text:
Warner Norcross Represents TCSB Bancorp, Inc. in Its Merger With Independent Bank Corporation
Independent Bank Corporation (IBCP), the parent company of Independent Bank, and TCSB Bancorp, Inc. (TCSB), the parent company of Traverse City State Bank, announced the signing of a merger agreement pursuant to which IBCP will be acquiring TCSB.
Subject to the terms of the merger agreement, which has been unanimously approved by the board of directors of each company, TCSB shareholders will receive 1.1166 shares of IBCP common stock for each outstanding share of TCSB common stock or 2.71 million shares of IBCP common stock in the aggregate. The 169,800 outstanding options to acquire TCSB common stock will be converted into IBCP options at the completion of the merger. The transaction is valued at approximately $63.24 million based on IBCP's 15-day volume weighted average price of $22.4438 as of December 1, 2017, which is equal to 206.4% of TCSB tangible book value as of September 30, 2017. After the closing, IBCP intends to consolidate Traverse City State Bank with and into Independent Bank, operate under the Independent Bank name and maintain all five branch locations.
TCSB Bancorp, Inc. is a Michigan-based bank holding company with total assets of approximately $350 million. Founded in 2000, TCSB is the parent company of Traverse City State Bank and provides a full array of banking services through five full-service branches in the Traverse City area.
In connection with the merger, Warner Norcross & Judd LLP acted as legal counsel to TCSB, and D.A. Davidson & Co. acted as TCSB's financial advisor.
The Warner Norcross transaction team was led by Charlie Goode and included the following attorneys: Jason Byrne, Emily Cantor, Sean Cook, Angelyn Justian, Jonathan Kok, Norbert Kugele, Gordon Lewis, Heidi Lyon, Rodney Martin, Ryan Richter and Corinne Sprague.
About Warner Norcross & Judd
By providing discerning and proactive legal advice, Warner Norcross & Judd LLP builds a better partnership with its clients. Warner Norcross is a corporate law firm with 216 attorneys practicing in eight offices throughout Michigan: Grand Rapids, Southfield, Midland, Macomb, Muskegon, Kalamazoo, Holland and Lansing. To learn more, follow us on Twitter @WNJLLP or connect on LinkedIn.
Warner Norcross & Judd LLP has been ranked as one of the "Best Law Firms" by Best Lawyers and U.S. News & World Report, as one of the leading law firms in Michigan by Chambers USA and our attorneys have been deemed "Super Lawyers" by Michigan Super Lawyers magazine year after year.
Show contact details forJason L. Byrne
Jason Byrne is the chair of the firm's Insurance Practice Group and has over a decade of experience advising clients on co... View Full Profile
Show contact details forEmily E. Cantor
Emily Cantor focuses her practice on business and corporate law. She assists both publicly traded and privately held compa... View Full Profile
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Sean Cook's practice encompasses many diverse areas of law: tax, mergers and acquisitions, closely held businesses, trusts... View Full Profile
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Charlie Goode represents both public and private companies in a variety of transactional matters, with particular expertise in... View Full Profile
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Angie Justian focuses her practice on corporate, family business and real estate law. Licensed in both Michigan and New Yo... View Full Profile
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Jon Kok specializes in labor relations and employment compliance issues, employment arbitrations and NLRB proceedings. Jon co... View Full Profile
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Norbert specializes in employee benefits and privacy and information security law. His employee benefits work focuses on he... View Full Profile
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Gordon Lewis is corporate counsel to publicly held companies, banks and bank holding companies, insurance companies, and othe... View Full Profile
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Heidi practices employee benefits law with an emphasis on retirement plan and executive compensation matters. Her practice incl... View Full Profile
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Rodney Martin has counseled financial institutions for more than 35 years on banking and consumer compliance ... View Full Profile
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Ryan Richter is a corporate attorney who focuses his practice on a variety of transactional matters. He regularly drafts and ne... View Full Profile
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Yes! You can find cheap Propane prices in Tracys Landing, Maryland, and throughout Anne Arundel County. We have a dependable partner that is a low-cost Propane leader for the Tracys Landing area. Each of our Propane partners has a proven record for quality and service.


Our phone line has been down since Thursday night, and has only been repaired today. I feel like I have a million things to say - about work, Michael Jackson's death, the kids, the books I'm reading, how much I miss travelling - but I don't even know where to begin anymore. So many words spilling about in my head. I'll try to update properly soon.
yay! you'll have to let me know as soon as you know dates etc&i will start looking =DDDDD ridiculously excited, we can hit up the mac counter in bloomingdales!!!
i think we should write to tim&tell him how ~dedicated~ we are!


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La  est une gare ferroviaire de la ville de Tsuchiura, dans la préfecture d'Ibaraki au Japon. La gare est exploitée par la compagnie JR East. La gare possède également un terminal de fret géré par la JR Freight.

Situation ferroviaire
Tsuchiura est située au point kilométrique (PK) 63,8 de la ligne Jōban.

Histoire
La gare de Tsuchiura a été inaugurée le .

Service des voyageurs

Accueil
La gare dispose d'un bâtiment voyageurs, avec guichets, ouvert tous les jours.

Desserte
 Ligne Jōban :
 voie 1 : direction Tomobe, Mito et Iwaki
 voies 2 et 3 : direction Abiko et Ueno (interconnexion avec la ligne Ueno-Tokyo pour Tokyo et Shinagawa)

Notes et références

Notes

Références

Voir aussi

Lien externe
  La gare de Tsuchiura sur le site de la JR East

Gare dans la préfecture d'Ibaraki
Gare JR East
Gare mise en service en 1895

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


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Google's been under pressure lately. Q4 results missing forecast, Facebook filing their IPO; it's getting hotter in the kitchen. Maybe that's why we're seeing such suspicious search terms in some of our accounts.
Every good PPC'er should be using modified broad match to soak up all the relevant clicks you don't reach with exact and phrase match. Sure, there are situations when broad match is a good idea. But if you want to avoid the mind boggling search queries that often show with barely any relevance, you are better off sticking to modified broad. Or so we thought.
Lately we've been getting avalanched on some of our modified broad keywords (okay I know I'm over reacting! I just liked that picture and couldn't think of a catchy title okay!). It seems Google has been loosening up its algorithm in order to improve its financials, and taking less experienced PPC'ers lunch money in the process.
As you can see the '+shoes' will always match to abbreviations, acronyms, synonyms, misspellings and singular/plurals of shoes. However, by not including the + modifier on 'formal', this allows Google to use its formidable algorithm to match to synonyms of 'formal'. This is a great way to gain lots of additional relevant traffic, in theory.
This means Google is ignoring the word that is on pure broad match and will just implement modified broad match around the modified broad word. I mean how relevant is just the word 'green' to 'green hats' anyway? You'd have to really love the colour green to be convinced to buy a green hat when you searched for the colour green!
This brings us back to the dilemma of thousands of untargeted searches for terms that will never ever convert. So what's the solution? Well sorry there isn't really one that doesn't involve hard work!
One option is to just use the '+'broad match modifier and keyword more thoroughly rather than relying on Google to find all the keywords you didn't input. Going back to our example, ensuring you include '+smart +shoes', '+dress +shoes' etc will make sure you capture the vast majority of relevant clicks.
The other is to very carefully monitor the search term report in Google and see what your keywords are actually matching to and create long lists of negative keywords from these (you should be doing this anyway). The problem with this is it can take lots of time and you are only able to exclude searches once you've already spent money showing on them. Plus the Adwords search term report does not list every search term your ads showed for anyway.
The 'other search terms' row on a search term report shows hundreds or even thousands of searches that didn't receive a click or weren't searched by a significant number of users. This means these searches cannot be negative matched as you don't know what they are! And, while an individual search may only equate to a single impression, thousands of these single impressions can drastically harm your click though rates and therefore your cost per click.
So, there's no easy fix. It seems Google is living up to its "Don't be evil" mantra a little less these days, and even more than ever ignorance comes at a high price in the pay per click world. However this does provide yet another opportunity for those who aren't adverse to hard work to capitalise where others either don't know how or aren't willing to.


