderful paths too!
The Cinque Terre National Park gives the opportunity to follow a series of paths that wind along the coast or lead to the sanctuaries. The most famous trail is the Sentiero Azzurro, which runs along the sea connecting the five localities, from Riomaggiore to Monterosso. Easily walkable, has a difference in height that excedes 500m. The first part of the Sentiero Azzurro is the Via dell'Amore, a path overlooking the sea that stands out in the rock and connects Manarola to Riomaggiore. The Sentiero dei Santuari connects, halfway up, the five sanctuaries of the five villages through steep mule tracks that are still today traveled by believers during the anniversaries. The Sentiero Rosso or Sentiero di Crinale is a more difficult but it offers a very scenic route that connects Portovenere to Levanto. It is about 40km long and reaches a height difference of 1300m. If you want to enjoy another suggestive view, we recommend the Path for Monesteroli, a mule track consisting of a staircase that descends to the sea, built by farmers to reach the vineyards contained by dry stone walls. Another unusual belvedere within the area of Golfo dei Poeti and La Spezia is Biassa, an ancient hill town in the hinterland of Riomaggiore.
During the high season, where the availability is limited, an option to visit the Cinque Terre could be to leave from nearby Levanto, whose shoreline offers easier beaches, unlike the Cinque Villages that have a pristine coastline, with deep and crystalline waters, but tiny bays of pebbles and almost inaccessible coves. For those who want a different experience and point of view, it is possible to go from Monterosso to Vernazza also by kayak, through an ideal route that connects Levanto to Punta Pineda.
Monterosso al Mare is the largest of the Cinque Terre and the most touristic for sandy beaches and crystal clear waters, including the Spiaggia di Fegina, at the end of which stands "Il Gigante", the imposing statue of the god Neptune, created by the sculptor Arrigo Minerbi in 1919 for the Villa Pastine.
The colorful houses of the village are dominated by the remains of the ancient castle overlooking the sea. To see the literary park dedicated to Eugenio Montale and the church of San Francesco in which important works are kept.
As for the palate, try the salted anchovies, a specialty of Monterosso, celebrated every year during the Sagra dell'Acciuga Fried and Olive Oil held on the third Saturday in June and the third Saturday of September. A taste also deserves the Limoncino, a lemon-based liqueur, perhaps during the Festa dei Limoni in Monterosso held in May.
Vernazza is an elegant village characterized by tower houses grouped in amphitheater around a small cove and dominated by the defensive walls and the castle tower. The historical center is crossed by narrow and steep caruggi that from the main street lead to the square in front of the evocative port, the only natural harbor of the 5 Terre. Facing the port, the Church of Santa Margherita di Antiochia, in black stone, with an octagonal bell tower. To visit the Castello Doria that dominates the promontory.
Corniglia is the only village of the Cinque Terre that is not located directly on the sea, is located on a small promontory at 100m above sea level from which you can admire the other villages. You can reach it along the long and characteristic stairway "Lardarina" with 377 steps. Corniglia has an agricultural vocation; It is famous for the hills with terraces cultivated with olive trees and vineyards from which the famous Vino Vernaccia is made. And do not forget to taste the sweet and delicious ice cream of Corniglia Honey.
Manarola is the most scenic of the Cinque Terre for the colorful houses that slope down to the small port and the panoramic terraces. It is renowned for the production of olive oil and for the fine Sciacchetrà passito wine, produced only in this area. At the top of the village is the main square, where religious buildings are concentrated, including the Oratory of the Disciplinati, the Bell Tower and the Church of San Lorenzo. The white concrete pyramid stands out among the houses, a trigonometric sign for sailors. The famous Manarola Nativity, powered by solar energy and made of 17 thousand lights and more than 300 life-sized characters, positioned between the terraces.
Riomaggiore is the first village of the Cinque Terre that you come from La Spezia. The colored houses are built on the style of the tower-houses, developed in height on three or four floors and linked in rows. Characteristic the Porto, sheltered by a natural inlet and where the colored fishing boats are moored. In the upper part there are the remains of the Castello dating back to the XV-XVI century and the romantic panoramic terrace.
