text:
The Wizards Who Delved Too Greedily
Serah Allison and Brandon Johnstone
Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) is, unfortunately, a commercial product owned by for-profit company Wizards of the Coast LLC (WotC) and therefore by that company's owners: Hasbro Inc. We say unfortunately because D&D is also an experience, a source of joy, and a source of community for a lot of kids and adults alike. From fantasy novels set in D&D worlds to countless hours spent with friends spinning adventure stories together, many people like us have a connection to the worlds and experiences associated with D&D specifically versus numerous other role-playing games which have arisen in the past half century. Of course, the whole time D&D has existed the books and supplementary materials have always been sold for a more-than-cost-of-production price in shops, and personal wealth has always restricted each individual's potential engagement with D&D worlds. It is an understatement to say the commercial reality and the community 'vibe' have always been in tension. But our concept of "D&D" has been much more akin to collectivised folklore and folk gaming than seeing it as a legally restricted "intellectual property".
For two decades the community has had a limited ability to publish supplementary D&D material under an 'Open Gaming Licence' (OGL). Many of us, as players but not publishers of D&D supplementary material, until recently haven't paid much attention to this legal blurb in books and websites – we've simply basked in the joy of our favourite hobby becoming less reviled and more widespread. But capitalism ruins everything.
The OGL is, in brief, a legal document inspired by open-source software that allows creators anywhere to use the D&D game system to create their own worlds, settings, characters and so on to share with others. Under the OGL, creators were even allowed to sell their work without WotC taking a cut! At first glance, this sounds counter to the drive for profit, doesn't it? Not according to ex-WotC Vice President Ryan Dancey. In an interview in 2002, Dancey went into great detail, shockingly honest detail, about the purpose of the Open Gaming Licence:
"Here's the logic in a nutshell. We've got a theory that says that D&D is the most popular roleplaying game because it is the game more people know how to play than any other game. (For those of you interested researching the theory, this concept is called "The Theory of Network Externalities.")
[Note: This is a very painful concept for a lot of people to embrace, including a lot of our own staff, and including myself for many years. The idea that D&D is somehow "better" than the competition is a powerful and entrenched concept. The idea that D&D can be "beaten" by a game that is "better" than D&D is at the heart of every business plan from every company that goes into marketplace battle with D&D game. If you accept the Theory of Network Externalities, you have to admit that the battle is lost before it begins, because the value doesn't reside in the game itself, but in the network of people who know how to play it.]
If you accept (as I have finally come to do) that the theory is valid, then the logical conclusion is that the larger the number of people who play D&D, the harder it is for competitive games to succeed, and the longer people will stay active gamers, and the more value the network of D&D players will have to Wizards of the Coast." [1]
This is confirmation of what you may have already guessed: the apparent display of altruism by a for-profit business was, in fact, a careful business decision intended to capture the market, fence out competition, and ensure players are driven towards their products… for profit! And it worked. The OGL was incredibly popular because anyone could create, and collaboratively build the D&D community. An apparent utopia of free association, but a situation which in actuality served to build a corporation's brand recognition and consumer base.
Following the success of this strategy, eventually D&D grew into a lumbering titan of the role-playing game industry. The market became saturated, and profit growth slowed down. Not on Hasbro's watch though. Not on WotC's watch.
Flash forward to 2023.
At the start of 2023, WotC's replacement 'Open Gaming Licence' was leaked and circulated online. This replacement licence:
Backtracked on previously-made assurances by WotC that they wouldn't interfere with creative people's work;
Increased the degree of control WotC had over material shared by the community;
Allowed WotC to publish, without compensation, material created by the community, and even to stop the creator from sharing their own creations.
If this new licence had come into effect, it would have a chilling effect on the community. It has been pointed out that while this licence was still relatively open compared with how companies such as Disney handle their 'intellectual property', it was nonetheless very restrictive compared with the previous licence [2]. There has also been some conjecture and argument about the meaning of specific words crucial to the OGL such as 'perpetual' and 'irrevocable', the role of intent in the creation of a contract such as the OGL, and whether this change of licence would be enforceable in the event it was tried in court. At minimum, though, the announcement of a replacement OGL would have stopped a lot of people, often individuals or "indie creators", even trying to make any income at all from creating supplementary D&D material such as stories, videos, and online tools. But more deeply than simply a financial and contractual rearrangement, this leaked licence change was felt by the community as a betrayal of the spirit of creativity and free sharing of ideas. D&D has often been heralded as one of the few bastions of creativity where people proclaim "please, steal my work! I hope it makes your game better!" But now, this company that, frankly, has very little to do with their game table was essentially saying: "pay up, or we'll take your content and sell it." The outpouring of anger fuelled by that sense of betrayal has been palpable.
Almost every aspect of our nostalgia and our goodwill is exploited for profit, from childhood toys to remade movies, from artificial scarcity to cease-and-desist orders shutting down fan websites, and so on. WotC and Hasbro are for-profit companies, and maximising control over their profit-making activities is simply expected behaviour. While the exact details vary in each situation, this general sequence of events is not unique to these particular companies, nor unpredictable behaviour for any corporation. The capitalist philosophy requires every business to maximise profit or collapse, and the role of a 'community' in the context of a profit-making institution is merely as a tool to drive consumption and/or reduce labour costs. The terms of the leaked D&D licence only made that role more explicit than before and certainly ratcheted up the level of exploitation, and this was understandably a shock to those who had held an optimistic view of the corporate dynamics of their favourite game. Crucially, it was also a shocking blow to the average WotC worker. The only reason we know so much about the inner workings of the new licence discussion is because multiple workers leaked details to journalists behind the backs of their bosses in order to salvage the work and community that is their livelihood.
In recent years, D&D has seen greater-than-ever popularity. This latest OGL debacle will lose a lot of goodwill and some of its player (customer) base, but WotC will probably navigate a path that ensures acceptable profit, and Hasbro certainly will continue with minimal disruption to their approximately four billion dollar annual profit [3]. Already, WotC has come out with a statement of intent to backtrack (for now) on some of its more draconian measures. As is standard for these sorts of damage-control statements, there is a substantial quantity of gaslighting designed to confuse the consumer into believing the company had their best interests at heart all along:
"Driving these goals were two simple principles: (1) Our job is to be good stewards of the game, and (2) the OGL exists for the benefit of the fans. Nothing about those principles has wavered for a second. That was why our early drafts of the new OGL included the provisions they did. That draft language was provided to content creators and publishers so their feedback could be considered before anything was finalized. In addition to language allowing us to address discriminatory and hateful conduct and clarifying what types of products the OGL covers, our drafts included royalty language designed to apply to large corporations attempting to use OGL content. It was never our intent to impact the vast majority of the community." [4]
Dungeons and Dragons in-jokes have abounded. Using the 'alignment' morality language of D&D, discussion board users have described WotC's actions as "lawful evil". This is particularly ironic considering a disclaimer printed in one of WotC's recent books, Descent into Avernus, stating: "Wizards of the Coast fully endorses the kicking of evil's butt." In a 'how do you do, fellow kids?' sort of moment, WotC tried to appeal to the community by apologising using role-playing game terminology: "However, it's clear from the reaction that we rolled a 1." [5] Commentators have, of course, used much more descriptive and effective references to the fantasy genre to explain the company's actions: "WotC has shown that they are the dragon on top of the hoard, willing to burn the thriving village if only to get a few more gold pieces. It's time for us to band together as adventurers to defend our village from the terrible wyrm." [6]
The now-jaded community of people who recreationally enjoy D&D, or help pay their bills through creating supplementary art, stories and so forth, are left wondering where to from here. Ongoing online discussions suggest switching their gaming away from D&D and to alternative game systems, such as Pathfinder which is published by Paizo Inc. Such large numbers of people have been cancelling their subscriptions to the D&D web service D&D Beyond that first the website crashed, then later WotC have 'hidden' the button to unsubscribe. Discussions have questioned how continuing to play a game for which you already own the materials, such as rule books, actually helps or condones a company whose morals you consider questionable. A common theme of such discussions is the concept of 'voting with your wallet', which is synonymous with allowing free market forces to dictate which companies succeed and which fail. And there is the proposed holy grail of a new game licence (to be called the 'Open RPG Creative License'), to be created by Paizo Inc but managed by a separate entity, which perhaps will produce some relative degree of collective ownership in the style of open-source software such as Linux. In a neoliberal capitalist epoch, these consumption-based responses are to be expected, but it is our job as socialists to point the finger at the other side of the equation: at production, at a system that values constant growth, and which will sacrifice existing creative communities to achieve that goal.
It is, nonetheless, heartening to see large numbers of people rally in defence of art and ideas of collectivism and against monopoly and the drive for profit. Despite the limitations inherent in a boycott of a consumer product, this unfolding drama may just help those consumers gain a slightly greater insight into the structures present in our society, which even infect the games they play to forget about the day-to-day pressures of wage drudgery.
What lessons do we draw from this debacle that mean more to the socialist movement than just the ability to enjoy a role-playing game?
These events show the power of collective action. This was more than an average boycott, it was an exposing of the inner working of a company's production. It laid bare the exploitative practices a near-monopoly levelled against smaller, even fledgling businesses, and the way it weaponised non-disclosure agreements to control a narrative. We saw a community of passionate creators and artists poring over legal documents to identify how they could be used to control the flow of wealth, not terribly unlike a collective of workers picking over a collective agreement together and learning from one another, including journalists and lawyers who were counted among the masses, making their voices heard.
Players learned their creations and art are not deemed worthy of existing for their own sake. If a creation cannot be alienated from its creator, then it must be made to serve to carve out a piece of a market for an intellectual property owner. If not, the capitalists shut you down. To be clear, it hasn't just been socialists yelling "the problem is capitalism!" The player base en masse has expressed an understanding that the profit motive is their Big Bad Evil Guy.
Anyone who cares about their work should unionise! If WotC workers had been unionised and if union laws were stronger, they would not have had to resort to leaking insider knowledge to reporters. The workers could have collectively said to the employer: "no, here's how we want the product of our labour to be used in the community." And if the employer had resisted, the workers would have been empowered to collectively put down their tools down until WotC came crawling back.
And, lastly: if you want to greedily plunder a group of people, don't pick a fight with the folks who spend their free time role-playing in groups collectively facing seemingly insurmountable odds to create a better world.
https://web.archive.org/web/20020404235238/http://www.wizards.com/dnd/article.asp?x=dnd%2Fmd%2Fmd20020228e
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZQJQYqhAgY
https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/HAS/hasbro/gross-profit
https://www.dndbeyond.com/posts/1423-an-update-on-the-open-game-license-ogl
https://www.opendnd.games/#open-letter
Book review: Workers Can Win
Should we Support the Public Sector Pay Adjustment Proposal?
The cost of living crisis: workers must not pay for capitalism's failures
Why You Should Be a Socialist