text:
COOKING UP A STORM (Feb 2014 issue)
As a huge fan of the great British Bake Off, it was a dream come true for Compers News member Janice Papworth when she got to meet her culinary heroes.
"The task for this competition was to create a recipe that had to be baked and that included Elizabeth Shaw chocolate. You also had to submit a photo of the completed baked delight", Janice told us.
"I set about scouring my recipe books for inspiration and decided to make a chocolate roulade with a mint chocolate and double cream filling because I felt this fitted the adult nature of the chocolate and the sophistication of the Elizabeth Shaw brand. I had a very good feeling about the comp but was still thrilled to be the overall winner. The prize package was fantastic, but one of the best bits was meeting Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood. Mary even commented on the year's supply of chocolate which was also part of my prize!"
"All in all this was an amazing money can't buy prize and truly a dream come true for my friend and myself. I'm sure I will remember it all my life and it's all thanks to Compers News."
2. Yet ANOTHER two £3,000 trips to Lapland
3. Luxury 5* Paris break with £1,000 to spend
4. ELEVEN dishwashers from Morrisons & Fairy
5. £2,000 worth of tech goodies
And if you need even more encouragement, here is just a small selection of the other prizes our readers have told us about during the past month! London theatre break, £1,000 House of Fraser voucher, £500 worth of wallpaper, SMEG fridge, £100 Waterstones voucher, THREE Sky TV for a year packages, £300 Amazon voucher, Edinburgh city break, 32" Smart TV, £100 Waitrose voucher, case of wine, men's bike worth £259, iPad Air, £100 Morrisons voucher, Silentnight bed worth over £1,000, £500 One4All gift card, luxury Harrods hamper worth £500, spa day for 2, Chanel bag worth £2,000, Butlins family break, Samsung Galaxy S4 phone, £300 cheese hamper, Hamleys toy bundle, £100 Ticketmaster voucher, £200 Westfield gift card, iPhone 5, plus LOTS of deluxe hampers from Norwegian Seafood at Morrisons, Villeroy & Boch breakfast sets from Tropicana at Waitrose, £100 cash prizes from Airwick at Asda, party prizes from J2O and much, much more…
LEGOLAND LUCK (Feb 2014 issue)
Tracey Redfern was lucky enough to win tickets to Legoland Windsor, and it's one of her daughter's favourite places. This picture is of Ruby blending in with her Lego family, as she calls them!
V is for VARIETY (Feb 2014 issue)
Tracey Faulkner won this wonderful variety of prizes from a Sunny Delight competition on 23rd December and it was all was delivered the very next day in time for Christmas – including an iPad mini, trampoline, bikes and more worth £1,000 in all!
1. Another FOUR £3,000 family trips to Lapland!
2. £5,000 Asda gift card
3. ELEVEN luxury P&O cruises
4. Design Your Dream Day Out worth £3,000
5. £2,500 cash from Pork Farms
And if you need even more encouragement, here is just a small selection of the other prizes our readers have told us about during the past month! Luxury Barcelona break, £1,000 Westfield gift card, case of vintage wine, Sage coffee machine worth £1,200, THREE TVs from Morrisons and Pepsi, family weekend in London, Xbox One console, £100 Build-A-Bear Workshop gift voucher, Canon digital camera, TWO iPad Minis, SIX £100 Asda gift cards, Acer Touchscreen PC, FOUR £50 Iceland gift vouchers, Sky TV for a year, £200 Virgin Experience voucher, THREE £200 cash prizes from Wonka chocolate, £250 H&M gift voucher, FOUR Vileda robot vacuum cleaners, TWO hair appliance bundles worth £300 each, Bluestone Wales activity break, £100 Co-op gift voucher, FIVE £50 Book Tokens, £500 Net-a-Porter shopping spree, plus LOTS of £50 Asda gift cards from Heinz, Blinkbox vouchers from Cadbury, Christmas koalas from Cushelle, party prizes from J2O and much, much more…
TOP OF THE WORLD (Jan 2014 issue)
When Compers News member Karen Bond won a trip to Lapland courtesy of Airwick at Asda, she experienced a little bit of Christmas magic.
"When I saw a competition to win a trip to Lapland last Christmas I thought my teenage son was too old really", Karen told us. "How wrong I was!"
"I was delighted to receive a telephone call from Airwick to tell me that I had won, and then we had a year to wait until we could take the prize. My friend Helen really wanted to go, so in the end we both went last month along with three teenage boys. And what an amazing trip it was. The staff were very friendly and knowledgeable, and the scenery was breathtaking. There were lots of fantastic activities including a husky sledge ride, drinks in a giant igloo and a snowmobile safari. The boys loved Europe's biggest toboggan run was was just outside the village."
"I don't know why I didn't believe in Father Christmas because I have met him now and I can tell you that he really does exist. Merry Christmas everyone!"
Accolade's 2013 £6,000 Dream Prize Winner!
Compers News member Frank Aldred is the latest lucky winner in our series of Dream Prize draws, and he chose a £6,000 cash prize as his reward.
"I didn't believe it when I got the call", Frank told us when we met him to hand over the prize. "All of my family and friends were sceptical, and to be honest so was I after reading all the advice in Compers News about scams. But after a few more phone calls to your office, it finally sunk in."
"I've been comping for many years, not really for the prizes but because I enjoy it so much. What other hobby gives you so much excitement all for the price of a stamp? You never know what's around the corner – as the phone call from Compers News proved! This is my first really big prize, but what a way to start!"
"I'll be sharing the prize with my family, and we'll also be going on a nice holiday once my wife has finished some hospital treatment. Our first choice from your Dream Prize list was the VIP holiday, but because of the uncertainty with my wife's treatment you kindly offered us the cash alternative so that we can book something once everything has been sorted out. And we'll certainly be doing that… we can't wait!"
1. A trip into space or £70,000 cash!!
2. Luxury family trip to Lapland
3. Worldwide music festival break worth over £6,000
4. Lord of the Manor package including title and land
5. £3,000 worth of Selfridges vouchers from Tesco & Scholl
And if you need even more encouragement, here is just a small selection of the other prizes our readers have told us about during the past month! Family holiday to Orlando, FOUR luxury London breaks, trip to the Dakar Rally in Argentina, £1,000 cash, Louis Vuitton handbag worth £500, Butlins family break, 3D Smart TV, zookeeper for a day, holiday to Fuerteventura, Alton Towers break for 10 people, THREE Xbox One consoles, THREE Sky TV for a year packages, luxury 5* holiday to Vietnam, £100 John Lewis voucher, FOUR Nexus tablets, Nikon DSLR camera, £250 Next shopping spree, £100 Asda voucher, Pashley bike worth £675, year's supply of Pampers nappies, £1,000 bathroom, holiday to Cephalonia, plus LOTS of party prizes from J2O, tool kits and beanie hats from Irwin, Trick or Treat buckets from Co-op and Mr Kipling, school bags from Morrisons and Nestlé, Christmas koalas from Cushelle and much, much more…

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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text:
List of Slovenian politicians:

A
Juro Adlešič
Fran Albreht

B
Andrej Bajuk
Engelbert Besednjak
Janez Bleiweis
Katja Boh
József Borovnyák
France Bučar

C
Ivan Cankar

D
Stane Dolanc

E
Andrej Einspieler
Josip Ferfolja

G
Andrej Gosar

H
Ivan Hribar
Marjan Hribar

I

J
Zoran Janković
Janez Janša
Iztok Jarc
Zmago Jelinčič Plemeniti
Romana Jordan Cizelj
Aurelio Juri

K
Franc Kangler
Edvard Kardelj
Stane Kavčič
Franci Kek
Boris Kidrič
Roman Kirn
József Klekl
Anton Korošec
Sergej Kraigher
Janez Evangelist Krek
Miha Krek
Etbin Kristan
Milan Kučan

L
Karel Lavrič
Dragotin Lončar

M
Matija Majar
Drago Marušič
Tomaž Marušič

N
Marko Natlačen
Anton Novačan
Ljudmila Novak

P
Borut Pahor
Lojze Peterle
Janez Podobnik
Janez Potočnik
Albin Prepeluh
Janko Prunk
Jože Pučnik

R
Ciril Ribičič
Mitja Ribičič
Anton Rop
Dimitrij Rupel

S
József Szakovics
Ljubo Sirc
Franc Snoj

Š
Matjaž Šinkovec
Jožef Školč
Lovro Šturm
Ivan Šušteršič

T
Ivan Tavčar
Vilmos Tkálecz

V
Ivo Vajgl
Josip Vilfan
Bogomil Vošnjak
Josip Vošnjak
Anton Vratuša

Z
Jure Zupan
Milan Zver

Ž
Gregor Žerjal


text:
Democrat Pressley of Massachusetts Introduced Legislation Lowering Federal Voting Age to 16
These teenagers do not yet have 'all of the tools they need'
By Wayne Dupree
Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) offered an amendment to legislation that would have dropped the voting age down to 16 years old.
"The measure failed Thursday, garnering just 126 votes in the House, and further discussion was 'postponed' — meaning there is still potential for further consideration of the proposal," according to Fox News.
The most frightening takeaway is that 126 members of the House (approximately 29 percent) voted for this hot mess!
Wisdom and maturity cannot be used in the same sentence with "16 years old."
Now wait before you attack me on this.
I have two daughters about to turn 16.
I love this age group — and the fact they haven't matured as much as past generations is not their fault.
We spoil them. And we can't expect them to have all the tools they need when we didn't provide the store to buy those things.
Rep. Ayanna Pressley's idea shows her ignorance — and proves they're shopping for cheap votes.
Related: Nancy Pelosi Can't Control the 'Young, Radical, Progressive Wing' of the Party
How about working to improve your party?
It might result in winning back some of the voters you lost by being just plain stupid and un-American, to put it bluntly.
It is young people … who march, organize and remind us daily in the House and the halls of this institution what is at stake and just how high those stakes are. Since the days of abolitionists, suffragists and Civil Rights activists, young people have been pushing the wheels of progress forward.
These youth, our young people who will inherit the nation we design here by virtue of our policies or by default of our policies and authority, these very same young people should also have a say in who represents them.
For your consideration, Amendment No. 127, which would lower the minimum voting age in federal elections from 18 to 16 years of age.
At the age of 16, our young people have the opportunity and also responsibility to drive a vehicle, to gain employment and even to pay taxes. In fact, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2018, nearly 2 million young people between ages of 16 and 17 were employed, contributing to our labor force, to their communities, their local economy, by paying taxes.
And to be clear, this is not simply enhancing income. This is critical income to stabilizing of households.
And although I am introducing this amendment, I'm not the first to broach the idea.
Why stop here? Let's make the age requirement six. That way, essentially toddlers can start dictating national policy.
The Democrats and the Left are on an all-out mission to increase their voter rolls, with no regard for the effects on our country.
Their only concern is their ability to regain and keep control.
Friends of mine believe the voting age should be raised to 25.
Kids today are so immature and lack an understanding of politics.
Heck, these schools don't even teach civics as they used to — but there is an abundance of liberal revisionism being taught in our high schools.
And if that group of people is allowed to vote, socialism will be the cornerstone of this nation.
Kids lack the understanding to tell the difference between the pros and cons of socialism versus capitalism.
They need to go out and work before they're allowed to vote.
No one should be allowed to vote until they can at least cut their parents' grass — so that leaves out 99.9 percent of 16-year-olds.
Most 16-year-olds can't get out of bed, stay off social media sites, and quit texting, so they certainly don't need to vote.
This piece originally appeared in WayneDupree.com and is used by permission.
Read more at WayneDupree.com:
House Dems Vote To Allow Illegal Immigrants To Vote In U.S. Elections
AOC Calls For Ending U.S-Israel Relationship In Fundraising Letter
Ilhan Omar Tries To Walk Back Obama Attack Statement — Listen For Yourself!
The opinions expressed by contributors and/or content partners are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of LifeZette.
Wayne Dupree
Wayne Dupree is owner and founder of WayneDupree.com. He was named to 2017 Newsmax's 50 Most Influential African-American Republicans. He served in the USAF from 1987-1995; he saw time in Operation Desert Storm/Shield. The father of three, he's the host of "The Wayne Dupree Show."