To spend a stay in the Cinque Terre you can choose from our Agritourisms, Apartments and Holiday Homes and our other holiday facilities in Liguria.


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'I use it for life': Mike Tyson joins the list of celebrities launching a cannabis line
November 27, 2021 adminComment(0)
In this handout image Mike Tyson attends the Hublot x WBC "Night of Champions" Gala at the Encore Hotel on May 03, 2019 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Omar Vega | HUBLOT via Getty Images
Mike Tyson told CNBC cannabis makes him a "different person" and that he's releasing his Tyson 2.0 cannabis line to help others who are looking for emotional and physical relief.
"It's really all about the love of the medicine," the co-founder and chief brand officer of Tyson 2.0 said. "I put a great deal of time in agriculture and discovering the right strain."
The former heavyweight boxing champion of the world added, "It's become pretty complex, but the best time of my life."
Tyson 2.0 launched Friday in Colorado through a partnership with Columbia Care, a U.S.-based multistate operator that currently runs 99 dispensaries in 16 states, according to its website.
"Because of Mike Tyson's passion for cannabis, and the insight he brought to this brand through his own positive outcomes, we knew we needed to bring this product line, which has such a broad appeal, to market as quickly as possible. We're thrilled to be able to ramp up our partnership when we did," Jesse Channon, Columbia Care's chief growth officer, said in a statement. "It is also perfectly fitting that we are launching in Colorado, one of our largest markets, and look forward to leveraging our experience and scale to bring it to fruition across the country."
The Tyson 2.0 brand will begin selling 1-ounce bags of flower featuring a variety of strains — including the popular "Maui Wowie" — with varying potency priced at $89.95. The average price for an ounce of cannabis in the U.S. in November is $82, according to data from Cannabis Benchmarks. Tyson 2.0 has plans to sell pre-rolls and 3.5-gram jars of flower in the coming months.
"He's not just putting his name on a product. We won't put product on the market unless Mike approves," Tyson 2.0 CEO Adam Wilks told CNBC. Tyson is involved in the research and development process, Wilks added. "Mike actually gets to choose the strains that he prefers, the 'Sour Diesel' and 'The Toad' being some of his favorite strains," he said.
"My best strain is 'Sour Diesel,'" Tyson said with a smile while explaining his goal of creating a new and deeper relationship with his fans through cannabis. "It's a powerful connection with the buyer," he said.
The boxing legend joins a long list of celebrities using their fame to promote cannabis or CBD lines.
The family of music legend and cannabis advocate Bob Marley launched the "Marley Natural" cannabis line in 2016. Rapper and mogul Jay-Z created the "Monogram" cannabis line in 2020. Actor and comedian Seth Rogen, known for stoner comedies, started his "Houseplant" cannabis company in 2019. Martha Stewart launched her namesake CBD brand in 2020 and markets the line of wellness products for people and pets.
Tyson, 55, said he uses his cannabis line for wellness as well, noting, "I use it for life."
"If I don't use it for a week or three days, something of that capacity, I'm totally a different person. And I'm not a likable person," he said.
'Please get vaccinated': France cautious on Covid situation after Austria, Germany impose strict measures
French Junior Industry Minister Agnes Pannier-Runacher in Paris on October 18, 2021. ERIC PIERMONT | AFP | Getty Images French Industry Minister Agnès Pannier-Runacher said Friday that the government was "very cautiously" monitoring Europe's latest wave of Covid-19 infections, urging citizens to get vaccinated to ensure stricter measures won't be necessary. It comes at a […]
Novartis CEO says Covid-related doctor visit delays likely impacting cancer diagnosis rates
The health-care system is still seeing lower rates of diagnoses for certain conditions after the coronavirus pandemic kept non-Covid patients away from the hospital early on, Novartis CEO Vasant Narasimhan told CNBC on Wednesday. "I think the signals that were sent that ultimately asked patients to stay away from the emergency room, stay away from hospitals, sent […]
Biden picks former FDA Commissioner Dr. Robert Califf to run the agency
Dr. Robert Califf testifies during his nomination hearing before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee November 17, 2015 in Washington, DC. Win McNamee | Getty Images President Joe Biden announced Friday he has nominated Dr. Robert Califf to serve as the chief of the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA, currently overseen by […]
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Muhdo DNA Health Kit


Among foreign visitors, Germans are on the top rank since years. According to the statistics in 200, the Germans are well ahead with 4 million 150 thousand visitors.