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While Tinder solves a few of the problems women face with online dating -- like being smothered with lascivious messages from anyone and everyone -- there's still an issue of privacy that it fails to address. That risk of not being nearly as anonymous while looking for a mate as one would hope is what inspired Seattle's Susie Lee to create Siren. What sets it apart from every other dating app is that it keeps a woman's picture private until she deems it appropriate to share with a possible suitor. As Seattle Times notes, a lady can peruse the profiles of men at their leisure and if, say, she's into a guy's answer to questions like what their three magic-lamp wishes are, she can then show him her picture. The idea is to give ladies the control here and base matches on real-world personality, not a dry series of surveys akin to eHarmony.
Access is fairly locked down at the moment. There are around 1,200 current users and you can only get in if you're living in grunge-music's birthplace and have an iOS device. Perhaps more restrictive is that it lacks options for anyone other than heterosexual men and women. Lee says that despite the app's abilities, though, if you use it like any other dating service and focus on shallower interests like how handsome a mate is, you're likely to remain sleepless in Seattle. And really, who wants to go through another break-up again anyway?


I heard the interview on the radio this morning by the present head of the CQC. It would seem that they are still hiding the names of those responsible. This is yet another result of the cult of pretending that a person trained in "management" can do any job even if they know nothing about the job. All these protect each other , sometimes criminally, to protect their lifestyle.


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text:
Residents regain cable television
Time Warner restores service to RECAP
MIDDLETOWN – Residents of houses operated by an anti-poverty agency for seniors, military veterans and abused women with young children on Wednesday regained cable television service they had lost for as long as two months.
The service was restored by Time Warner Cable by late afternoon to the Regional Economic Community Action Program (RECAP).
"We've been actively working together with RECAP on a solution since February," TWC said in a statement emailed Wednesday afternoon. "Their services were fully restored today."
The basic cable service was interrupted during TWC's digital conversion for between two weeks and two months at housing RECAP provides for people with limited mobility and entertainment alternatives, Michele McKeon, RECAP's chief operations officer, said Wednesday before the restoration.
In all, about 60 residents in three locations were affected.
RECAP, McKeon said, was repeatedly frustrated by a lack of communication from TWC, and said the company repeatedly "dropped the ball."
Through it all, RECAP has paid TWC bills totaling $451 per month, and even signed a new contract with TWC early last month.
TWC began its Hudson Valley transition from analog to digital video delivery in March, a change that has not always gone smoothly. Both Sportsplex New Windsor, and the Middletown Park Rehabilitation and Health Care Center in the Town of Wallkill switched to DIRECTTV last month after losing patience with TWC.
Residents of Orange County's Valley View Center for Nursing Care and Rehabilitation saw the number of television channels plummet for nearly a month. TWC finally restored the service under pressure from the county government.
jwalsh@th-record.com