text:
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Eastern promise
Ginseng and other herbal medicines used in China at least 1,650 years ago could hold the key to finding a cure for dementia, say scientists.
A study of classical medical texts has identified references to age-related memory impairment similar to modern-day Alzheimer's disease.
And several plant-based ingredients – still in use today – were treating forgetfulness centuries ago.
Dr Charlie Xue said: "Alzheimer's disease is a significant and increasing health issue in contemporary China and other Asian countries.
"Traditional medicines (TMs) are commonly used in China for prevention and/or treatment of dementia, and research into TMs for dementia is a growing field."
Experimental studies of five of these traditional Chinese medicines suggest they have biological activity relevant to Alzheimer's, reports The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine (JACM).
Researchers performed a comprehensive, systematic search of the Encyclopedia of Traditional Chinese Medicine – a database of more than 1,000 Chinese medical books dating back to the fourth century.
They describe specific mentions of signs and symptoms of memory impairment associated with ageing – and the formulas and ingredients most commonly used to treat these disorders.
The study identified 1,498 citations of dementia and memory impairments derived from 277 different books written from around 363 to 1945 AD.
Dr Charlie Xue, of RMIT University in Australia, said: "In 91 of these citations memory impairment was associated with ageing and was broadly consistent with the clinical features of Alzheimer's disease.
"Although the interventions varied in name Poria cocos, Polygala tenuifolia, Rehmannia glutinosa, Panax ginseng and Acorus species consistently appeared as ingredients in multiple formulas for memory impairment in the context of ageing."
He said ginseng has boosted memory in rats and destroyed beta amyloid plaques – rogue proteins that clump together in the brains of patients with dementia.
The compound catalpol from R. glutinosa has protected brain cells exposed to beta-amyloid – as has an extract of P. tenuifolia.
In experiments on mice a chemical from Polygala roots improved learning and memory while a water extract of P. cocos was reported to protect brain cells.
An extract of Acorus tatarinowii also protected brain cells from beta-amyloid.
Dr Xue said:: " Memory impairment in older age was a recognised condition in the classical literature.
"Many of the traditional medicines frequently used as ingredients in classical formulas for memory impairment consistent with clinical features of Alzhemer's disease remain in contemporary use, and experimental studies suggest biological activities relevant to Alzheimer's disease."
Most of the books were written during the Ming (1369-1644) and Qing (1645-1911) dynasties.
But one of the earliest citations was in Essential Prescriptions Worth a Thousand Gold for Emergencies (Bei Ji Qian Jin Yao Fang, c.652), in which the formula Wu bu wan was used for 'Kidney qi deficiency, frequent forgetting (xi wang), dissociation (huang hu),' and a host of other symptoms, as well as for promoting longevity and slowing ageing.
Dr Xue said: "This study identified several citations in the classical literature that described conditions characterized by profound memory impairment but whether these were due to Alzheimer's disease pathology or other causes remains uncertain.
"What is evident is memory impairment associated with ageing was a recognised condition.
"The formulas recommended for this condition varied considerably in name but certain ingredients including P. cocos, P. tenuifolia, R. glutinosa, P. ginseng and Acorus species appeared in multiple formulas and in multiple books for memory impairment in the context of ageing.
"This same group of TMs also appeared in a systematic search of the largest printed compendium of Chinese formulas.
"These five TMs remain in clinical use for memory impairment and experimental studies suggest biological activities relevant to Alzheimer's disease."
Journal editor John Weeks said: "Recent research out of UCLA (California University Los Angeles) that was the subject of the JACM editorial in August shined a spotlight on the potential role of natural agents in a whole person protocol for reversing Alzheimer's disease.
"Dr Xue and his colleagues have provided an important addition from traditional Chinese medicine to this emerging literature."
Tags: alzheimers, brain function, chinese medicine, dementia, ginseng, health, natural
admin 1308 views 0 likes Sep 21, 2016 HEALTH, LIFESTYLE Share
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Sat, Feb 11, 2006 page9
Censorship in China is not as easy as it looks
By Howard French / NY TIMES NEWS SERVICE
For months now, the news about the news in China has been awful. Carrying out its vow to tighten controls over what it calls "propaganda," the government of President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) has busied itself closing publications, firing editorial staff and jailing reporters.
More noticeably, the government has clamped down on the Internet, closing blogger sites, filtering e-mail messages and Web sites for banned words and tightening controls on text messages.
Last year, Yahoo was criticized for revealing the identity of an Internet journalist, Shi Tao (師濤), who was subsequently jailed. On Wednesday, the Committee to Protect Journalists said court documents posted on a Chinese Web site showed that Yahoo had done the same in 2003, resulting in the jailing of another writer, Li Zhi (李志)
Against this grim backdrop, the news that Google had agreed to apply censors' blacklists to its new Chinese search engine might have seemed like the ultimate nail in the coffin for freedom of information in this country. Chinese Internet mavens were outraged at Google for collaborating in the government's censorship effort.
"For most people, access to more diversified resources has been broken," said Isaac Mao (毛向輝), a popular Chinese blogger, in a typical sentiment.
"The majority of users, the new users, will only see a compressed version of Google, and can't know what they don't know. This is like taking a 30-year-old's brain and setting him back to the mind of a 15-year-old," he said.
Some threatened that Internet companies that toed the government line would regret it someday.
"Doing the bidding of the Chinese government like this is like doing the bidding of Stalin or Hitler," said Yu Jie (余杰), a well-known dissident writer.
"The actions of companies that did the bidding of Stalin and Hitler have been remembered by history, and the Chinese people won't forget these kinds of actions, either," Yu said.
Whether the Chinese will hold a long-term grudge is arguable. But Web specialists are far more confident that the government will fail in its efforts to reverse a trend toward increasingly free expression that has been reshaping this society with ever more powerful effects for more than two decades.
Last year, China ranked 159th out of 167 countries in a survey of press freedom, Reporters Without Borders, the Paris-based international rights group, said. But rankings like this do not reflect the rapid change afoot here, more and more of which is escaping the government's control.
A case in point is the Chinese government's recent effort to rein in bloggers who tread too often into delicate territory, criticizing state policy or detailing official corruption. In December, the government ordered Microsoft and its MSN service to close the site of Michael Anti, one of China's most popular bloggers.
Although Anti -- who is also an employee of the Beijing bureau of the New York Times -- had his site closed, any Chinese Web surfer can choose from scores of other online commentators who are equally provocative, and more are coming online all the time.
Microsoft alone carries an estimated 3.3 million blogs in China. Add to that the estimated 10 million other blogs on other Internet service providers, and it becomes clear what a censor's nightmare China has become.
What is more, not a single blog existed in China a little more than three years ago, and thousands upon thousands are being born every day -- some run by people whose previous blogs had been banned and merely change their name or switch providers. New technologies, like pod casts, are making things even harder to control.
"The Internet is open technology, based on packet switching and open systems, and it is totally different from traditional media, like radio or TV or newspapers," said Guo Liang (郭良), an Internet specialist at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
"At first, people might have thought it would be as easy to control as traditional media, but now they realize that's not the case," he said.
If the Internet is at the center of today's struggle over press freedom, it is only the latest in a series of fights that the government has so far always lost.
Under the veneer of resolute state control, one sector after another, including book publishing, newspapers and magazines, has undergone a similar process of de facto liberalization, often in the face of official hostility.
The first wave came in book publishing, where beginning in the 1980s censors found themselves unable to suppress titles that were critical of state policy or expressed divergent views on ideological matters.
A big part of the reason for the weakening of the censors was the introduction of a market economy, where publishers had to seek profits to support their activities. Turgid, politically correct books that delighted the censors sold poorly, so profit-seeking publishers sought to get bolder, often provocative writing into print.
Changes in the news media have also been driven by profit motives. With the state ending its subsidies for most publishing companies, publications have sought ways to build readership. Saucy entertainment and sports journalism have been big hits for many magazines and newspapers.
Others though have hit on the idea of public affairs, uncovering corruption and writing about environmental problems and social inequality. As the readers' appetite for this kind of news has grown, the government has been hard pressed to force the genie back into the bottle.
Newspapers have been closed, reporters and editors jailed -- even killed, like Wu Xianghu (吳湘湖), a newspaper editor who died last week after being beaten by the police, who reportedly were incensed by an article he published on abuses of power in their ranks. Still, the trend has not been reversed.
Editors, like Li Datong (李大同), of a recently closed Beijing newspaper supplement, Bing Dian, officially owned by the Communist Party Youth League, have begun to use the courts to challenge government efforts to silence them. But many frustrated reporters have simply moved to blogs, which give them an outlet to write about what they are not permitted to in their day jobs.
"Symbolically, the government may have scored a victory with Google, but Web users are becoming a lot more savvy and sophisticated, and the censors' life is not getting easier," said Xiao Qiang (蕭強), leader of the Internet project at the University of California, Berkeley.
"The flow of information is getting steadily freer, in fact. If I was in the State Council's information office, I certainly wouldn't think we had any reason to celebrate," Xiao said.
China is threatening Asia's future
In November last year, a man struck a woman with a steel bar and killed her outside a hospital in China's Fujian Province. Later, he justified his actions to the police by saying that he attacked her because she was small and alone, and he was venting his anger after a dispute with a colleague. To the casual observer, it could be seen as another case of an angry man gone mad for a moment, but on closer inspection, it reflects the sad side of a society long brutalized by violent political struggles triggered by crude Leninism and Maoism. Starting
By Palden Sonam
Virus exposed Taiwan, China, US
The year 2020 will go down in history. Certainly, if for nothing else, it will be remembered as the year of the COVID-19 pandemic and the continuing impact it has had on the world. All nations have had to deal with it; none escaped. As a virus, COVID-19 has known no bounds. It has no agenda or ideology; it champions no cause. There is no way to bully it, gaslight it or bargain with it. Impervious to any hype, posturing, propaganda or commands, it ignores such and simply attacks. All nations, big or small, are on a level playing field
By Jerome Keating
EDITORIAL: KMT gets Beijing's message across
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's announcement on Saturday that the US was to drop self-imposed restrictions on meetings between senior Taiwanese and US officials had immediate real-world effects. On Monday, US Ambassador to the Netherlands Pete Hoekstra met Representative to the Netherlands Chen Hsing-hsing (陳欣新) at the US embassy in The Hague, with both noting on social media the historic nature of this seemingly modest event. Modest perhaps, but their meeting would have been impossible before Pompeo's announcement. Some have welcomed this move, thinking that it is long-overdue and a step in the right direction to normalizing relations between
Walter Lohman On Taiwan: Headed in the right direction on Taiwan
The US last week took action to remove most of the diplomatic red tape around US-Taiwan relations. While there have been adjustments in State Department "Guidelines on Relations with Taiwan" and other guidance before, no administration has ever so thoroughly dispensed with them. It is a step in the right direction. Of course, when there is a policy of formally recognizing one government (the People's Republic of China or PRC) and not another (the Republic of China or ROC), officials from the top of government down need a systematic way of operationalizing the distinction. They cannot just make it up as