They are followed by Russians with a number of 2 million 465 thousand tourists. The country sending "the least" tourists to Turkey is Luxembourg. In 20C only 6 thousand persons came from this country. On the global scale, the country sending the least tourists is Iceland with 9 thousand visitors.


A simple 20 payline slot with stacked symbols and a low to medium variance. Players can score some nice payouts during base play and there's always a chance for one of the four jackpots to be won.
20 Diamonds is a video slot coming from EGT. This is quite a simple game with a fast gameplay and pretty much no bonus features. Still the slot has the potential for some big payouts thanks to stacked symbols on the reels and a rich paytable. If you like playing simple games 20 Diamonds is guaranteed to catch your attention.
For this slot the EGT designers decided to go with a Gems theme. The visual details of the slot are great, with modern animations and high symbol details. The designers also used bright colors to give the slot a luxury appearance.
The gameplay in 20 Diamonds is very fast and exciting. Since the game symbols land stacked across the reels players can easily land a few reels of matching symbols or even a full screen of identical symbols. This detail compensates for the fact that the slot lacks a classic bonus round.
20 Diamonds is a 20 payline slot with 5 reels and 3 rows. You can bet anywhere from $0.01 to $12 per spin and you can also adjust the number of pay lines from 1 to 20.
The top payout in the game is set at 500 times the total stake for landing 5 scatters anywhere on the screen. The game comes with an RTP value of 95.8% and with a low to medium variance.
This is one of the few EGT slots which don't have a classic bonus round. The Scatter symbol doesn't trigger any bonus feature and only offers a payout of up to 500 times the total stake.
The Wild symbol in the game is the Seven and it can land stacked on all of the reels. The Wild symbol will replace all other symbols in the game except for the Scatter symbol.
20 Diamonds also comes with four jackpots attached. The jackpot game in the slot is triggered randomly. The player will need to make picks from 12 facedown cards on the screen. Once three cards are matched the corresponding jackpot is awarded.
20 Diamonds is a simple video slot which doesn't have much to offer in terms of bonus features. The game has a low to medium variance and a rich paytable with stacked symbols on the reels. Thanks to this detail players can land some great payouts on the reels of 20 Diamonds.


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BU Jazz Associate Professor Releases Solo Disc
Brandon, MB — The Brandon flood of 2011 will be remembered by many in different ways. For pianist/bassist/composer Michael Cain, it was a time to focus on the creation of his latest disc entitled "Solo". For this endeavour, he not only wrote the five cuts — Kammotion, Prayer, Gerald, The Question and Last Waltz — but also performed the piano and the electronics as well as produced the album.
"A lot of it was recorded during the flood and I was one of the evacuees. I was living in (colleagues) Eric (Platz) and Sarah (Hall's) basement for most of the recording. The flood didn't inspire me. It was a challenge because I was concerned about losing my stuff in the apartment. I didn't get my piano out. The water didn't reach my place, but it was touch and go for quite a while," said Cain, who has been a School of Music faculty member since 2008. "The thing that the flood did was force me to focus: 'It didn't matter what comes, I'm making this recording.' Without the flood, it would have been a different project. The flood made it ten times harder."
After recording material in either his BU office, the Lorne Watson Recital Hall or in the Kinsmen Rehearsal Hall, Cain would bring home the material and edit in the evenings. Though this project was brought to fruition in about six months, it was something Cain had been dreaming about since his childhood.