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Three-time Daytime Emmy winner Billy Miller has wrapped up his time with ABC's General Hospital. Miller, who has also appeared on All My Children and The Young and the Restless, issued a rare statement to confirm the news.
It's official: Billy Miller has exited his role as Drew Cain on General Hospital.
Whispers of Miller's impending exit have been growing louder over the past several weeks -- and the Emmy-winning actor's status was also a topic of much discussion at this past weekend's General Hospital Fan Club event. The rumors were put to rest in a rare official statement from Miller to his fans.
"With a slight air of sadness, it is time to ponder what 'Goodbye' means. However, instead of dwelling on what is gone and sure to be missed, there is another way," Miller shared in a letter released by his agent, Marnie Sparer. "Maybe our goodbye is really a remembrance of love felt, an appreciation for lives shared, and the lifelong reminisces that come from embraces and received. Maybe our goodbye is an earnest hope for the brightest path forward for us all. Now, instead of sadness, I am filled with gratitude for all your support, encouragement, and every emotion shared. I cherish the journey we have taken together. Thank you for allowing me into your home and lives. With every ounce of myself, I thank you for being you. I would be remiss in this crazy, unpredictable world we all love so much if I did not hold out the possibility that maybe our goodbye is really...UNTIL NEXT TIME."
Officially. Billy. Miller.
.....#GH #GH56 pic.twitter.com/0U6CxbNHKe
— Marnie Sparer (@TalktoMarn) July 29, 2019
Miller began his daytime career in August 2007 as Richie Novak on All My Children. Miller was a part of the AMC cast for a year before he jumped to CBS's The Young and the Restless to play Billy Abbott. Miller's five-year run on Y&R earned him three Daytime Emmy wins -- 2010 and 2013's wins for Supporting Actor, and a win in 2014 as Lead Actor -- and five total nominations.
Miller joined General Hospital in October 2014, though his addition to the ABC soap had been rumored for nearly a year by the time it was officially announced. Miller originally played the role of Jason Morgan, but when Steve Burton returned to GH, Miller was revealed to be Jason's twin, Drew. The character swap resulted in a wave of Internet rumors that Miller was unhappy at GH. In December 2017, the media-shy actor released a statement denying the rumors. The following year, Miller earned a Lead Actor nomination for his work on GH.
Fans are already clamoring for Miller to return to the role of Billy Abbott on The Young and the Restless -- but the role is currently being played by GH alum Jason Thompson (ex-Patrick Drake). That doesn't necessarily preclude the CBS soap from making a recast. Y&R recently dropped Emmy winner Gina Tognoni from the role of Phyllis Abbott when the role's original Michelle Stafford (ex-Nina Reeves) became available.
It's unclear how Miller's character will be written out. However, a show source tells Soap Central that Miller worked heavily with Roger Howarth (Franco Baldwin) in his final days. Miller's final GH appearance -- which was reported filmed on Friday, July 26 -- will air in late August
As for the "until next time" that Miller spoke of in his message, the actor already has a new role booked -- but it's not in daytime. He will appear as Alex Dunn on the upcoming NBC primetime series Truth Be Told.
How do you feel about Billy Miller exiting General Hospital? Would you like him to return to Y&R? Would you be interested in seeing him join one of the other two remaining soaps? We want to hear from you -- and there are many ways you can share your thoughts.
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text:
Pulmonary Director, Phelps Memorial Hospital, Westchester, NY
Biomedical Informatics Associate Professor Research Tenure Track
RN Supervisor Procedural Ambulatory Surgery Center
Research Fellow-Data & Tech - Part Time (20hrs/week)
Ennis, Texas
Location: Westchester, New York
Internal Number: Director Pulmonary Phelps
Northwell Health Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine Program is seeking a Director of Pulmonary at Phelps Memorial Hospital. The outpatient pulmonary office is located in Sleepy Hollow, NY, with inpatient consults at Phelps Memorial Hospital. There is an opportunity to practice sleep medicine within the sleep lab on the PMH campus.
Fellowship training and Board Certification in Pulmonary Medicine as well as at least 5 years of experience is required. The Director will be expected to provide clinical, educational, and administrative leadership for our department, including the pulmonary lab.
Northwell Health Pulmonary, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine Programs:
Northwell Health Pulmonary, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine Programs started in the 1980s and has grown to over 35 dedicated physicians. Our programs are nationally and internationally recognized for expertise in pulmonary, critical care and sleep medicine, and we boast innovative clinical research and graduate medical education programs. We have specialized centers for pulmonary hypertension and advanced lung disease, cystic fibrosis and bronchiectasis, asthma and sleep medicine.
The Northwell Program spans the full range of lung diseases, whether common or rare, simple or complex. We have subspecialty programs in pulmonary hypertension, asthma, critical care, cystic fibrosis, non-CF bronchiectasis, non-tuberculous mycobacterial diseases, interventional pulmonary medicine, pulmonary rehabilitation and sleep medicine. Learn more about the program here: https://youtu.be/XbHyzDMBRJA.
Phelps Memorial Hospital
Phelps Memorial Hospital is a 238-bed acute care community hospital, located in central Westchester County. Since its beginnings in 1956, Phelps has strived to provide its community with the finest quality healthcare. The extent of services made available to those we serve ranges from emergency services to acute care inpatient services, as well as a host of outpatient services designed to address the needs of those who make up the Phelps service area (Westchester County and surrounding communities in Rockland, Putnam, and Dutchess Counties in New York and Fairfield County in Connecticut).
Northwell Health includes 23 award-winning hospitals and more than 750 community based practice locations throughout Long Island, Manhattan, Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island, and Westchester. All candidates will receive competitive salaries, a comprehensive benefits package, and eligibility for tuition reimbursement. Physicians will be employed as members of Northwell Physician Partners, the fifth largest medical group in the country. Academic Appointment to Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell is commensurate with credentials and experience.
For further details and opportunities, please contact: Lindsay Appelman, Senior Physician Recruiter, Northwell Health, lappelman@northwell.edu.
EOE M/F/D/V
About Northwell Health
We continually recruit a diverse physician workforce to meet the needs of the diverse patients we seek to serve; as a result, our Health System is proudly ranked Diversity Inc's #1 Hospital and Health System. We fully understand that diversity is integral for our institutional excellence and a means to attaining health equity. As a result, our diversity and inclusion efforts are a part of everything we do, from education, to clinical care, to research, to physician well-being. For more information and resources regarding our initiatives, please visit our Center for Equity of Care, https://www.northwell.edu/education-and-resources/community-engagement/center-for-equity-of-care. Northwell Health is New York State's largest health care provider and private employer, with 23 hospitals, 830 outpatient facilities and more than 16,600 affiliated physicians. We care for over two million people annually in the New York metro area and beyond, thanks to philanthropic support from our communities. Our 76,000 employees – 18,900 nurses and 4,800 employed doctors, including members of Northwell Health Physician Partners – are working to change health care for the bett...er. We're making breakthroughs in medicine at the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research. We're training the next generation of medical professionals at the visionary Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell and the Hofstra Northwell School of Nursing and Physician Assistant Studies.
Connections working at Northwell Health
https://careers.acrpnet.org/jobs/18024678/pulmonary-director-phelps-memorial-hospital-westchester-ny


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R. Kelly goes ahead with album despite troubles
Geoff Boucher Los Angeles Times
HOLLYWOOD - R&B star R. Kelly will return to the music scene in mid-January with the release of his new album, Chocolate Factory, his first major project since his June indictment on felony child pornography charges in his hometown of Chicago.
Mr. Kelly had been slated to release an album titled Loveland in November, but that collection has been shelved.
Officials with Jive Records, the singer's label, cited the widespread downloading of the music as undermining the release, but sources close to Mr. Kelly's camp say that some of the Loveland themes and lyrics would present awkward connotations in the context of the singer's legal situation.
Mr. Kelly is expected to go on trial in the summer and could face 15 years in prison if convicted.
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thebestofsolihull
The Future plans for Solihull Town Centre are revealed in 'Masterplan'
KEY DEVELOPMENT opportunities within Solihull Town Centre which includes the relocation of the train station, have been showcased at an international property conference.
The new masterplan outlines future plans including the potential to build on growing support to relocate the train station and developing a new transport interchange at a 'Southern Gateway' which would also offer opportunities for 1,900 sq m of leisure and commercial space and the intensification of the adjacent business and commercial quarter, which could see 21,000 sq m of new office development.
The ambitious plans also outline how Solihull Council will lead on driving development and delivering infrastructure to build upon the town's strong level of inward investment and low retail vacancy rates and detail the potential for up to 1,400 new homes, over 70,000 sq m of new office space and 11,000 sq m of commercial and leisure space in the town centre.
The Homer Road Triangle – a prominent gateway to the town's commercial centre with exceptional road and rail connectivity and the potential to develop over 18,500sq m of headquarter office space – also features in the plans
Coun Ian Courts, Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Managed Growth, said: "Solihull is a thriving, bustling town centre which makes it a great destination for shopping, entertainment and business.
"However, for the town centre to continue to prosper we must not only exploit its strengths but also make the most of future development opportunities.
"We have a number of exciting prospects and transformational infrastructure schemes within our masterplan, including a potential new location for Solihull train station, strengthening of our business and commercial quarters, and the development of new high quality homes, built to a high quality and sustainable urban deisgn.
"Solihull town centre is in a fantastic location, with access to the rest of the UK and beyond just minutes away. Our masterplan will ensure we capitalise on this, and maintain our place at the heart of the UK's economy."
The Solihull Town Centre Masterplan brochure can be found here: www.investinukcentral.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Solihull-MBC-brochure-FINAL.pdf
Ann A
Member since: 27th May 2014
Hi! I'm Ann and with my husband John, said 'Farewell' to bestof on 31st July 2017 and are returning to the horticultural trade. Thank you to everyone past and present for reading my blogs.
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Funny Video: Potty Mouth Tours' Bathroom Tour Commercial - Potty Mouth Tours – Check this $#!+ out!
This funny video is not just a love story, it is Potty Mouth Tours' bathroom tour commercial.
Potty Mouth Tours will officially be launching on Monday, October 9, 2013 with more videos. Woop! Woop!
Check this $#!+ out and get a taste of what is to come on PottyMouthTours.com.
**To remove the advertisement banner on the screen, click the "x" in the right corner of the banner.
Spoiler Alert: The first virtual bathroom tour will be of Stir Cooking School.
You do not want to miss it. Grab your friends and check Bathroom Tours next week to see it.
The background, Bathroom Dance Music song for this funny video is Everything At Once – Two (Bonus Track Version) by Lenka**.
Do you know of a bathroom that has a story that needs to be told? Submit your recommendation on our Be a Scout page.
**Sony/ATV owns the rights to this song. Sony/ATV have approved this video (with this song) as a UGC (user generated content) recording. This commercial trailer is not monetized.