text:
RTI in Media
Tamil Nadu: Sripathi to be TN info chief?
By karira, August 9, 2010 in RTI in Media
karunanidhi
jayalalitha
tnsic
karira 5,893
RTI India Architect
As reported by Jayaraj Sivan in timesofindia.indiatimes.com on 05 August 2010:
Sripathi to be TN info chief? - Chennai - City - The Times of India
Sripathi to be TN info chief?
CHENNAI: Tamil Nadu chief secretary
KS Sripathi is likely to be appointed the state chief information commissioner when S Ramakrishnan retires this month-end, highly placed sources said. S Malathi, vigilance commissioner and commissioner, administrative reforms, could be the new chief secretary.
Sripathi attained superannuation on April 30, but was given an extension by the state government with a view to organising the World Classical Tamil Conference.
As reported by Gangadhar S Patil in expressbuzz.com on 14 August 2010:
RTI activists oppose Sripathi as next CIC | Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) | | Indian Express
RTI activists oppose Sripathi as next CIC
CHENNAI: A news report that Tamil Nadu's present Chief Secretary, K S Sripathi, is to be made the next Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) has sparked protests from Right to Information (RTI) activists, who have shot off a memorandum to Chief Minister M Karunanidhi against such a move.
Activists have raised serious doubts about the integrity and objectivity of Sripathi, considering his past dealings with RTI.
They point to Sripathi's initiative in getting the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti Corruption and Tamil Nadu State Vigilance Commission exempted from the purview of RTI during his tenure as Vigilance Commissioner.
According to documents obtained through RTI, the exemption was given on the insistence of the Vigilance Commission, even though the Government did not favour it.
Similarly, his effort in denying information about assets of IAS and IPS officers in Tamil Nadu despite the State Information Commission's order to furnish the information has irked activists. "If the government selects Sripathi, there will be protests and we might file a Public Interest Litigation," Retna Pandian, general secretary of Federation of Anti Corruption Teams, India, said.
"It is weird that the name of the next CIC is decided even before the Selection Committee has met. If it turns out that the CS is the next CIC, it completely exposes how farcical the process of the Selection Committee is," said V Madhav, an activist from Chennai.
vishnu_madhav 1
This is a continuation of the article referred to in the first post of this page.
Madhav.
Times of India Publications
Chief secy Sripathi may head info panel
Jayaraj Sivan | TNN
Chennai: Tamil Nadu chief secretary K S Sripathi is likely to be appointed as the next state chief information comm i s s i o n e r when the inc u m b e n t chief commissioner S Ramakrishnan retires this month end,highly placed sources said.S Malathi,vigilance commissioner and commissioner,administrative reforms,could be the new chief secretary.
Sripathi had attained superannuation on April 30,but was given an extension by the state government with a view to organising the World Classical Tamil Conference,which was held in Coimbatore in June.The new assignment in the information panel is apparently a reward for the successful conduct of the Tamil conference.He might move into the new post before his extended term as chief secretary ends.
Sripathi,a native of Chennai,is a 1975 batch IAS officer.He is a polyglot and is well versed in Tamil,English,Hindi,Kannada,Malayalam,German and French.
Malathi belongs to the 1977 batch of IAS.She was home secretary till recently and was shifted from that post based on her own request owing to health problems.
Sripathis appointment as chief commissioner of the information panel has to be cleared by a committee headed by chief minister M Karunanidhi.Other members of the selection committee are opposition leader and a cabinet minister nominated by the chief minister.The appointment is for a five-year period or till he attains 65 years of age,whichever is earlier.
As per the provisions of the RTI Act,the state chief information commissioner and state information commissioners (max 10 people) should be persons of eminence in public life with knowledge and experience in law,science and technology,social service,management,journalism,mass media or administration and governance.
He or she should not be a member of Parliament or the legislature of any state or union territory,or hold any other office of profit.The person should not be connected with any political party and should not be doing any business or pursuing any profession.
Sripathi
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Arbitrary appointment of info panel chief, say RTI activists
as reported by Jeeva, TNN, CHENNAI: Aug 23, 2010
Appointment of a new chief information commissioner for Tamil Nadu is likely to be a complex task for the State government as right to information (RTI) activists have stepped up their campaign to prevent the appointment of KS Sripathi to the post.
With the meeting of the selection committee for the appointment of the new CIC scheduled on Monday, a group of activists on Sunday met AIADMK general secretary Jayalalithaa who, as a opposition leader, is part of the three-member selection committee headed by chief minister M Karunanidhi. The other member of the committee is a minister deputed by the chief minister.
The activists - V Madhav of Association for India's Development, Nityanand Jayaraman of Tamil Nadu Right To Information Campaign and K Saravanan of Corporate Accountability Desk told Jayalalithaa that the name of chief secretary KS Sripathi was doing the rounds as the next CIC even before the meeting of the selection committee.
"We told the opposition leader that it was when Sripathi was the vigilance commissioner that Tamil Nadu Vigilance Commission (TNVC) pushed for the exemption of directorate of vigilance and anti-corruption (DVAC) and TNVC from the purview of RTI Act. Moreover, as the chief secretary, Sripathi had challenged the order of the Tamil Nadu State Information Commission which directed the government to disclose details as to whether IAS and IPS officers have disclosed their assets,'' Madhav said.
Jayalalithaa assured the activists that she would do her best. However, it is not known whether she would participate in the selection committee's meeting on Monday.
While the present Tamil Nadu chief information commissioner S Ramakrishnan's term is to end this month, RTI campaigners started their campaign last year itself. Some of the activists inspected, under the RTI Act, records of appointment of the present chief and other information commissioners and found the procedure followed was arbitrary.
The campaign gathered momentum last month when activists from several parts of the state applied for the CIC post to have a locus-standi to legally challenge the selection if it was not done in a transparent manner.
"We want the state government to prescribe rules for the appointment. It should call for applications by giving advertisement through media, prescribing minimum educational qualification and experience for the candidates. It should also test the capability and integrity of the applicants and shortlist the candidates and invite public objections, if any, before sending the panel of names to the selection committee,'' said H Krishnaraj Rao, an activist.
On August 4, about 50 RTI activists from across the country including Arvind Kejriwal and Aruna Roy met in New Delhi and discussed how governments at the Centre and the states could be pressured to evolve a clear eligibility criteria and transparent selection process for the appointment of information commissioners to the state and the central information commissions.
As per Section 15 of RTI Act, "the state chief information commissioner shall be a person of eminence in public life with wide knowledge and experience in law, science and technology, social service, management, journalism, mass media or administration and governance.'' CIC can hold office for five years but not beyond the age of 65.
Source : Arbitrary appointment of info panel chief, say RTI activists - Chennai - City - The Times of India
Jaya boycotts CM-headed meeting to discuss CIC candidates
as reported in Hindustan Times, Chennai, August 23, 2010, PTI
AIADMK chief Jayalalithaa on Monday boycotted a selection committee meeting headed by Chief Minister M Karunanidhi to discuss candidates for the post of the state chief information commissioner, with incumbent S Ramakrishnan's term ending this month.
Today's meeting assumed significance in the wake
of rights activists urging Jayalalithaa, a member of the commission by virtue of being Opposition Leader, to oppose the candidature of Chief Secretary K S Sripathy, whose name was reportedly in contention.
Activists have been opposing Sripathy's name as they contend that it was during his tenure as Vigilance Commissioner that the Tamil Nadu Vigilance Commission pushed for exemption of Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption from the purview of the Right to Information Act (RTI).
Three activists had also called on Jayalalithaa on Sunday to convey their concerns, saying Sripathy's name has been doing the rounds even before today's meeting.
Karunanidhi and Finance Minister K Anbazhagan participated in the meeting, an official release said.
Jaya boycotts CM-headed meeting to discuss CIC candidates - Hindustan Times
As reported in Times of India, Chennai Edition on 24 August 2010:
Article Window
Jaya skips meet to pick CIC, says govt didn't give names
Chennai: Opposition leader J Jayalalithaa on Monday boycotted a meeting of the selection committee under chief minister M Karunanidhi's chairmanship to choose the state's new chief information commissioner (CIC). AIADMK sources said Jayalalithaa skipped the meeting after she was denied advance information about the candidates being considered for the post.
Karunanidhi and finance minister K Anbazhagan, a member of the selection panel, met to discuss the appointment. Jayalalithaa, as the leader of the opposition, is the third member of the committee.
AIADMK sources said Jayalalithaa had asked for the names after she was invited to the meeting. However, the government declined to send her the names in advance and asked her to attend the meeting, the sources claimed. "She decided not to attend the meeting in protest. She felt that she could not give her views if she did not know the names first," they said.
Government officials did not discuss the details of the meeting. There was also no information about the names considered for the post. RTI activists had met Jayalalithaa earlier to oppose the possible appointment of chief secretary KS Sripathi, who is due to retire in October, as the chief information commissioner. It could not be ascertained whether his name was considered at Monday's meeting.
Chief minister M Karunanidhi, personnel and administrative reforms department secretary KN Venkataramanan and finance minister K Anbazhagan at the meeting in Chennai on Monday
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RTI India Pope
As reported at expressbuzz.com on 24 Aug 2010
Nobody's talking about the next CIC
CHENNAI: The process for the appointment of new Chief Information Commissioner (cic) is shrouded in secrecy as no information came forth after the meeting of the committee for selecting the new CIC at the Secretariat on Monday.
Leader of Opposition, J Jayalalithaa, skipped the crucial meeting. The Chief Minister, who heads the committee for selecting the CIC, held discussions with Finance Minister K Anbazhagan, one of the members of the panel. Personnel and Administrative Reforms Secretary KN Venkataramanan was present.
Sources said Jayalalithaa had written to the Government expressing her views on the appointment of the CIC and the Government had responded to her views.
But neither the Government nor the Leader of Opposition had clarified what was going on. Official sources said the State government was silent on the issue, as it cannot disclose the names recommended by the committee for appointment of the CIC to the Governor.
The announcement of the new CIC could come only from the Raj Bhavan. The sources, however, declined to confirm if present Chief Secretary KS Sripathi's name was recommended. RTI activists are against his apopointment as the next CIC.
As reported in timesofindia.indiatimes.com on 25 August 2010:
MK criticises Jaya for skipping CIC selection meeting - Chennai - City - The Times of India
MK criticises Jaya for skipping CIC selection meeting
CHENNAI: Criticising opposition leader J Jayalalithaa for failing to turn up at a meeting of the selection committee of the state's chief information commisioner (CIC), chief minister M Karunanidhi on Tuesday said it had become a habit with her to ignore his invitations to attend meetings, including all-party deliberations, convened by him.
Asked by reporters at the DMK headquarters about her absence at the meeting. he said that when the last CIC was appointed, the then opposition leader, K Anbazhagan, had attended the meeting and accepted the majority view about the appointment made by then CM Jayalalithaa and finance minister C Ponnaiyan. "Perasiriyar (Anbazhagan) cooperated with the selection process in a dignified manner, Karunanidhi said, contrasting his conduct with Jayalalithaa's tendency to skip meetings convened by him.
On Monday, the panel, comprising the chief minister and finance minister, had met in her absence and sent a recommendation to the governor. AIADMK sources had claimed that Jayalalithaa, a member of the committee as required in the RTI Act, kept away because she was not given details of the candidates under consideration for appointment in advance.
Asked whether she had given any reason for her absence, Karunanidhi did not give a specific reply, but said that in general she kept away from meetings convened by him, including all-party deliberations on important issues concerning the state's interests and on the Sri Lankan Tamils issue. "I will invite her, but she won't come. Sometimes, she will write to me criticising me or my government in a substandard way and say she is boycotting the meeting." he said.
Meanwhile, official sources said Governor S S Barnala had signed the appointment order.
With the state government tight-lipped over the name of the person recommended for the CIC post, a group of RTI activists have petitioned the Governor to ensure transparency in the selection process saying that the government was trying to keep the exercise completely under wraps.
The RTI Act merely says the CIC shall be a person of eminence in public life with wide knowledge and experience in law, science and technology, social service, management, journalism, mass media or administration and governance. The activists want the government to prescribe rules stipulating calling for applications by giving advertisement through media, prescribing minimum educational qualification and experience for the candidates, for testing the capability and integrity of the applicants and, short list the candidates and invite public objections if any before sending the panel of names to the selection committee.