"One of my biggest heroes would be Thomas Dolby — British/techno-keyboardist/singer/songwriter/composer. He does everything himself. Keyboard players can think like that because we can cover all the parts," said Cain. "We can think about orchestrating in the way we would like it."
A cohesive whole, the disc's five compositions can be compared to the aural aspect of a walk in the forest. The idea of sound, juxtaposed with the piano line , is the main thread.
"It's its own world of sounds. To me, it's very nature-like. As I was mixing, I was thinking of creatures, little sounds that want to chirp up and go away, like if you're in the woods. There are sounds that are very close and some in the distance," said Cain. "It's a way of taking electronic sounds and all those colours, textures and everything that's available to use and have that seamlessly and organically encompassing an acoustic piano and all the vastness that the piano is. The piano is so big, with such rich tones and sounds that come out of every which way. The electronics morph in and around the piano."
Michael Cain's newest disc "Solo" is available through cdbaby.com, while the digital version is available on cduniverse.com, amazon.ca and iTunes.
For more information &/or photo/cover art, please contact:
Joanne F. Villeneuve
270 – 18th Street
Brandon, MB R7A 6A9


"Does moose browsing threaten European aspen regeneration in Koli Natio" by Sauli Harkonen, Kalle Eerikainen et al.
Does moose browsing threaten European aspen regeneration in Koli National Park, FinlandAND?
Harkonen, S. et al. 2008. Does moose browsing threaten European aspen regeneration in Koli National Park, Finland. Alces. 44:31-40.


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Live NetTV APK 4.8 Download Latest Version
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text:
The Quincy Unitarian Church Home Page.
The list of Selected Sermons.
Reflections on Justice
in Shakespeare
Presented December 18, 2005, by Joseph Messina
I originally thought I was going to talk today about justice (hence my title), but as I looked at Shakespeare's plays with this in mind I found myself drawn to something that interests and moves me more-not mercy, which we often think of as justice's opposite, but forgiveness, which is something else. Forgiveness plays a powerful role in Shakespeare. It can save his comedies for comedy. It can mitigate the heartbreak of his tragedies, even while being an element of their pain. That's the note I think I have to close on, because it rings truest to me.1
I'll nonetheless begin with justice, because my moral consciousness dawned when as a child I learned that the world wasn't just. "It isn't fair. I didn't do it. He [my brother] or she [my sister] did it. Punish him or her." More often I said "her," because my little sister couldn't talk yet and so couldn't defend herself when I was trying to redirect the radical injustice of my parents toward some other target.
To my child's mind my parents and the whole pack of adults weren't just, though they were real enough, as my stinging backside and wounded pride well knew. And through that sting and wound, that childish suffering, there arose in me, as maybe in all children, the knowledge of the terrible clash between justice and reality. Maybe that child's knowledge is not so different from that which stirred in Aeschylus, the creator of Prometheus, and in the Hebrew poet who created Job, and in the other Hebrew prophets, in Socrates, in Jesus, in Dante, in Shakespeare, and in the creators of so much of our great theology, philosophy, and poetry, a good deal of which can be viewed as forms of resistance, of refusal to accept injustice simply because it is real. In this connection I always think of a great and powerful formulation by Ursula Le Guin, who speaks of "the terrible justice of reality" to which we often, as we become adults, learn to submit without a struggle. The story from which that quotation comes, however, is not about submitting, but about seeking an alternative to the terrible justice of reality.2 I hope that at least part of my talk will be part of that seeking. In Le Guin's story the seekers must reject and walk away from terrible injustice, but it's typical of LeGuin's tough-mindedness that they don't walk away to some just utopia, some place where they can live out an ideal. Rather, they are going we know not where-a little like me as I wondered where my reflection on justice in Shakespeare was going to take me.