'First things first. Get the champagne,' said Winston Churchill in 1931. It's time to celebrate a win for good development outcomes in Brisbane. Earlier this week, the submitter appeal against Brisbane City Council's decision to approve the Grace on Coronation development was all but dismissed.
It's a win for good development outcomes in Brisbane for three important reasons: community dividend, design excellence and sustainability.
For decades, the site at Toowong has been inaccessible to the public. The approval of Grace on Coronation unlocks 130m of river frontage previously unavailable to the community. It will also open half of the site to the public. The unique tapered building design helps to create more open space at the ground level as well as open up view corridors and minimises the bulk and scale of the buildings.
The design excellence of the project is such that it will put Brisbane on the architectural tourism map. Its organic, sculptural form is unlike anything Brisbane has seen before. The design is inspired by the site's unique location on the river's edge and responds to the developer's vision to create an urban park.
The genius behind the contemporary architectural design is non-other than the late Dame Zaha Hadid. She was the first woman and the first Muslim to be awarded the heralded Pritzker Prize for architecture. Grace on Coronation is also the first of only three Australian projects to be designed by the legendary architect.
As well as iconic architecture, the development creates community dividend by making the heritage listed building, Middenbury House, a focal point of the site. The heritage listed building and its two heritage listed fig trees will be retained. The building will be restored and opened up to the public, intended as a restaurant, art gallery or community facility.
It's surely going to be a popular place to be as it will be within walking distance of the Toowong railway station, the Regatta Ferry Terminal and bus stops serviced by high frequency services. This is also a plus for sustainability as the site's easy access to public transport and amenities may help to decrease private vehicle usage and travel times.
For workers and students who commute via Brisbane's busiest bikeway their ride is about to be improved. A new section of dedicated bikeway will be created through the development site linking the Bicentennial Bikeway with Archer Street. No longer will cyclists travelling through Toowong have to brave the existing narrow and often in peak time, chaotic space along the footpaths of Coronation Drive.
With all the benefits that this development brings, it is no wonder that the Planning and Environment Court effectively said Yes In My Backyard to Grace on Coronation. "On balance, I am satisfied that there are sufficient grounds, in the public interest, to approve the proposed development notwithstanding conflict with the planning scheme," said Judge Rackemann earlier this week.
This is how performance based town planning works. The focus is on quality outcomes instead of a set of tightly prescribed controls where the mindset is limited to designing only for what is considered good enough to pass. So, raise your glasses, I'd like to make a toast to performance based planning and to more good development outcomes like this being realised in our city!


A smart casual outfit can be worn in various occasions so it is important to give it the proper importance.
You must know that this type of attire is quite offerer. I don't want to give you a definition of a smart casual attire, I am just trying to show you some outfit pieces which I personally use when I am creating a smart casual outfit.
The blazer is a very important piece of outfit and it gives a touch of style to smart casual attires. Actually, many times it can change an outfit from casual to smart casual.
Our faithful readers already know how much I like this piece of outfit.
I believe the comfort of your feet should be essential.
I like it a lot and the combos that you can get using this type of shirt too.