With media speculating that chief secretary K S Sripathi, retired IAS officer Shanta Sheela Nair or one of the present information commissioners T R Ramasamy may be likely candidates, activists in their representation to the Governor on Tuesday said they wanted to meet him in person to brief him as to how there has been no effort from the government to initiate a transparent procedure despite their repeated requests.
"It is a great irony that the appointment of the very person who is expected to uphold transparency is happening in such a hush-hush manner,'' said the representation, signed by V Madhav of Association for India's Development, on behalf of a team of activists who have been campaigning for transperancy in CIC's appointment.
CIC is like a backbone for the Act as he can ensure transperancy in governance. The Government should, at least, fulfill the obligations under section 4 of the Act as per which it should `publish all relevant facts while formulating important policies or announcing the decisions which affect public,'' said V Gopalakrishnan, another campaigner.
As reported by IANS in indiatalkies.com on 25 August 2010:
'Appointing RTI chief without consulting opposition is illegal' | Politics
'Appointing RTI chief without consulting opposition is illegal'
Chennai, Aug 25 – Leader of Opposition in Tamil Nadu and AIADMK General Secretary J. Jayalalithaa said here Wednesday that the appointment of the Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) without consulting her was illegal.
Charging the government with not providing her the requisite information on the appointment of the new CIC, Jayalalithaa said Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi cannot take her for granted and expect her to sign on the dotted line.
Responding to Karunanidhi's charge that she did not cooperate on the issue of selecting the new CIC, Jayalalithaa said: 'As the Leader of Opposition is one of the members of the CIC selection committee, I was given the invitation to attend the meeting. And I decided to attend the same.'
She said some social organisations and Right to Information (RTI) activists met her and complained that the functioning of the Information Commissioner's Office is bad and it takes a long time to settle a case.
She said they also requested her to see that the new CIC is selected in a transparent manner.
According to her, the government declined to provide her the bio-data of the candidates who had applied for the post on the ground that it would be placed before the panel at the Aug 23 meeting.
A reply was sent to that letter stating that when the information is available to the chief minister and also to his ministerial colleague in the panel, denying that to her is discriminatory.
'In 2005, no member of the selection panel had asked for the bio-data prior to the meeting and had such a request been made – the same would have been provided,' she said.
The term of current CIC R. Ramakrishnan gets over at the end of this month.
As reported in The Indian Express, Chennai Edition on 01 September 2010:
As reported in hindu.com on 2 September 2010:
The Hindu : Front Page : Sripathi sworn in Chief Information Commissioner
Sripathi sworn in Chief Information Commissioner
CHENNAI: K.S. Sripathi, former Chief Secretary, was sworn in State Chief Information Commissioner (CIC) at a brief function at Raj Bhavan here on Wednesday.
Governor Surjit Singh Barnala administered the oath of office. Mr. Sripathi succeeded S. Ramakrishnan, who demitted office on Monday.
A gazette notification regarding Mr. Sripathi's appointment was issued on Wednesday.
In a brief interaction with reporters, the new State CIC said: "I will do what is just and what is justice. It is my objective."
Asked whether he would like to be a pro-active CIC, he replied that "There is nothing called [being] pro-active. I would be an active CIC."
To a question whether he applied for the post or if he was nominated, Mr. Sripathi replied: "You can ask for information." As for the contention of information activists that the post had always gone to bureaucrats, the CIC responded that this was the second time that the CIC had been appointed. "The second need not be always."
To another query on the activists' criticism about lack of transparency in the selection of State CIC, Mr. Sripathi said it was their opinion.
Finance Minister K. Anbazhagan, Deputy Chief Minister M.K. Stalin, Law Minister Durai Murugan and Chief Secretary S. Malathi, among others, were present on the occasion.
3 arrested
Three RTI activists who allegedly protested the appointment of Mr. Sripathi in front of Raj Bhavan here were arrested. Police said Siva Elango, Madhav and Gopalakrishnan alleged that the appointment of the new CIC was made in a "non-transparent" manner. They were released in the evening.
In a statement, People's Union for Civil Liberties vice-president Sudha Ramalingam described the arrest of the three RTI activists as "unconstitutional" and demanded their immediate release.
As reported in deccanherald.com on 06 September 2010:
Jaya defends boycotting of meeting to select CIC
AIADMK chief Jayalalithaa today defended her decision to skip the meeting to select state Chief Information Commissioner(CIC), saying she had not been provided with details on the contenders for the post so she saw no point in attending the meet.
"As a member of the committee (by virtue of being the opposition leader) I had sought details of those who had applied for the post of the CIC. But since they were not given I was not in a position to express my views on the matter and therefore I did not participate," she said in a statement.
Jayalalithaa said she would have participated in the meeting, which was headed by Chief Minister M K Karunanidhi, had the details been furnished.
She alleged 'lack of transparency' in the appointment of former Chief Secretary K S Sripathy as the CIC, saying his name was making the rounds even before the selection process.
"The government had already decided the CIC and their inviting me looks more of a formality," she said, adding the very purpose of having the opposition leader as a member of the committee for transparency purposes had not been served.
Selection of Sripathy for the post was marred by controversy as Right to Information (RTI) activists had been opposing his candidature contending that it was during his tenure as Vigilance Commissioner that the Vigilance Commission pushed for the Department of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption out of the RTI purview.They had also called on Jayalalithaa urging her to oppose Sripathy's name in the selection committee meeting.Three activists had staged a protest outside Raj Bhavan last week during Sripathi's swearing-in ceremony as CIC
As reported at expressbuzz.com on 07 Sep 2010
CIC choice a blow to RTI: Jayalalithaa
CHENNAI: Leader of Opposition J Jayalalithaa on Monday charged that the appointment of the next Chief Information Commissioner of the State in a non-transparent manner without consulting her had defeated the very objective of the Right To Information Act. She also reiterated her view that the appointment of new CIC was illegal.
In a statement here, Jayalalithaa said the purpose of making the Leader of the Opposition one of the members of the committee choosing the CIC was to ensure transparency in the entire process. But the government had failed to give her the information about those who were considered for the post of the CIC and the government had invited her just for a formality to impose its decision on her, Jayalalithaa added.
Stating that the DMK government's action in the appointment of the CIC had ulterior motives, Jayalalithaa said had the government given her the details sought by her, she would have attended the meeting. But the government's decision had given room for controversies.
It may be recalled that RTI activists had called on Jayalalithaa last week and asked her to thwart the attempt of the government to appoint the then Chief Secretary KS Sripathi as the next CIC. However, the government went ahead and made Sripathi the CIC by keeping its decision under the wraps till the last moment.
As reported by Jeeva in timesofindia.indiatimes.com on 04 December 2010:
HC orders notice to Govt on CIC's appointment - The Times of India
HC orders notice to Govt on CIC's appointment
CHENNAI: The Madras high court on Friday ordered issuing of notice to Tamil Nadu government on a writ petition challenging the appointment of retired IAS official KS Sripathi as the chief information commissioner (CIC) of the state as there was "no transperancy" in the selection process.
Justice N Paul Vasantha Kumar ordered the notice, asking the government to file its counter within two weeks while admitting for hearing the petition, jointly filed by two right to information (RTI) activists V Madhav, a software engineer in Alwarpet, and Siva Elango of Saidapet.
While Sripathi, who is former Tamil Nadu chief secretary, was appointed as the CIC on September 1, 2010, the petitioners said there was a news report in The Times of India on August 5 itself stating that he could become the CIC whereas the selection committee meeting was held only on August 23.
Stating that the government had violated every concept of transperancy in the appointment process, the petition said opposition leader J Jayalalithaa did not attend the selection committee meeting saying that she was not given the list of names of the candidates who were considered for the post.
Three activists including the petitioners staged a protest, condemning the lack of transperancy in the CIC's appointment, in front of Raj Bhavan on the day when Sripathi was sworn in as the CIC. The agitators were picked up by the police and released later.
While a number of RTI activists from across the state had been urging the government to evolve a clear and transperant procedure to fill up the vacancy of the CIC, the authorities have not given any notification inviting applications from eligible candidates for the post, the petitioners said.
They said if the government had adopted such a procedure, several people who satisfied the criteria for appointment as the CIC could have applied for the post. In the absence of any procedure, no decision making process appeared to have involved in the selection committee meeting, they said.
The sequence of events leading to Sripathi's selection clearly showed that his appointment was "predetermined and preconceived" and against the provisions of Right To Information Act and principles of natural justice, the petitioners said.
They prayed the court to set aside his appointment and also restrain Sripathi from functioning as the CIC till the disposal of their petition.
sepl70 0
please keep up the good work,Mr.krishna raj.please provide your phone no or contact me.
bala/
XXXXXXXXXXXX - Deleted mobile number - posting against forum rules
Tamil Nadu may face action under Section 18(3) of RTI Act
By karira
The government claims that the information regarding land acquisition for SEZs cannot be shared as private parties involved in the projects are against it
John Samuel Raja D
Chennai: Tamil Nadu has failed to comply with two orders from the State Information Commission to provide information relating to land acquisition for special economic zones (SEZs), leading to demand by the applicant that the information commission seek documents from the government using its power under section 18(3) of the Right to Information Act. The section confers the power of a civil court to the Information Commission.
"This is for the first time probably anywhere in India we are facing this (action under section 18 (3) of RTI Act) situation," said S. Ramakrishnan, state chief information commissioner. "There is no fixed time frame for action under this section". The matter will be heard next week.
On the other hand, the state government claims that it has obtained a stay order from the Madras High Court on 26 October 2007 against operations of the state information commission order.
Strangely, the government claims that the information cannot be shared as private parties involved in the projects are against it.
A senior official in Industries Department who did not want to be identified, said, "We are unable to provide documents that are not of the department like project reports and memorandum of understanding (MoUs) as these have commercial significance and companies have said no to us sharing them."
Ramakrishnan, however, says that they have not received any information regarding stay order from the Madras High Court. The Industries department has complained that it was not given proper hearing before the commission, therefore the complaint would be heard next week and action under section 18 (3), taken subsequently.
Madhumita Dutta, a volunteer at The Other Media who sought information from industries department from December last year, said she wants to share the details of land being acquired with the affected people, so that they can take informed decision about their. "At present, no information is available and people are being cheated", she said.
Her organization claims that, "the land requirement for 55 out of 66 approved SEZ proposals is about 32,235 acres, or 130 square kilometres roughly the size of Coimbatore (a tier II city in Tamil Nadu)".
In an earlier case too, the state had failed to provide details about the proposed Tata Titanium Project in the southern districts of Tamil Nadu.
Tamil Nadu may face action under Section 18(3) of RTI Act - livemint
'Large-scale smuggling of PDS rice from TN by DMK men'
As reported by PTI in hindu.com on 24 May 2008:
The Hindu News Update Service
Chennai (PTI): Charging that there was a large-scale smuggling of PDS rice from Tamil Nadu by ruling DMK men, AIADMK chief Jayalalithaa on Saturday blamed Chief Minister M Karunanidhi for not taking any action against them.
Alleging a nexus of police and DMK functionaries behind the smuggling, Jayalalithaa, in a statement, said due to this, ration card holders were deprived of their monthly quota of 20 kg of rice.
"Rice supplied under the Rs two per kg scheme to ration shops is being smuggled by DMK partymen, with the help of police, to other states or sold in black market," she said. She claimed that 1.9 lakh quintal of rice was smuggled last year, citing information received under the Right to Information (RTI) act.
The former Chief Minister said some persons were arrested for smuggling rice only after AIADMK and DMK's allies came out with concrete proof.
"There have been complaints from people that they are being supplied only 20 kg of rice at the fair price shops while some other essential commodities are not supplied regularly," she said while calling for immediate solution to the problem.
Prasad GLN
sppataskar
By spacebreeze
Violation of Provisions of RTI Act-2005
By nk agarwal
Complaint to Registrar
By Santosh_V
RTI from Abhijit Dabhekar regarding Quality and Leakage issues with 6 Water Dams in Pune district and the necessary action to ensure safety of people
By abhijitvdabhekar
Aadhaar Judgement of Supreme Court (Original)
By Priya De
Applicant cannot ask for any information as to why such opinions, advices, circulars, orders, etc. have been passed
debnanda
turb0_tun3r