There's so much in Shakespeare to feed a reflection on justice that any selection must be arbitrary, yet in accordance with some sense of a master mood or worldview, be it his or the selector's. In Macbeth, for example, there's a great soliloquy on the operation of both earthly and final judgment. It occurs before Macbeth has committed murder, while he can still just stop at the horrible thought of it:
If it [the murder of King Duncan] were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well
It were done quickly. If the assassination
Could trammel up the consequence, and catch,
With his surcease, success; that but this blow
Might be the be-all and the end-all here,
But here, upon this bank and shoal of time,
We'd jump [risk] the life to come. But in these cases
We still have judgment here, that we but teach
Bloody instructions, which being taught return
To plague the inventor. This even-handed justice
Commends the ingredients of our poison'd chalice
To our own lips.
Macbeth believes, and the play bears out his belief, that sin is punished-not just in eternity but in the Shakespearean here, "upon this bank and shoal of time"; retribution is internal to history and not just in eternity; sin is condemned to historical failure and punishment. Furthermore, here and elsewhere in the plays Shakespearean retribution is not just in history; it is an interpretation of history. Thus much of Shakespeare can be read as testimony to a moral immanence,3 a moral indwelling, in every human being and in every historical moment; historical time is a moral medium. Much of Shakespeare. And yet there's much that one must struggle to read that way. There have been generations of commentators, in particular the late Victorian and early and mid-20th-century ones, who have struggled to read him that way. My late Shakespeare teacher, Irving Ribner, a kind foster father to me, read Shakespeare in this touchingly hopeful way, devoting much of his work to the proposition that Shakespeare made moral sense within an orderly Elizabethan world-view.
One can make reassuring moral sense of the workings of justice in the fate of Macbeth, a man who goes bad and pays dearly for it. Yet even in this play, which seems to stage the mechanisms by which the powers above work their justice through men in the world, there's much to unsettle and dismay us. What are we to make of the merciless slaughter of the wife and children of Macduff, a deed with no point or purpose in the moral world except maybe to perfect Macbeth in evil?
And what of the moral career of Macbeth himself, what about his heroism of the damned? A moment ago I referred to what appears to be a Shakespearean confidence in the moral immanence in everyman, and a Shakespearean commitment to ethical interpretation, to uncovering the indwelling moral being. Shakespeare's Macbeth is fully aware of the evil of his deeds and is tormented by that awareness, but his recognition of his evil leads to no reversal, no real attempt to at least just stop. His self-awareness deepens, then degenerates into coarse superstition and fear alternating with swaggering, and finally into a perverse resolve to hang tough. Awareness does not, here, turn the sinner's life around, does not save him from some of the worst effects of sin, the effects upon himself; Aristotle spoke of recognition-seeing oneself clearly-and reversal in tragedy-availing oneself of the chance to change that seeing clearly presents4 -but what are we to make of recognition without reversal?
Claudius in Hamlet is another problematic instance. One of our readings this morning was an excerpt from his great soliloquy, right after his conscience has been quickened by an enactment of a deed much like his murder of his brother. This soliloquy was a favorite of Abraham Lincoln's. In a letter to the actor James Hackett, Lincoln wrote,
Some of Shakespeare's plays I have never read; while others I have gone over perhaps as frequently as any unprofessional reader. Among the latter are "Lear," "Richard III.," "Henry VIII.," "Hamlet," and especially "Macbeth." . . .
Unlike you gentlemen of the profession, I think the soliloquy in "Hamlet" commencing "Oh, my offense is rank," surpasses that commencing "To be or not to be."
William H. Herndon, his law partner and early biographer, writes that Lincoln had a profound sense of sin and suffered from a consequent hopelessness: "Lincoln maintained that God could not forgive; that punishment has to follow the sin."5 That seems harsh, but in the Christianity of Lincoln's day it's maybe not such a strange belief; after all, death itself was held to be not a natural event but a sentence, what Paul called the wages of sin, God's punishment of humankind's willful disobedience, which could not be forgiven but had to be atoned for, a very different matter from forgiveness. Views like this would help to explain Lincoln's choice of Claudius' soliloquy.
O, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven;
It hath the primal eldest curse upon 't,
A brother's murder! Pray can I not,
Though inclination be as sharp as will.
My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent .
What if this cursed hand
Were thicker than itself with brother's blood,
Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens
To wash it white as snow? . . .
I'll look up;
My fault is past. But, O, what form of prayer
Can serve my turn? 'Forgive me my foul murder'?
What then? What rests?
Try what repentance can. What can it not?
Yet what can it when one cannot repent?
Help, angels! Make assay.
Bow, stubborn knees; and heart with strings of steel,
Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe!
All may be well.
This remarkable soliloquy sets up a wonderful possibility for a sinful man: that he might put his fault in the past; or better, that he might return to the condition of a new-born babe, clean as fresh snow. But as you remember, Claudius does not rise from prayer washed clean; the awful, dismaying reality is that he can't look up, he can't pray. I don't know whether Shakespeare was influenced here by some contemporary theology, according to which no one could make a move toward God unless God so moved him, and if God didn't move him, the sinner could do nothing toward his own redemption. Whether or not Shakespeare let such a theological postulate inform his presentation of Claudius, he has confronted us here with the disturbing spectacle of a man who tries to repent, but cannot.
If this were all that Shakespeare and the world presented, we'd be in awful shape. Shakespeare at least presents something else, and for that I would like to read again the 4th passage in the readings we heard earlier, from Hannah Arendt's The Human Condition:
The possible redemption from the predicament of irreversibility-of being unable to undo what one has done though one did not, and could not, have known what he was doing-is the faculty of forgiving. [F]orgiving serves to undo the deeds of the past, whose 'sins' hang like Damocles' sword over every new generation. . . .
Without being forgiven, released from the consequences of what we have done, our capacity to act would, as it were, be confined to one single deed from which we could never recover; we would remain the victims of its consequences forever. [Forgiving] depend[s] on plurality, on the presence and acting of others, for no one can forgive himself; forgiving enacted in solitude and isolation remain[s] without reality and can signify no more than a role played before one's self.
That may be how Shakespeare considered Claudius' attempt to pray-a role a man plays, or tries to play, before God, but which ends as a role played only before the self and therefore condemned to failure. Divine forgiveness seems to be unavailable, or at least hidden from our sight; and to forgive oneself doesn't work. What's left to us, the gift within our reach, is forgiveness by our fellow human beings. Here Shakespeare provides us with some wonderful instances, especially in his comedies and romances, of a marvelous capacity to forgive, as great as our capacity to wrong one another. One could argue that without this capacity to forgive, typically embodied in one of Shakespeare's great female characters like Marianna in Measure for Measure, or Hermione in The Winter's Tale, or Helena in All's Well That Ends Well, the world of Shakespearean comedy and romance simply could not be. This capacity redeems the world of comedy & romance from some pretty foul doings and pretty foul characters. It has a part to play in the tragedies, too. The awfulness of Hamlet and Laertes' slaughter of each other, for example, is softened by their exchange of forgiveness before they die. But in the tragedies forgiveness can run up against an intransigence, a lack of give in the universe we inhabit. I'll close my talk with a few words about one of the most moving instances of forgiveness in Shakespeare-an instance which for me defines the emotional effect of what may be his most unsettling tragedy, King Lear.
I just finished reading the final exams in my Shakespeare class. Here's what one student, J. C. Weyand, has to say about the effect of King Lear on him. I had asked students to write about the catharsis of King Lear,6 the release of emotions that Aristotle says is the basic effect of tragic drama. J. C. wrote,
[King Lear] struck me as more depressing than any [other] tragedy. At the beginning of the play (and assumedly before the play begins) Lear commits many crimes [against] humanity, including banishing his daughter Cordelia, because she didn't want to flatter him. However, throughout the tragedy Lear is stripped of everything he had-his power, his title, [his wealth], his daughters, and his sanity. He is paying for the crimes (figurative of course) he committed. Paying the penalty for your sins is a key step to salvation. Lear experiences all the pains one would expect him to endure in order for him to be saved. A catharsis is . . . a change or purification that a person endures in the process of spiritual cleansing. In this tragedy Lear does just that. The catharsis is about Lear purging himself of everything and cleansing himself. Lear is stripped of everything in penalty of folly and pride.
This is what makes the tragedy of King Lear so depressing to all of us. It is the fact that after Lear is stripped of everything, broken and powerless, he dies. Lear pays the price for his sins and has changed his person for the better. [H]e should be saved and in the end live. However, not only Lear's but Cordelia's life is needlessly snuffed out, leaving the reader with a sense of pain and injustice.
To what J. C. says I'd want to add that the pain of the play's ending is especially intense because when reunited for a brief moment before their deaths Lear and Cordelia participate in a beautiful rite of forgiveness. As Cordelia kneels for Lear's blessing, he kneels before her:
O! Look upon me, sir [she says]
And hold your hand in benediction o'er me.
No, sir, you must not kneel.
And here are the last words of Lear's reply:
You must bear with me.
Pray you now, forget and forgive: I am old and foolish.
"Forget and forgive": we still say that. This association of forgiving and forgetting suggests that forgiving is a kind of forgetting. And forgetting-isn't it a kind of undoing? What we forget-did it really happen?
All Lear wants now from the world is his daughter's forgiveness. When Cordelia's forces have lost the battle and Lear & she have been taken by their murderous enemies, he says,
Come, let's away to prison;
We two alone will sing like birds i' the cage:
When thou dost ask me blessing, I'll kneel down,
And ask of thee forgiveness: so we'll live,
And pray and sing, and tell old tales . . .
It will be enough for him to wear out life in a walled prison, enacting over and over this blessed moment of forgiveness.
But this moment of healing and repair has been just that, a moment; any hope it kindles is mercilessly extinguished by the remaining action, which pursues the effects of Lear's early bad choices to their brutal conclusion. It's as if Lear had unleashed an unforgiving law that makes one pay despite penance and human forgiveness.
We can forgive one another, yet in the stark universe we all inhabit we die unforgiven. We leave the play with a fear that is basic to human existence: that one's repentance for one's wrongs is not enough, for it can't undo their brutal effects, it can't repair the rent they make in nature and society.7 One can't make things right; such is the tyranny of brutal factness that what's done cannot be undone. Our comfort must come not from the unforgiving gods of the brute universe but from "the [forgiving] presence and acting of others" of which Hannah Arendt speaks. Here, in the giving and accepting of forgiveness within the family and all the circles of those with whom we are bonded in our loves and sympathies, lies our comfort and our consolation as we endure the terrible justice of reality.
(1) The inspiration for this talk is a lecture by Frank Kermode called "Justice and Mercy in Shakespeare" (Houston Law Review, 33 (Winter 1996), 1155-74). Though I've gone in a different direction from Kermode, I'm pleased to acknowledge his influence.
(2) "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas."
(3) I draw on Cynthia Ozick's comments on the ancient Hebrew commentators' attempts to find an indwelling moral design in human reality as this is imaged in Hebrew scripture. See her essay on the Book of Ruth in Metaphor and Memory (New York, 1989).
(4) I'm using Aristotle's terms in senses he probably did not intend.
(5) Caleb Crain, "Rail-Splitting: Two Opposite Approaches to Honest Abe," The New Yorker, 11/7/05, 126-133.
(6) This is the title of an essay by Judah Stampfer which I regularly assign to my students to help them prepare for an exam on King Lear. This essay has profoundly influenced my understanding of the play. Shakespeare Survey 13 (1960), 1-10.
(7) See Stampfer's essay.
©2005 Joseph Messina
The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is the preferred citation for this article:
Messina, Joseph. 2005. Reflections on Justice in Shakespeare, http://www.uuquincy.org /talks/20051218.shtml (accessed January 18, 2020).


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