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Prairie Artsters.com
An archive of art writings from across the prairies. Circa 2007 - 2012. Est. by Amy Fung.
Prairie Artsters: The Isolating Aesthetic*
Riding the train beyond the tunnels of downtown, rumbling along in the semi-new carts and into the chain-linked isolation of north and east Edmonton, I sat numbed by the graffiti removal just east of 95 St. Where there was once a milieu of unsolicited creations lining the otherwise grey zone of industrialization, there now only exists more grey, in the form of patches outlining the former bursts of expression.
If you saw this particular stretch of graffiti that resided there for seemingly as long as I can remember, you would remember that it was a mix of amateur works stretching between the nothingness of Stadium and Churchill. For the most part, the works were mediocre, being neither mind-blowing or base in articulation, but still there was something intrinsic in their quality; everytime you saw them amidst the emptiness, there was something deeply moving about the experience of encountering these works that situated you into an "Edmonton" experience.
Their removal is natural to the medium of graffiti, and on one hand the situation presents itself as a prime blank canvas. On the other hand, though, its targeted removal by a civic committee intentioned to replace all unsanctioned works with blotchy patchworks of muted blue-greys actually creates another type of Edmonton experience: the experience of isolation, or in terms of visual understanding, an isolating aesthetic.
Beyond the inherent issues of improving architectural standards and public art engagements, the city reinforces a visual solitude. Navigating through the city, the conditions isolate you into the solitary commuter: sand and grit dunes lining every meridian and sidewalk from Beverly to Lewis Estates creates less-than-desired treks; the horizon breaks up into hubs of big box stores along inhumane lanes of traffic; gravel lots extend from homogenous single storey abandoned buildings; the soulless walks through sidewalkless paths leading you to nowhere.
Erasing those marks left by the anonymous only perpetuates the disconnection that already permeates our dirty city streets. With each step we take to "clean up" this city's image, we are removing those who have contributed to Edmonton's identity, and in turn, the potential of ever forming a self identity and heritage.
As the Edmonton Heritage Council begins to form adjacent to the Edmonton Arts Council, a look back at The Art of Living Plan emphasizes that heritage "is the knowledge of the watersheds in human experience that provide the framework for how communities and individuals understand themselves."
Heritage is a form of living history cultivated down into a collection and archive, but what boils down to inclusion and exclusion will inevitably shape our history and heritage. There are plans to open up a city museum, but will this museum feature an Edmonton that I remember? Through erasure, there leaves no possibility for remembrance and understanding, be it through the difference and expression of opinions. In starting fresh everytime, there is no momentum, no continuation, no follow through, leaving only the static representation of the present. This in many ways may be our identity, partaking in an ongoing amnesia of not just the past but our past mistakes in believing that it's easier, cheaper and better to start all over again. Staying on this path, there will never be anything more than this self-effacing cycle of denial, which looking back and looking ahead, leads again to a state of isolation.
- A.F.
*First published in Vue Weekly, February 19 - 25, 2009
at 4:35:00 p.m. No comments:
Manatee Mammaries, Travis McEwen and Mandy Espezel, The Fringe Gallery, Jan 1- 31, 2009 REVIEWED by Pam Baergen
I have known Travis McEwen and his work for several years, yet as I followed him down the steps of the Fringe Gallery to see his latest show I wasn't sure what to expect. This exhibition was to be a collaboration with Mandy Espezel, and the impression I had of collaboration is that it was a difficult practice, especially for young artists.
Image credit: Travis McEwen and Mandy Espezel. "Untitled" from Manatee Mammaries. Photo credit: Travis McEwen 2009.
What I found at the bottom of the staircase was an array of imaginative, awkward creatures--figures birthed from the collaborative drawing efforts by these two young Edmonton artists.
McEwen completed his BFA in painting, and his work produced up until this point has been largely representational portraiture based on memory and imagination. Espezel's work is also figurative, often mixing animal elements such as horns and paws with human limbs, breasts, and body hair. Fusing their separate interests and aesthetics together, each piece created for Manatee Mammaries expresses a sign of trust, as each piece was worked on by both artists, beginning a few pieces on their own, then trading and adding to what the other had made. The artists selected 40 of the 50 works they created and pinned them around the gallery in lines or groupings of similar size.
Espezel and McEwen explain that their creature-figures were created as a way to explore the conceptual relationship between instinctual drawing and figuration. This exploration has pushed both artists' works and themes to achieving a sense of social anxiety. One drawing that I found interesting was of a bulbous head shape with small, unbalanced eyes on a flat green and grey background. In this piece the artists have established a play between appealing and appalling, most notably in the figure's forehead and scalp where a piece of decorative paper curves around areas of yellowish pimple-like growths. I found this work to be a successful fusion of both artists' styles.
The unity of the works was aided by the repetition of materials, and the variety of colours and techniques used was a strength of the show. However, there was one image that I felt added little to the show's overall aesthetic and its overall conceptual exploration. The central male face and chest as well as the painterly background disappeared into the dark colours of this untitled image, and pulled visual focus away from its surrounding drawings. This was unfortunate, since it was close to one image that I found particularly intriguing: a plain swipe of colour overlayed with gold pigment on the bottom half of a plain white sheet of paper. Was this image meant to be figuration in it's simplest form? Was it a shadow: something that suggested the presence of a figure? I was torn between pondering this piece and staring back at the other.
After viewing the exhibition my impression of collaboration as a difficult practice has not changed—artists take risks when they step out of their own studios, not only because they are challenging themselves, but because they are challenging each other. According to McEwen, the show would not have been possible had he and Espezel not had "a high level of respect for each other as well as each other's work." Facing the challenges that collaboration presents was definitely worthwhile for these two artists, since it has led them to develop effective and interesting ways of communicating their ideas.
- P.B. Edmonton
Afshin Matlabi, Terrorism, Democracy, Leisure. aceartinc., January 23 - February 28, 2009. REVIEWED by Noni Brynjolson
The introductory text to Afshin Matlabi's Terrorism, Democracy, Leisure at aceartinc., taken out of a Sandals Resort catalogue, reads: "It is a dream as old as time. Every moment is rich with a thousand delights." This clichéd statement is followed by the digital photograph "Cuba," and the video "Four Cuban Impressions." The sunny utopia pictured in these works is the destination Matlabi visits annually with his family, in part, he says, to relieve accumulated anxiety accompanying the threat of global terrorism. The work consists of digital photos and videos, as well as several works on paper, all of which are informed by the artist's humour-inflected drawing sensibility. Matlabi, a Montreal artist of Iranian descent, intends to expose hypocrisies in western, liberal democratic life. However, he has not been entirely successful in communicating a clear message.
Image credit: "Cuba," Afshin Matlabi, 2002, digital photograph.
Missiles are featured in many of Matlabi's works. In "WMD," a missile dances to the tune of ancient, and very beautiful Persian music. In the crayon and paper pieces "Ballistic Missile's Weekend Family Outing," plump tourists dive alongside grey missiles into vast expanses of swirling blue. Water, symbolic of refreshment, rebirth, and also salvation, is a common theme throughout the show. Nearby, the piece "Anxiety Apology" shows dozens of zombie-like figures running over surreally coloured hills, towards a spouting fountain much too small to save them all.
Matlabi cites his influences to include Magic Realism, Persian miniatures, faith-based art, and political art. He abhors the art for art's sake approach, believing strongly in art's didactic potential. In an artist talk the day after the opening, some critical questions were raised about the connection of Matlabi's artistic influences and political beliefs to his work. For example, Persian miniature paintings are much more detailed and decorative than Matlabi's drawings. It is also hard to see the influence of Shirin Neshat, a reference brought up by the artist. His attempts to parody advertising would have been aided by a more slick, polished aesthetic in some of the works. Matlabi named Théodore Géricault's "Raft of Medusa" (1819) as an inspiration, an iconic painting that condemned the then-recent failure of the restored French monarchy to save one of France's shipwrecked navy ships. In contrast with Géricault's accusatory work that focuses in on one isolated event, the focus of Matlabi's works is far less clear. Is it the concept of democracy, the individual, the government, the media, or all of these interrelated units that Matlabi is contesting?
Matlabi's own political beliefs add another layer of opacity. After he talked about reconsidering "family values, core values, a faith-based system, and religious texts, which are more sophisticated than philosophy," he stated "voting dictates the value of your artistic creativity," adding that he had voted Conservative in the last election. Does this change the political message associated with the show? Matlabi sees democracy as flawed, but what kind of change is he after? To me, the artist's words were more confusing than enlightening, both aesthetically and politically. Considered next to each other, one might piece together a critique of the inhabitants of western liberal democracies: unquestioning, flabby followers whose political systems inherently result in war, and who relieve their anxiety by escaping to warm, sandy beaches to regenerate. However, the works were more difficult to comprehend after hearing Matlabi speak, and I am left with questions surrounding the connection, and in this case disconnection, between aesthetics and politics, intention and expression.
- N.B. Winnipeg
Yan Geng, Sub-Sur-Face, FAB Gallery, January 27 - February 14, 2009. REVIEWED by Sarah Hamilton
Yan Geng's MFA thesis looks in many ways like just another exercise in modernist painting. In fact, the exhibition has already been criticized as just. From a distance, as I approach each painting, it is almost all too pretty. But I also have trouble with the assertion that with so much criticism of Edmonton's modernist history lately, a young artist could seriously practice pure formalism without bringing in some discourse from the past thirty years.
Geng has taken up a keen interest in the sub-conscious and the subsurface by probing deeper into the human psyche. His paintings are figurative, but the faces have been removed because he doesn't "believe that the face itself really shows us very much truth on the surface." As a figurative idea, I think this is a dull realisation; the sub-conscious and sub-surface realized though strict modernist painting is cliché – I'm recalling the work of the late Surrealists and the Automatistes here. Artists like Paul-Émile Borduas and Jean-Paul Riopelle uninhibited themselves in some way to unleash their subconscious mind, reflected in abstracted forms with narrative titles. It's interesting, but without further investigation, this method of art making has run its course.
Image credit: Yan Geng "Perplexed" 2009. Acrylic and Oil on Linen, 57"X39.5"