McNeil has halted promotion of its nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory Suprol (suprofen). The company's Director of Clinical Research Carol Ellis, MD, noted at FDA's Arthritis Drugs Advisory Committee meeting Dec. 2 that McNeil does not plan to advertise the drug in any way. Advertisements have not appeared in medical journals since September. The committee concluded at its meeting that Suprol should be relabeled to include a boxed warning highlighting the adverse reaction of flank pain. The committee also recommended that physicians be advised in the labeling as well as in a "Dear Doctor" letter that patients receiving Suprol should be followed up for at least two years. In addition, the committee said FDA and McNeil should "work out an acceptable system for follow-up . . . to assess permanent kidney function." Committee member designate Gerald Arnoff was alone in recommending that the drug be withdrawn from the market. However, Arnoff's membership has not yet been cleared through FDA and he was not considered a voting member at the Dec. 2 meeting. Arnoff said that until the risks with Suprol are in range with other nonsteroidal anti-inflammatories he would recommend removing it from the market. FDA Office of Drug Research & Review Director Robert Temple, MD, asked Arnoff if he would change his mind if it could be shown that hydration of the patient reversed the adverse effects. Arnoff responded that this would change his mind. Committee member Norman Gottlieb, MD, University of Miami, said he was "loath to have a drug removed" from the market that might help some people. Temple commented that FDA is accustomed "to the idea that when you're talking about rheumatoid arthritis, maybe osteoarthritis, that there is enough individuality of response that almost any number of drugs is worthwhile and almost any drug, almost no matter what its side effects, is acceptable as a last resort kind of agent." He added: "I guess I don't know how far one could push that, but there's a strong feeling that people respond individually to drugs." Temple said "its very important to try to figure out whether" there is a real patient population that would benefit from suprofen use. Ellis stated that use of Suprol "has dropped off dramatically" since McNeil sent out its third "Dear Doctor" letter in October, updating physicians about adverse reactions and pointing out labeling changes that limit use of suprofen to second line therapy. "One could argue that the risk/benefit ratio has come into line in light of that and that [Suprol] is being reserved for people who are not getting a response on any other drug," Ellis said. "From there you could argue that this risk might be quite acceptable." Describing the company's understanding of the pathophysiology of the flank pain syndrome, Ellis said. "We believe that suprofen causes an increase in urinary uric acid excretion and a decrease in urine flow. . . . The result of this is an increase in urine uric acid concentration which is very pH dependent." She explained that "in the presence of a low pH, it is very possible that uric acid crystals could form; and, if this occurs in a massive amount, there is plugging of the tubular with crystals" which results in pain as well as changes in renal function. Ellis added that the syndrome "will resolve spontaneously as the urine pH changes during the course of the day." Ellis maintained that patient variables such as the degree of hydration and serum uric acid levels will influence the flank pain reaction. Drug variables such as the degree of uricosuria and use pattern are also factors in the reaction, Ellis said. FDAer John Harter, MD, provided the committee with a handout listing 55 flank pain adverse reactions that have occurred with other NSAIDs. He explained that the data includes adverse reactions reported to FDA within the first three years of a drug's initial marketing. The list does not include indomethacin or phenylbutazone since the drugs were approved more than four years before FDA's system was implemented. McNeil's withdrawn Zomax (zomepirac) had 25 reported cases of flank pain, according to Harter's printout. That put Zomax second after suprofen in terms of adverse reactions. There were three cases with ibuprofen, two with piroxicam, one with meclomen and one with diflunazol. As of the end of November, FDA had received 301 reports of flank pain from suprofen use. The committee also discussed the possibility of residual effects from suprofen use. Temple stated that "we can't, with the available data and available follow-up, guarantee that there's no long-term residual effects." Temple said "what you can say is that so far" renal function returns to the way it was before a patient was treated with suprofen. He asked rhetorically: "Does that preclude a long-term effect of a subtle nature? Of course not. We can't know that." McNeil said it is conducting a case control study consisting of patient questionaires sent to physicians. Ellis said the company has received half of the questionaires and that data could be compiled by the first quarter of 1987. She commented that so far, the information suggests that drinking or vigorous exercise the day or evening before an episode of flank pain may be factors in occurrence of the reaction. Committee member Marlene Egger, PhD, University of Utah, suggested that a patient insert be developed to extend information to the patient and increase cooperation in follow-up. Temple said the agency "will certainly explore" the suggestion. Harter noted that FDA initially suggested a patient information sheet and that McNeil had chosen a sticker to go on each bottle of the drug as an alternative. The sticker advises patients to drink two glasses of fluid with the medication and to stop taking the drug if low back pain occurs.


text:
package noobbot.json_objects;

/**
 * Created by Valentin on 4/17/2014.
 */
public class CreateRace extends SendMsg {

    private final BotId botId;
    private final String trackName;
    private final int carCount;

    public CreateRace(String botName, String botKey, String trackName, int carCount) {
        botId = new BotId();
        botId.name = botName;
        botId.key = botKey;
        this.trackName = trackName;
        this.carCount = carCount;
    }

    @Override
    protected String msgType() {
        return "createRace";
    }

    @Override
    protected Object msgData() {
        return this;
    }

    public static class BotId {
        public String name;
        public String key;
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


We would like to congratulate Tariq Khoyratty, who has been appointed as a Celgene Fellow to study the link between neutrophil chromatin organisation in rheumatic patients and their ability to form pathogenic extracellular traps.
Recent evidence suggests an essential contribution of neutrophils in immunity, inflammation and cancer that extend far beyond their well-known anti-microbial responses. This evidence includes their ability to release extracellular DNA structures. The release of extracellular DNA leads to externalizing enhanced levels of putative autoantigens, and is considered to be particularly relevant to neutrophil deleterious roles in rheumatic diseases. This phenomenon is currently collectively referred to as neutrophil extracellular trap (NET) formation.
PAD4 is an enzyme capable of citrullinating proteins that is being considered as an interesting therapeutic target in rheumatic disorders. The primary interest is to determine whether PAD4 inhibition impacts NET formation in human neutrophils in response to disease-relevant stimuli and to determine whether sub-populations of patients are more prone to citrullination-associated NETosis and thus more likely to respond to a PAD4 inhibitor. Mechanistically, NET formation has been linked to a programmed genome disassembly that is precisely organised and sequence programmed at the level of chromatin organisation.
Tariq will be based primarily in the Kennedy Institute and work under the supervision of Prof Irina Udalova and Raashid Luqmani.
The fellowship starts in November 2017 and runs for 36 months.


If you've been injured or have a serious medical condition, it can be difficult to earn a living. Disability is more common than you might think—it is estimated that a 20-year-old worker has about a 30% chance of becoming disabled before reaching retirement age. Losing a job because of injury or illness can be devastating to you and your family.
Fortunately, Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) benefits are available to many people in this situation. Grewal Law PLLC can help determine if you qualify for SSDI benefits, help you apply, and assist you if you need to appeal a determination. Obtaining SSDI benefits can be a complicated and time-consuming process. Let our Social Security Disability attorneys in Michigan help you navigate the system.
Contact us for more information today. Call (888) 211-5798 or fill out and submit an online contact form for a free consultation.
Which Medical Conditions Qualify You for SSD Benefits?
The Social Security Administration (SSA) has what is known as the "blue book," which outlines the various medical conditions that qualify an individual for SSDI benefits. In order to be eligible for SSDI benefits, your condition must match one listed in the blue book or be accepted as "equivalent" to one of the listed conditions.
This list is not exhaustive. You may still qualify for SSDI benefits if you have a disabling injury or condition not listed here or if you have a condition that is equivalent to one of the accepted conditions. Visit the SSA's website to view the full list of conditions and disorders listed in the blue book.
The process of applying for and receiving your SSDI benefits can be incredibly complex—even if you qualify. Many first-time applications are denied. However, we understand that you are likely counting on these benefits to get by. Our firm can help you work to secure the rightful benefits you are owed.
If you are just beginning the process of applying for SSDI benefits, our Michigan-based SSDI attorneys can help you gather and submit all of the necessary paperwork. This is an important step that can be critical to the outcome of your case. If your application has been denied, we can also help you appeal this ruling. With over 100 years of combined legal experience, our attorneys are here to answer your questions and guide you throughout the entire process. With three office locations, we proudly serve clients throughout the state of Michigan.
Call us at (888) 211-5798 to schedule a no-cost consultation with a member of our legal team today.


days of holiday family fun in Hilton Head Island.
Peyton and Austin could not resist the ocean.
However, the indoor heated pool was their favorite.
this was our first Christmas break trip.
Dinner at the Salty Dog Café is a family tradition.
miniature golf, shopped, and enjoyed great restaurants.
and flaming desserts at Hugo's.
for Peyton who will be 9 years old in a few days.
We arrived home New Years Day afternoon.
fun travel and afternoon teas.
Melissa's continued recovery from October 30th open-heart surgery.
Glad you had a wonderful holiday vacation. The photos are great! Blessings in 2014.
Peyton looks like he really LOVES Grandpa! And I must say that Austin takes after his dad in appearance. You have a nice family and I'm glad you had this time together.
Simply perfect---family fun, good times, ocean strolls, quiet evenings, and good conversation over good food in familiar places you love.
What a wonderful way to close out a year, with bright prospects for the one to come.
Such a great way to welcome in the New Year!
Happy 2014! Its good to see everyone looking so well. By the way, I've made commenting on my blog easier. ").
This sounds like a wonderful family time and celebration. Oh I need to find a ukelele for my little guy. He got a cheap guitar for Christmas and it was his favorite thing. Oh he loved it and then it broke. He was so sad. Happy 9th to Peyton.
I think the best thing of all is seeing your daughter there so happy and healthy!


The Hockey Shop Source for Sports in Guelph is proud to keep its on going sponsorship of the GARHL "Performer of the Month" award for each division. Each monthly winner will get a prize from Hockey Shop Source for Sports, located on Carden Street in Downtown Guelph. Note that Hockey Shop Source for Sports is having their annual "Big Sale" beginning on Wednesday Nov 18 at 7pm with some massive door crashers on sticks and other items.
Here are the Performers of the Month for Each division for September and October.
The GARHL Stats and Standings have been updated, please check out the update.


text:
How much fuel do I need to carry?
When does too much become a weight burden and then a potential boat problem? And how much is not enough? When will questions have a simple answer? There I go again another question to an answer!
Needles to say this is actually one of the easier questions to answer. We wanted to carry enough fuel to cover the longest passage. Yeah! Some joke. The longest passage was to be almost 3,000 nautical miles. That would mean at an average of 0.5 gal an hour we would need about .... cough, cough... more than "Mouse Pad" could ever carry. So, now lets be reasonable about this. We had to do some hard thinking and research. We came up with approximately 375 ltr. (100 gal) as a fuel requirement. That would get us from just about anywhere to anywhere, except of course the longest passage. We were after all a SAILING VESSEL! We had based all this on all the books saying that fuel was not available after leaving Cabo San Lucas until we would arrive in Papeete, Tahiti. A total of about 4,000 miles. This fortunately was not to be true. By the time we were half way to Atuona, Hiva Oa we had heard on the HAM radio that fuel was readily available and even abundant in Atuona and that we didn't have to conserve if we didn't need to.
In the end we found we had to add one additional 25 gal tank in the lazorette. That gave us 50 gals in tanks and we had decided to carry another 50 gals in plastic cans on deck. Four on starboard, two on port along with 2 cans of gasoline for the outboard and generator. The outboard and generator are other questions to be answered in another section. That would give me a reasonably even balance of load, even if it did sink the boat a bit, Opps.. that should be "raised the water line a few inches". Oh, an by the way we sold the generator in Raeatea. Never needed it with the wind generator and solar panels.
This is how we cam up with the 100 gals. With a Universal 25 HP engine running at about 2000 rpm, in reasonably calm seas, we could expect to make about 5 kts. of headway using a little less than 0.5 gal per hour. This was based upon many trips to Santa Catalina Island from Marina del Rey at different speeds and sea conditions, and doing the math. Not bad we thought! In most instances it has been more than enough to get us where we need to go and then some. Even on the long passage from Cabo San Lucas to Hiva Oa we had fuel left over. My need for fuel has not yet turned into the engines thirst. Most of the time we have been carrying an excess of fuel on board. The availability of fuel throughout French Polynesia has been abundant.
We have made a practice of getting fuel in the jerry cans and filling "Mouse Pads" tanks from them. I can then filter it through a "Baja Filter". To date the worst fuel we have come across was from the good ol' US of A. Mexico has been the cleanest, and French Polynesia is not far behind Mexico.
For those with the need to know, here is where we found fuel available in unlimited quantities; Atuona, Hiva Oa - Mobil Taiohae Bay, Nuku Hiva - Shell/Total Papeete, Tahiti - Mobile/Shell/Total (duty free fuel is at either the downtown dock or at the Maeva Beach Marina) Utoroa, Raiatea - Shell Rarotonga - Mobil (they deliver it in 400 lt. drums with a hand pump) Vava'u - Shell Tongatapu - Shell
There were other places rumored to have fuel or that we saw fuel trucks at the dock, but since we didn't actually buy fuel or see others refueling I am hesitant to name them. You could almost always find someone with a 500 gal tank in there back yard and more than willing to sell you a few gals when needed.
Cruising ground
Return to "What makes a cruising boat?"


text:
Q: Error message specific to limma employed using R 2.15.2 I recently updated R, and code I had written using the limma package before now returns an error.
The code was
classes = c(rep('Phenotype1',), rep('Phenotype 2',))
classes= as.factor(classes)
design=model.matrix(~classes-1)
colnames(design)=levels(classes)
fit1= lmFit(exset, design)
cm=makeContrasts(Phenotype 1 - Phenotype 2, levels=design)
fit2= contrasts.fit(fit1,cm)
fit3= eBayes(fit2)

With the new version of R, the following command
fit2= contrasts.fit(fit1,cm)

returns this error message...
Error in .Call("La_chol", as.matrix(x), PACKAGE = "base") :
Incorrect number of arguments (1), expecting 2 for 'La_chol'

A: limma is a package from the BioConductor project, and each version of R has an associated version of BioConductor. If you updated R without updating your BioConductor packages (including limma), there might be some incompatibilities. Are you sure you're using the latest version of limma and BioConductor?

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Q: Is there any way to terminate a kernel on AMD GPU with OpenCL? Recently, I wrote OpenCL program to use AMD GPU,However, as I'm new to this, some problems I cannot detect directly will cause launched kernel dead, and clinfo also display nothing in this condition. Is there any method to kill a running kernel on AMD GPU ? Each time kernel is dead, rebooting is what I depend on to fix it for now.

A: There's no standard way to stop a kernel which has begun executing. You should write your kernels so that they stop predictably - i.e. don't use infinite loops, just repeatedly enqueue the kernels from the host instead.

A: One thing i know can hang some AMD GPUs, is having a barrier that's only executed by some work-items of a workgroup. Note that this is not a bug in the GPU, the OpenCL specification explicitly says this about barrier():

This function must be encountered by all work-items in a work-group executing the kernel.

So either all, or none of the work items must encounter a barrier. If only some do, your program can hang on the GPU. So i'd check the OpenCL code for things like this:
if (localmem[i] > 0) {
   barrier(CLK_LOCAL_MEM_FENCE);
}

You could also try using Oclgrind on your code, it's an OpenCL GPU emulator that's useful to find problems in OpenCL code.


text:
Down syndrome teen reaches Everest base camp
11:49am Apr 1, 2013
A US teenager is believed to be one of the first people with Down syndrome to climb to base camp on the world's tallest mountain.
After 10 gruelling days, 15-year-old Oregon teenager Eli Reimer reached Mt Everest's base camp in Nepal with his father, Justin, television station HLN reports.
The Reimers, along with their team, made the 17,000-foot climb last month in a bid to raise money for the family's charity, the Elisha Foundation.
"It was surreal," Mr Reimer told HLN.
"To be standing there at that place and see the smile on Eli's face and the sense of accomplishment that he had, and the face that his health was better than any of us at that point … it was humbling, it was inspiring, just an amazing moment."
Mr Reimer added that the achievement proved that having a disability was not a limitation.
"The lives of those with disabilities have infinite worth," he told HLN.
Trump's lawyers: Impeachment case 'flimsy'
Donald Trump impeachment: What to know about the historic Senate trial of US President
The Reimer's raised more than $80,000 to go towards supporting families with special-needs children.
Source: HLN
Author: Sophie Cousins, Approving Editor: Matthew Henry.


text:
Prosecutors: Castle Rock officer justified in shooting
DENVER (AP) — Prosecutors say a police officer was justified when he shot a man who brandished a pellet gun during a confrontation in Castle Rock south of Denver.
The Denver Post reports 67-year-old Charles Rees called 911 on Christmas Eve saying he needed help, but that he would shoot any police or medical personnel who showed up. A second 911 call came from Rees' wife, who told dispatchers that her husband was drunk and that he wanted police to shoot him.
When officers went inside his home, Rees met them in a hallway and brandished a pellet gun that resembled a .45-caliber handgun.
One of the officers fired four rounds from a rifle, striking Rees once in the right arm. Rees survived and is facing four counts of felony menacing.


Moving can be an exhausting process when you're simply relocating to a new neighborhood – so it's no wonder that a move to a brand-new city can be intimidating and overwhelming! We hope our apartment moving checklist will be a helpful tool for preparing you for moving to New Orleans, but once you're here, there's plenty to learn.
New Orleans is a beautiful, vibrant city bursting with history and culture. There's music around every corner and delicious food to satisfy any palate. People love New Orleans because of how unique it is, but that can make things hard for NOLA newbies! Check out our top tips for moving to New Orleans and living like a local. If you have any questions or are still searching for the perfect place in Greater New Orleans to call home, please contact us – we are here to help you find your perfect new apartment!
Bikes are a great way to get around New Orleans.
Bikes are one of the most enjoyable ways to experience the city. In addition to exploring a wealth of trails around New Orleans and the surrounding areas, cyclists can also take leisurely rides through iconic areas of the city like the French Quarter and the Garden District. Several local shops like Bayou Bicycles and The Bike Shop can help you find a bicycle that's right for your needs. Not quite ready to purchase a bike? Test drive… er, ride… a rental to give you a better idea of city biking.
New Orleans is a great place to build a career.
While the tourism industry is still booming, their are more and more job opportunities for young professionals in the greater New Orleans area every day. Did you know that New Orleans leads the country by 53% in number of startups-per-capita, and that we were voted a top city for woman-owned companies and young entrepreneurs? New Orleans was also recently ranked as one of the best cities for women in tech fields, outranking even Silicon Valley?
New Orleans is blazing trails in education.
New Orleans offers private schools and charter schools to meet the needs of students and families. Just last year, New Orleans closed the last five of its traditional public schools in favor of the charter school system. Governor Bobby Jindal hopes the charter school system will serve as a model for the rest of the country; the Washington Post called the endeavor "a grand experiment in urban education for the nation." The charter school system and private schools give parents an unprecedented choice in where they send their children to receive an education. For more information on K-12 educational opportunities in NOLA, visit the New Orleans Public School System or Jefferson Parish Public School System.
No one uses North/South/East/West directions.
The city of New Orleans is wedged between multiple bodies of water, including the Mississippi River, Lake Pontchartrain and Lake Borgne. In an old city such as this one, standard directions are useless. Instead, we give directions in terms of proximity to bodies of water or landmarks. Think "downriver" or "towards the Lake" and you'll be fine.
A place by lots of other names is still a sweet place to call home.
We say things a little differently around here.
Perhaps the toughest part – and the most fun part – is adopting New Orleans' unique vernacular. The city has lots of hard-to-pronounce words that will make or break you: say it wrong, and people will know you're an out-of-towner! We've collected a few of the toughest pronunciations to keep you sounding like a local as you navigate the city.
What it is: A street.
How you say it: Lan-yap.
How you say it: In New Orleans, people emphasize the second syllable for this word. Pronounce it Bur-GUN-dy and people will know you're in the know.
What it is: The best city ever!
How you say it: Quite simply, it's New Or-lunz. Not New Or-leanz.
Having a costume box or closet is a thing.
New Orleanians love any excuse to party, parade and celebrate. And any excuse for a party means any excuse for a costume. After living here awhile, you'll inevitably start to accumulate a random assortment of boas, wigs, costumes and other wacky wearables. Need to get started? Check out Fifi Mahony's in the French Quarter for custom wigs and makeup, or visit Uptown Costume & Dancewear on Magazine Street at Napoleon or Southern Costume Company in the CBD.
The best way to feel like a local is to celebrate like a local.
Now that you know we love any excuse for a costume or party, be sure to take advantage of all of the festivities on tap any given weekend. Go to every festival you can your first year. New Orleans offers well-known big events like Jazz Fest and French Quarter Festival, as well as plenty of festivals with local flair like Bayou Boogaloo, Greek Fest and Po-Boy Fest. Be sure to also venture to surrounding areas, as the Southeast Louisiana region offers something for everyone. Kenner offers an annual Italian Heritage Festival each spring, while Covington plays host to the Three Rivers Art Festival each fall.
Mardi Gras is not limited to Bourbon Street.
Once you move to New Orleans and experience your first Mardi Gras as a local, you'll soon discover there's more to Mardi Gras than Bourbon Street. First off, it's weeks worth of parades, balls and festivities. Second, most locals prefer to experience the parades far, far away from Canal Street. Watch the parades from the Uptown route along St. Charles Avenue, and seek out smaller walking parades like the Krewe of Chewbaccus. Mardi Gras is also not limited to Orleans Parish: there are parades in Metairie, the Westbank and on the Northshore, all with their own flair.
Not all of NOLA is cash-less.
New Orleans really does have four seasons.
However, they may not be the four that you're used to. While it DOES actually get cold here in winter, and it definitely gets hot here in summer, the four New Orleans seasons you really need to know are: carnival season, crawfish season, snowball season and football season.
New Orleans sticks with you.
Once you've visited and once you've lived here, you'll never be the same. The city has a way of pulling people back. With a culture and vibrancy like no other place on earth, you'll want to make it your home too. Contact us today and learn more about making New Orleans your new hometown.