But, underneath the seemingly pristine surfaces is an undulating, filthy texture, which breaks the surface and hints at something both fascinating and distressing underneath. I'm charmed by Geng's texture. The pure surface of the paint is tainted by some wretched something trapped under it. If I were neurotic, I'd scratch it out when no one was looking.
The works that drew me from across the room is a series of three paintings, hanging around the corner of the upper gallery. They are three large paintings that look almost like colour-field works, titled "Perplexed", "Exhausted" and "Insidious". Though still vaguely figurative, the shapes have been so abstracted that they have lost meaning. It's a head, I think. The same shape is repeated across all three canvases, but the colours are pop, almost neon. The emotions used to title the pieces are not symmetrical (I'm thinking, tritely, of symmetry like agony and ecstasy). I'm glad that Geng doesn't try to bow to our need for balance and meaning and investigates all feelings, as asymmetrical as they exist.
Overall, I think its very odd that a so-called modernist painter would choose a subject matter that rejects the surface as any source of truth, pointing out that in our own realities, the surface is a thin, inexpressive veneer for a complex machine working underneath, which contains content that cannot ever be expressed visually or literally or emotively.
Geng is satirizing painting at the end of painting. That a style meant to effuse all meaning and method in art has become just as emotive and inexpressive and perplexing as its predecessors. And yet, as artists, as a community we're still obsessing over the surface. It's humorous, and it's an interesting direction for an artist to take his formalist training.
- S.H. Edmonton
at 4:58:00 p.m. 3 comments:
Prairie Artsters - Many Sides to Every Story*
A few weeks ago, I went to two locally organized events by Toronto-based artist Peter Kingstone through Latitude 53 and HIV Edmonton. As a self-taught artist currently touring his single-channel video installation, 100 Stories About My Grandmother, Kingstone also screened a short independent work, "The Adventures of Strongman and Quickboy," for a community viewing and post-screening discussion.
Wanting to tell stories not normally seen in popular media, Kingstone's representation of sex-trade workers upsets mainstream constructions of prostitutes as often-disenfranchised, homeless drug addicts from shattered homes. Though it could be argued that this stereotype has roots pulled from reality, it cannot be denied that this construction has been massively popularized to maintain and uphold a moral standpoint that perpetuates prostitution as morally depraved and holds that prostitutes must by default be inferior. By not even engaging in the morality of the situation that automatically creates a "good" versus "evil" scenario, Kingstone instead represents male sex trade workers from a humanist point of view, and in so doing successfully tells a story about people rather than judgments.
Image credit: Still from 100 Stories About My Grandmother, Peter Kingstone, 2008
100 Stories About My Grandmother features 100 male prostitutes from Vancouver, Ottawa, Montreal, Miami and London sharing a first-person narrative about their grandmother. Each story runs for several minutes in an unedited, unscripted stationary shot with the participants ranging from 17 to 64 years of age.
At times wavering between a confessional monologue and a long-forgotten anecdote, the affect on the viewers is the experience of a pure and profoundly sincere moment of human intimacy. Presenting the 100 stories through three different living room sets reminiscent of one's grandmother's house, we are made privy to these stories broadcasting from television sets that would never otherwise offer these perspectives.
Media constructions often dehumanize prostitutes (or any group that is deemed morally inferior), framing them as victims, often of violent crimes, and thus upholding a moral justification of why they must be controlled and saved. Instead of beginning from a position of defense and being judged, Kingstone starts with a narrative about relating to his own grandmother, who was a sex trade worker and who he never got to know. Soliciting a collective memory that reveals horrors and comedies from our everyday relations, the work stands as a communal archive for storytelling.
Similarly, in "The Adventures of Strongman and Quickboy"—which features extended scenes of explicit sex between various assemblages of men—Kingstone presented the film as a community viewing to encourage discussion rather than voyeurism. Topical issues of age, disease and relationships converged without ever dramatizing or exploiting itself into clichés. The character of Strongman has to take daily meds, but the words "HIV" and "AIDS" are never uttered; the character of Quickboy is obsessed with a constructed pop culture that has not included him, but gay exclusion is never dwelled upon.
Serendipitously, on the same day of Kingstone's opening for 100 Stories About My Grandmother, the Edmonton Sun newspaper published an article entitled "A Twisted Homosexual World." Appearing by pure coincidence, Mindelle Jacob's column featured an interview with a Calgary-based psychology professor sharing his opinion about the twisted behavior of "hedonistic psychopaths" who either willingly give or seek out the HIV virus. Using internet profiles as its reported research and blatantly constructing these men as monsters, the article was crude and oblivious in a most disappointing vein, but through its sole manifestation into our consciousness, we are at least reminded that there will always be at least two sides to every story.
- A.F. Edmonton
*First published in Vue Weekly February 5 - 11, 2009
Scout's Honour, Urban Shaman Gallery, January 16 - February 21, 2009. REVIEWED by Roslyn Stanwick
Replacing Nostalgia: Contemporary Views of Home Sweet Home
When you hear the word "scouts" the first thing that usually comes to mind is the character-building youth organization that teaches pre-pubescent teens how to make fires and play safe in the great outdoors. But how about "scouts" in relation to Contemporary Canadian Art? Recently, Anishnaabe First Nations artists Michael Belmore and Frank Shebageget collaborated with Ontario curator Ryan Rice to present Scout's Honour, a traveling exhibition currently on display in Winnipeg's Urban Shaman Gallery.
Comprised of five sculptural installations, the exhibition playfully parallels the 'art' of Scouting by exploring themes of teamwork, community, and personal development within the shifting scope of our contemporary Canadian landscape.
Image credit: Frank Shebageget
"Lodge" 2008 gelatin, basswood, steel. Courtesy of Urban Shaman.
The idea for the show came about three summers ago, when high-school friends Belmore and Shebageget decided to return to Upsala, the remote community in northern Ontario, once home to the artists' grandparents. Having spent many childhood summers fishing, playing, and exploring in and around the area, their journey back was coloured by distant memories of a landscape that no longer was. Formerly the site of a booming sawmill industry, the community is now nearly all but abandoned, with few residual indications of its modern past.
But rather than succumbing to their personal sense of loss, Belmore and Shebageget found the experience liberating. From it, they drew inspiration to create a series of sculptural installations, in which they address the impact of Western technology within our country's cultural, social, and geographic climate.
Using hammered sheets of copper, engraved aluminum, suspended mosquito netting, interwoven fishhooks, and yes, even a giant pile of wooden airplanes, Belmore and Shebageget have pulled together a variety of informal materials to develop landscape installations rich with wit and hidden symbolism.
In "Snag," Belmore has cut a series of hydro/telephone poles into ten small aluminum panels, spacing the pieces evenly apart along the gallery's wall. In northern Ontario these poles still stand tall, but remain functionless. With no more community to connect to the outside world, the poles have been stripped of their wires and are slowly being engulfed by the natural forest from which they originally came. Now, they merely exist as ironic examples of cultural change; as symbols of an economic shift; and as icons of the lasting marks we so carelessly leave when we decide we've had enough.
Image credit: Michael Belmore "Snag" 2008: Aluminium (10 panels). Courtesy of Urban Shaman
For Belmore, these poles also convey a personal dialogue. Having grown up at a time when they functioned as Upsala's central lifeline to the modern world, the artist refers to the poles as 'guardians,' or technological symbols connecting life in the past to life in the present.
"Standing on the shores of the lake my grandparents once called home," Belmore recalls, "I am reminded that progress marches forward, and on that march things are sometimes left or forgotten. My work is an attempt to reconnect or at least capture the essence of our ever-changing landscape."
Similarly, Shebageget's installation "Lodge" plays with the notion of intercultural change within the places we call home. Resting approximately four feet off the gallery floor, "Lodge" is comprised of 1,692 hand crafted wooden Beaver bush planes. It is no coincidence that 1,692 is also the number of Beaver airplanes the de Havilland company first produced when the Canadian Shield first became open to southern pilots. With their ability to land on water, the introduction of the Beaver's modern technology forever revolutionized the way native and non-native communities alike would interact with the land.
As is true of most of the works in the exhibition, the more I think about "Lodge" the more I appreciate Shebageget's work. In a previous installation, the artist hung the planes from the ceiling in the formation of a beehive. This time, he meticulously piled the pieces onto the floor to resemble a dam. By cleverly playing on the various meanings of the word "beaver", Shebageget's installation requires you to stop and think about the competing relationship between these two symbols of Canada's heritage.
Shebaget proposes, "My focus on historical and contemporary intercultural history attempts to locate positive connections that have been established between native and non-cultures, without falling into tropes of stereotypical issues about native culture. This conceptual framework speaks to both the historical and contemporary relevance to both native and non-native identity in Canada."
By exploring the changing visual icons of the Canadian landscape, Belmore and Shebageget's sculptures touch on personal and universal truths about the community's role within the construction of self-identity. Emphasizing themes of change, development, displacement, mass production, and repetition, their subject matters explore parallels between the land's natural appearance and the surfaces we've learned to create. Such works cannot only be appreciated for their honesty in social address, but also for their playful candor and remarkably emblematic appearance.
-R.S. Winnipeg
A selection of spaces from across the prairies
Ace Art Inc
AKA Gallery
Art Gallery of Alberta
Art Gallery of Calgary
Art Gallery of Southern Manitoba
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Manatee Mammaries, Travis McEwen and Mandy Espezel...
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The average person over the age of 40 will end up suffering vision loss from developing cataracts—the leading cause of blindness around the world. The number of glaucoma, macular degeneration, and diabetic retinopathy cases around the world combined don't come close to matching the amount of cataract cases.
Subcapsular Cataracts: Occurring at the back of the lens. Subcapsular cataracts are most common developed in people who have diabetes or are regularly taking high doses of steroid medications.
As it stands right now, more than 22 million Americans, age 40 and older, are suffering from cataracts of some form. According to Prevent Blindness America (PBA) this number is expected to grow to as many as 30 million Americans by the year 2020!
Not all types of cataracts show symptoms of vision loss right away, in fact, in some rare cases patients developing cataracts can have temporarily increased vision. Cataracts develop slowly and take some time to cause dramatic losses in vision.


Stephanie "Sunshine" is about to embark on a 3,100 mile journey through the mountains of the United States by thru hiking from Canada to Mexico along the famous, Continental Divide Trail. This trail follows goes through glacial areas, the tallest US mountain peaks, and deserts. Stephanie will see the most beautiful mountains and views America has to offer, navigate through the original western frontier, and connect with nature.
We are a 501c3 organization, EIN 82-3427085.


We just got through another successful awards show season in LA, and man are our arms tired. We never get bored with this stuff - we are so appreciative of our clients who come back to us year after year to help out with the big ones. This was a gorgeous room that Cheryl and Andrea and the rest of the Sequoia team put together, to celebrate Hollywood's most celebrated. Sequoia has been doing this event for 20 years or so, and every year looks completely original. Tough task indeed. We provided lighting with the lighting design by Matt Levesque as well as audio for an all star band. Fun! read more..


Since most of you wanted a mix of the old and new versions of WW, today features the old version.
I'll start: "Message of love."
WHERE'S THE REST OF THE BOUQUET?
I'll start: "My, what big eyes you have."
CHASING FIREFLIES IS FREE FOR TWO DAYS ONLY!!
CHASING FIREFLIES IS FREE ON AMAZON FOR TWO DAYS ONLY, JULY 15 AND 16.
I'll start: "I love you, but never dress the same as me again."
Let me know if you like this version of WW or if you prefer the old version of WW. Or would you enjoy a mix and match of both?
I'll start: "Does he think I'm waving at him?"


Donald Trump's national security advisor, John Bolton, has acted on his long-stated distaste for the International Criminal Court by declaring it dead to the U.S. Though a few of Bolton's protestations have merit, the U.S. is setting a dangerous precedent in condemning the court.
Photo courtesy of Coalition for the ICC.
In a major policy speech on September 10, 2018, United States National Security Advisor John Bolton launched a virulent attack on the International Criminal Court (I.C.C.). In his idiosyncratic view, "the largely unspoken, but always central, aim of its most vigorous supporters was to constrain the United States." The U.S. will not join the I.C.C., will not cooperate with it, and will not provide it with any assistance. Instead, the U.S. will "use any means necessary to protect" its citizens: "If the court comes after us" or Israel, Washington will ban I.C.C. judges and prosecutors from entering the U.S., impose sanctions on I.C.C. funds held in the U.S., and prosecute I.C.C. personnel in U.S. criminal courts. Countries that cooperate with the I.C.C. in the investigation of Americans will risk losing access to U.S. economic and military assistance and intelligence.
In other words, the U.S. is now ready to deploy sanctions to coerce other countries into acting illegally. Remarkable.
Last November, I.C.C. prosecutor Fatou Bensouda said the results of a preliminary investigation had established that "there is a reasonable basis to believe that war crimes and crimes against humanity have been committed" in Afghanistan since July 2002 (when the I.C.C. became operational) by Taliban, Afghan, and U.S. forces. This paved the way for a formal investigation that can be launched only by the I.C.C. judges. In a sign of nervousness and preemptive self-censorship, the I.C.C. took over a decade to conduct the preliminary investigation into allegations of extrajudicial executions and intentional attacks against civilians.
In other words, the U.S. is now ready to deploy sanctions to coerce other countries into acting illegally.
The response from Bolton, then a private citizen who had never concealed his deep hostility to the U.N.-centric global multilateral order, was blunt. Any investigation of Americans by the I.C.C. would be "a direct assault" on U.S. national sovereignty. Having "done more than any other nation to instill in its civilian-controlled military a respect for human rights and the laws of war," the U.S. "should welcome the opportunity … to strangle the I.C.C. in its cradle." He added, "Even merely contesting its jurisdiction" would risk acknowledging "the I.C.C.'s legitimacy." Unfortunately for Bolton, the I.C.C.'s legitimacy has indeed been serially acknowledged and affirmed in several U.N. Security Council deliberations and decisions, with full U.S. participation, regarding I.C.C. cases.
Serious Problems with the I.C.C.
The landscape of international criminal justice has changed dramatically at astonishing speed. In 1990, a tyrant could confidently commit atrocities inside sovereign borders with impunity. Today, there is still no guarantee of prosecution and accountability; but no brutish ruler can be confident of permanently escaping international justice. The certainty of impunity is gone. The I.C.C., activated only if national authorities are unable or unwilling to prosecute, functions as a court of last resort for ending impunity for the perpetrators of the most serious crimes of concern to the international community.
But Bolton's criticisms cannot be dismissed totally, for there are serious problems with the I.C.C. Created in 1998, it has 123 members. The extensive membership is misleading. Several major powers and populous countries have not joined. The 70-plus non-members represent two-thirds of the world's population and armed forces. Former U.S. President Bill Clinton signed on in 2002 but did not submit the document for Senate ratification. In May 2002 President George W. Bush "un-signed" the U.S. from the I.C.C.
The number of convictions to date has been very few, and the court's processes have proven time-consuming and inordinately expensive. There have been repeated charges of the court disproportionately targeting Africans, dismissing African views, and jeopardizing delicate peace negotiations. Although the threatened mass exodus as called for by the African Union on January 31, 2017, has not occurred, several countries have refused cooperation. For years Kenya has refused to hand over suspects to the I.C.C. In October 2017, Burundi became the first country to withdraw from the court following a parliamentary vote a year earlier, and South Africa immediately announced it would follow suit—only for its High Court to rule the withdrawal unconstitutional and invalid. In October 2016, Russia withdrew its signature from the I.C.C. statute.
The 70-plus non-members [of the I.C.C.] represent two-thirds of the world's population and armed forces.
Powers given to the U.N. Security Council, to refer cases to the I.C.C. and to defer cases already before the court, cross-infect judicial processes with the high politics of major powers. Giving a vote on these decisions to countries that are not I.C.C. members is a violation of the principle of natural justice. And the absence of a democratically chosen and accountable world legislature and executive does raise valid questions about the legitimacy and viability of the I.C.C. In no society in human history has a criminal justice system functioned without legislative and executive branches of government as essential prior props.
The I.C.C. can also be faulted for institutional integrity. As documented by the respected Africa experts Julie Flint and Alex de Waal, its first prosecutor was morally compromised. The I.C.C. did not distinguish itself in its handling of the allegations of sexual misconduct by him against a South African journalist trying to interview him in his hotel room in 2005. Rather surprisingly, the case has not attracted fresh attention in the wake of the #MeToo movement.
A year ago, citizen Bolton advised Trump to send Bensouda "a terse note: 'Dear Madame Prosecutor: You are dead to us. Sincerely, the United States.'" On September 10, National Security Advisor Bolton in effect implemented his own advice. Parts of his speech (e.g. the I.C.C. is a "European neocolonial enterprise") descended into the theater of the absurd. But the thrust of his thesis is deeply sinister: "The only deterrent to evil and atrocity is …'the righteous might' of the United States and its allies—a power that, perversely, could be threatened by the I.C.C.'s vague definition of aggression crimes." Coming from a senior official of the righteousness-free Trump administration, this merely proves this administration does irony without knowing it.
Neoconservative warriors seem to believe that the vast U.S. military superiority confers a matching moral superiority.
Intoxicated by the arrogance of power, neoconservative warriors seem to believe that the vast U.S. military superiority confers a matching moral superiority. Furthermore, the same combination of might and virtue empowers and entitles them to construct a world in which all others have to obey universal norms and rules, but Washington can opt out whenever, as often, and for as long, as it likes on cherry-picked global norms with respect to nuclear weapons, landmines, international criminal prosecution, climate change, and international trade regimes. In a world of inexorable power shifts, this equation just does not compute.


text:
Tonight: start the Hashtag Hijack to save the Independent Living Fund #SaveILF
As almost 20,000 disabled people across the UK wait to hear the decision in the latest round of High Court battles over the government's callous decision to close the Independent Living Fund - the #SaveILF Campaign will tour the most popular hashtags in the UK over the next few weeks to highlight this attack on disabled people's right to independent living.
Video: Independent Living Fund recipients talk about their fight to save the fund
We're all in it together - aren't we? from Moore Lavan Films on Vimeo.
The ILF is a standalone fund which people with severe disabilities use to pay for added care and support to live independently in their homes. The government has made two attempts to close ILF. The first attempt was overturned by the court of appeal at the end of last year. The government came back in 2014 and announced again that it would close the fund. Disabled people went back to court and are waiting for a decision.
Following the massive support DPAC has already received for the ILF Postcard Campaign from the stars of ITV1 soap Corrie, BBC1 soap Eastenders and BBC1 hit drama Silent Witness, #SaveILF will go on a Hashtag Hijack, hijacking some of the most popular TV shows, sports and leisure events, and viral hits every week.
You can help to tell the nation why ILF is so important and what people can do to support the campaign to save it.
Beginning tonight with BBC1's Question Time, DPAC is asking all members, friends and supporters to join in Hijack the Hashtag: #BBCQT from 10pm until the end of the show at 11.30pm.
Use #SaveILF and #bbcqt in all your Tweets. You can follow @Dis_PPL_Protest, and share DPAC's tweets, or you can go here: http://dftr.org.uk/Songbird.php?TweetFile=SaveILF and select from some favourites.
Linda Burnip, a founding member of DPAC and part of the #SaveILF Campaign said 'we have beaten the previous Minister on this already. This new case represents the last desperate act of a desperate department which hasn't got a single decision right since this government came to power'.
Read the full post at Disabled People Against Cuts.
Posted by: False Economy at 6:32pm on 27 November 2014
Filed under: Disability, Inequality, Protest


BDS Suspension 3" Front Upper Strut Mount Lift Kit for the 2007 - 2011 Toyota FJ Cruiser. This 3" lift kit comes with new upper strut mounts that add pre-load as well as a top spacer all in one piece. The rear includes new 2" Pro-Ride coil springs capable of full coil bind, new extended length anti-sway bar links work with the new coil springs to offer extreme droop. Rear 5500 series hydraulic shock absorbers are included.
2007-15 Toyota Tundra 2WD AND 2007-16 Toyota Tundra 4WD - This 3" lift is the answer to clear those 33" tires. This front spacer kit is easy to install and no strut compressor or disassembly of the strut is required. These strut spacers will lift your truck while still maintaining the factory ride quality. The rear is lifted with a 2" block and U-bolt kit to keep some of the factory rake.
BDS Suspension 3" Upper Strut Mount Leveling Kit for the 2007 - 2014 Toyota Tundra 2WD & 4WD pickup. This 3" leveling kit comes with new upper strut top spacers. No disassembly of the strut is required. This kit is designed to level your vehicle. However, if you desire to maintain the stock rake there is a 1" shackle or 2" rear block kit available when you build your kit. Other options include rear hydraulic or gas shock absorbers for this 3" Toyota Tundra leveling kit.
2007-15 Toyota Tundra 2WD AND 2007-16 Toyota Tundra 4WD - This 3" strut top spacer is the answer to clear those 33" tires. This spacer kit is easy to install and no strut compressor or disassembly of the strut is required. These strut spacers will level your truck while still maintaining the factory ride quality.


Where I live, there's a large annual fair where you can watch live shows, go on exciting rides and play games to win prizes. But over the last few years, one of the main attractions has been the outrageous food that's served up by some very creative vendors! From donut burgers to mac & cheese cupcakes, it's tough to sample everything without running out of room in your belly! And to be honest, sometimes the idea of these crazy foods turns out to be a lot better than the way they actually taste. So when I came across this recipe for deep-fried peanut butter (yes, deep-fried peanut butter), I couldn't help but be a bit skeptical. Yes, it sounds really, really, ridiculously delicious… but is it? Well folks, being the trooper that I am, I gave it a go. After trying it, here's my humble advice: DO IT… DO IT NOW.
Here's what you'll need: Pillsbury Crescent Rounds, peanut butter, canola oil, and powdered sugar.
Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and put balls of peanut butter (about a rounded tablespoon each) on it. Now put the tray in the freezer to freeze the peanut butter balls. Once they're frozen, roll out the dough and make 2″ rounds (you should get about 15).
Place a frozen peanut butter ball in the centre of each of the dough rounds and then wrap them up!
Heat up a pot of oil to 350°F. While that's happening, keep the wrapped up balls in the freezer. Once the oil is ready, begin frying the balls, a couple at a time (if you put too many in at once, the oil will lose too much heat). Fry them until they're golden brown all around.
Remove them from the oil, and place them on a dish lined with paper towel. Dust them with some powdered sugar. And voila! Deep fried peanut butter balls!


text:
using UnityEngine;
using UnityEngine.UI;

[ExecuteInEditMode]
public class DoorAnimator : MonoBehaviour {

    public Sprite DoorOpen;
    public Sprite DoorClosed;

    public GameObject LockSymbol;

    public Gateway ControllingGateway;

    private Image _doorImage;

    void Awake() {
        _doorImage = GetComponent<Image>();
    }

    void Update() {
        if (_doorImage == null || ControllingGateway == null) {
            return;
        }

        if (ControllingGateway.open) {
            _doorImage.sprite = DoorOpen;
        } else {
            _doorImage.sprite = DoorClosed;
        }

        LockSymbol.SetActive(ControllingGateway.locked);
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub