text:
TT: One more time
March 1, 2006 by Terry Teachout
This is an essay I wrote a decade ago for a magazine that never got around to publishing it. The piece subsequently disappeared into the bowels of my computer, and I forgot about it until the other day, when I was cleaning out a file and stumbled across it. I thought you might possibly enjoy reading it.
The trouble with good advice is that nobody ever takes it. Kind friends warned me that a book tour is the only thing more humiliating than falling in love with someone who likes you back, but that didn't stop me from hitting the road and watching every single word they said come true. The TV people hadn't read my book; the newspaper reporters had, and hated it. As for the in-store appearances, the worst one was in a small town where I did an early-morning guest shot on the local radio station, then went to the mall and sat for five straight hours without signing a single copy.
But I did get to go to Kansas City, the place where I went to college and, later, spent four sweet-and-sour years playing jazz at night and waiting on customers in a bank during the day. I'm always glad to be in to Kansas City, and this time was no different, book tour or no book tour. I had lots of friends to call. I knew where to get good barbecue. And I could still pick up the Kansas City Star, turn to the weekly arts calendar, look at the jazz section and recognize nearly every name in it. I'd heard most of the musicians in town, jammed with many of them, written about some of them, worked with more than a few of them. I played my very first gig in Kansas City, which is something you don't forget, even if it goes well. And so it was that I ate a huge dinner at Italian Gardens, unfolded the Star, turned to the entertainment section, and ran my finger down the listings until I found the name I was looking for: Carol Comer.
Carol and I go back. I covered most of the Women's Jazz Festivals she put together in the '70s; I played bass at countless jam sessions where she bashed away at an electric piano and sang standards in a low, husky, set-'em-up-Joe baritone etched by hard use and chain smoking. I loved her strong, rumpled face, her bowl-cut mop of graying hair, her flip attitude that didn't fool anyone. I hadn't seen her for ten years, and now she was singing at a restaurant on the south side of town, and that was where I wanted to be. So I paid the check, got in the rented car and started driving, and after an hour or so I pulled into the parking lot of a shopping center deep in the heart of suburbia, just off one of the highways that ring Kansas City.
I've been here before, I thought. Not the restaurant, but the neighborhood. As soon as I got out of the car, I remembered: this was where my old girlfriend Debbie used to live. Across the street and around the corner was the house where she grew up, the place to which I returned her in the days when we were going out as often as I could scrape together enough money to buy enough gas to drive across town and back again. The past billowed up around me, tinting the crisp autumn night. I thought about other nights I had spent driving around this part of town, looking for the country clubs where I played dance dates with Bob Simes, the pianist who taught me all the standards I hadn't already learned off my father's 78s. A decade and more slid off my shoulders. I felt if I were still a boy, and still a musician.
The restaurant was just another yuppie-chow joint, run by some cockeyed optimist hopeful that a little music on weekends would make the customers drink more. I knew the jazz policy here would last three months at most, after which Carol would have to start carting her piano to private parties again and looking for another decent job, perhaps even a real jazz gig at a place where the customers knew better than to request "Feelings" or "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown." I got to play maybe half a dozen real jazz gigs, most of them one-nighters, in the whole of my career. I remember them all, especially an Oldsmobile dealers' convention where everybody in the ballroom was falling-down drunk and we got up on the bandstand and blew twenty smoking choruses of "Sister Sadie," wondering when somebody would sober up enough to ask if we knew "Tie a Yellow Ribbon."
That evening stands out in my memory for two other reasons: it was the only time I ever played a four-piece job with Mike White, who was then the best tenor sax man in Kansas City, and it was my last gig. After that night, I never again played bass in public for money. Instead, I went off to New York to become a writer, while Carol stayed in Kansas City and sang her songs. I have never doubted, not even for a moment, that I did the right thing. Yet rarely does a day go by when I don't wonder what my life would have been like had I stayed in Kansas City and kept on playing bass. Gerry Mulligan once wrote a song called "I Know, Don't Know How." That's the story of my life: I am, and am not, a musician. I used to be a musician, and once a musician, always a musician. But now I keep my bass in the closet, which means that I am no longer a musician, because I no longer play music.
I was reflecting on this paradox for the millionth time when Carol walked in, spotted me, came straight to my table and gave me the mother of all bear hugs. Another player, a guitarist, was on her heels. As he tuned up, Carol switched on her piano and started noodling. Then I saw, propped up in the corner of the bandstand, an electric bass. I looked around in vain for a bass player. And it came to me in a flash: Carol is going to ask me to sit in during the second set.
The room began to fill up with familiar faces as the music got going. Some were musicians, off for the night and stopping by to hear Carol and have a beer; others were civilians I used to see around town, the hardcore jazz buffs who came to everything. They all waved as they sat down. They remembered when I used to write about jazz for the Star and play it on weekends, utterly oblivious to any possible conflict of interest. The first set ended, and people started to crowd around my little table to say hello. Carol pushed her way through, grinning like a fool.
"So how the hell are you, anyway?" she growled. "I hear you wrote a book."
"Oh, Jesus, Carol, I'm beat to the socks, you know how it is, if I have to get on a plane once more…."
"Yeah, I know what you mean. Hey, there's a bass over there in the corner. You want to sit in? I'm getting tired of working my left hand so goddamn hard."
"Thanks, Carol, I'd love to, but…" But the truth is that I don't play anymore, Carol, I haven't touched a bass in years, it wouldn't be fun for either one of us, maybe some other time. Long pause. Deep breath. "But promise me one thing–don't make me take any solos."
How could I say no? How many times in your life do you get to turn the skies back, to take the road not taken, if only for an hour or two? Even if I fell flat on my face in front of a roomful of people, even if I couldn't remember the bridge to "Don't Blame Me," I knew I was going to get up there and play.
The literature of jazz is about the musicians who kept on playing until the day they died. The reality is different. For every Charlie Parker or Johnny Hodges, there are a thousand second alto players who spent six months on the road with Les Brown and now sell life insurance. There is nothing mysterious about them: they are the journeymen of jazz. The real enigmas are the virtuosos who quit at the top of their form, the Artie Shaws and Shorty Rogers and Dodo Marmarosas. They were the ones I could never figure out back when I was making music all day and most of the night and coming back for more the next day and the day after that. And yet good people are always quitting. Not long after I graduated from college, my viola teacher moved to Texas and went into the real-estate business. He'd been the principal violist of the Kansas City Philharmonic. I felt as if he were a deserter, a traitor to the cause.
As for me, I stopped playing when I decided that I wrote better than I played. Not that I saw my retirement as a turning point. I didn't understand then that I was quitting for good. Even though I must have known on some level that I would probably not make my living as a musician, it never occurred to me that there might come a time when I wouldn't play at all. Yet that was exactly what happened. I moved to New York and took a magazine job, and all at once my playing days were a thing of the increasingly remote past.
At first, my new life was too crowded for second thoughts, however tentative. But I began at length to feel an ache in my heart that couldn't be soothed merely by sitting in clubs and listening to other people play. I missed the act of spinning what James Lincoln Collier aptly calls "the ribbon of sound" that comes out of a jazzman as he improvises, floating blissfully in the eternal present. I missed the near-sensual pleasure of negotiating the changes of a ballad like "Body and Soul" or "Lush Life," of knowing all the different ways of moving from chord to chord and choosing among them with ecstatic deliberation. I missed the feeling of being in the middle of a rhythm section on a good night, when every note you play is right and the beat becomes a great glowing presence that fills you with warmth and buoys you up. I also missed the culture of jazz, that endlessly tolerant late-night world of scuffling, easy camaraderie and wry jokes unintelligible to the outsider. It was the only club to which I had ever belonged, and it suited me right down to the ground.
So I dragged out my bass one evening and tried playing along with a few favorite records, and it just didn't work. The sounds that came out were all wrong. My ears remembered the clean, supple way I had played after years of practice and months of steady gigging, but my hands didn't. I simply couldn't play well enough to please myself, much less anybody else. I sighed, returned my bass to the bedroom closet and resigned myself to the inevitable.
In time, I even stopped writing about jazz, except for a dreamlike week-long interlude when I went out on the road with Woody Herman's band for a magazine piece. That was a fluke–or so I thought. But the piece grew and grew and turned into a book about growing up in the Midwest, which contained two chapters about my short, happy life as a jazzman. I found a publisher and signed a contract, and the next thing I knew, I was tuning up somebody else's bass in a restaurant in Overland Park, Kansas, nervously wondering what tune Carol Comer would call first. There are no coincidences.
I wish I could tell you exactly what happened next, but most of it is a blur. I do remember that I ended up playing two whole sets, and that I had lipstick on my collar when I got back to the hotel, because there was a lot of hugging and kissing after the last set. I also remember that Carol, glad though she was to see me, made no allowances for my rustiness. If I couldn't cut it, that was my problem: every tub, as they say in jazz, stands on its own bottom. She played her usual set, leaving me to stagger through some tricky turnarounds. (Lou Levy, Peggy Lee's old pianist, has a toast suitable to such occasions: "Here's to all the guys who died coming out of the bridge of 'Sophisticated Lady.'" Thanks a lot, pal.) Then she called a blues, "Centerpiece," and I finally settled down and found the groove. Grace descended and things began to swing, and suddenly it was all over and everybody was clapping, and I was crying.
Even as it was unfolding, I knew my evening with Carol was a unique experience, not to be repeated on pain of disillusion. I didn't sell my bass after I got back to New York, but I haven't gotten it out of the closet, either, and I don't plan to any time soon. As Crash Davis says to Annie Savoy at the end of Bull Durham, I hit my dinger and I hung it up.
This isn't to say I will never make music again. In fact, I make it nearly every day, if only for a few minutes. I like to sit down at the piano between paragraphs and fake a chorus or two, and sometimes I knock off for a half-hour or so and put in a little mock-serious practice. But it's purely for my own pleasure: there is no beast in view, and I was never more than a part-time piano player to begin with. In golf, there are duffers; in chess, patzers. I'm a piano patzer. Stealing licks off Bill Evans records is the extent of my latter-day performing career, and it'll have to do. The real thing has come and gone.
Instead of playing music, I write about it, and I am a better critic for knowing how it feels to be on the bandstand. I'm never tempted to score off a player just to make myself look good. I understand the miracle of getting the curtain up every night. I also understand the power of an amateur's passion: it is the seed from which great audiences grow. That is something I didn't know until long after I threw away my union card and joined the ranks of the amateurs. They also serve who only sit and listen.
Somebody asked me once if I were a frustrated musician. "No," I said, "I'm a fulfilled writer." But that doesn't mean I never think about what might have been, much less what used to be. The way I feel about having once been a musician is not unlike the way some reformed alcoholics feel about booze. They know they can't live with it anymore, but they also know how much they liked it, and they remember, as clearly as if it were this morning, how good that last drink tasted. I remember, too.


Anthony and I are on our way down to Huntington Beach to meet my parents & siblings for a Roome Family Vacay (Roome is my maiden name and it's pronounced: Rome). I was thinking about it and our family functions are about to return to being louder & more interesting because my Uncle, Aunt, and their 7 kids are moving back to the United States after having spent 6 years living in Brazil.
I'm really excited that they're moving back. Our family has grown since they moved, by two husbands! It's incredibly cool to think about the changes that will occur the next few years. The Roome family will get bigger and bigger. My dad has a brother & a sister and between the three of them, they had 15 grandkids. It's fun to imagine how much larger our family will get when all of us are married and have little bambinos.
For now, I'm looking forward to spending a few days under the same roof as my dad, mom, sisters, brother-in-law, and of course Anthony. My little brother had to stay home, he has work and football. I'll miss him...even though he does enjoy picking me up and walking around with me on his shoulder! More thoughts to come.
Happy Saturday, my friends! Any interesting plans this weekend?


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407 10-02-2012 The former president of the African National Congress Youth League Julius Malema at the national executive committee meeting held at ST George's Hotel in Irene, Pretoria. Picture: Tiro Ramatlhatse
Malema's assets up for auction
By MOLOKO MOLOTO Feb 10, 2013
Julius Malema's grand piano, wine cabinet, four fridges and other household goods will go under the hammer in the next two weeks. The former youth league leader's possessions were advertised in a legal notice for an auction in a Limpopo newspaper on Thursday.
At least 31 household items will be sold in execution at the offices of the Sheriff of the High Court in Polokwane. This follows a judgment granted to the commissioner of Sars by the Pretoria High Court on September 11 last year.
During his heyday as ANC Youth League leader, Malema's life was characterised by extravagance.
Malema and his attorney could not be reached for comment yesterday.
Malema allies were not favoured: MEC
Malema left homeless
It is not clear when his homes and cars that were attached will also be auctioned off.
Malema's troubles with the taxman deepened when he failed to pay the R16 million he owes. He begged for a compromise, but four months later the taxman went for the kill, removing his assets and taking possession of his houses.
Sars applied to the Pretoria High Court to have Malema sequestrated, to probe if he is hiding assets. His immovable properties, including a house in Sandton, one in Polokwane and a Sckuilkraal farm, were attached.
Last week's public notice indicated that the goods would be sold to the highest bidder. But the notice did not say if Malema's houses would be auctioned on the same day.
Malema may still have a bond on his Polokwane and Sandton properties, so Sars will have to consider other creditors such as banks before auctioning them.
Sars has also applied for Malema's sequestration, believing he could still be earning income from undeclared sources or third parties.
Malema is opposing the application and the decision is expected to be made on February 27.
He is also facing criminal charges linked to his and his family trust's business dealings with some Limpopo business people and the government.
He and his co-accused are due to appear in court in April.
The Sunday Independent understands that top government officials could join Malema in the dock soon.
It is understood that some of Malema's business allies sold him out during an in-camera judicial tax inquiry, while his alleged failure - according to two sources close to his financial situation – to disclose the true source and extent of his wealth was the final torpedo that sank him.
Malema's political star faded when the ANC's conference in Mangaung returned his nemesis, President Jacob Zuma, for the second term. This was after Malema told his supporters that Zuma was not suitable to lead the ANC and South Africa.
He has confessed to City Press that some of his friends are not returning his calls and are treating him like a leper.
On his cellphone voice mail, Malema states: "Some of our former friends are now vacillating, withdrawing and bowing before the enemy. We shall never do that. For before victory is certain, we shall not be overcome."
- List of items to be auctioned off
1. Seven-piece dining room suite
2. Eurogrand piano
3. Wall mirror
4. Wall painting
5. Heater
6. Wine cabinet
7. Cabinet
8. Table and four chairs
9. Samsung microwave oven
10. Coffee table
11. LG television
12. Flower table
13. Two easy chairs
14. Two-seater couch
15. Samsung fridge
16. Dressing table
18. Carpet
20. Samsung DVD
21. DVD player
23. Two two-seater couches
24. KIC chest freezer
25. Kelvinator bar fridge
28. Two Pioneer CD players
29. VMX sound mixer
30. Six plastic chairs
31. Seven-seater cane garden set - Sunday Independent

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Originally Published: April 8, 2018 5:55 a.m.
ALAMO LAKE – A 57-year-old fisherman was rescued Wednesday after his four-wheel drive vehicle got stranded in a wash while he was trying to fish the north side of Alamo Lake.
His 911 call for help was routed to Maricopa County, then transferred to Mohave County Sheriff's Office Search and Rescue.
Search and Rescue personnel called the man, who said he was extremely exhausted and out of oxygen.
A Department of Public Safety helicopter was sent to locate the man, while searchers from Lake Havasu went to the lake.
The fisherman set a red beacon light on top of his Chevy Tahoe, which helped the DPS helicopter spot him about 200 yards off Alamo Road in a rugged wash.
He was medically evaluated and taken to Wickenburg Regional for further care.


We are excited to share our many adventures with you! Please stay tuned as we continue to develop Family Retreats on the beautiful northern coast of California and on the warm and enchanting island of Puerto Rico. Comments/Suggestions/Requests are always welcome at info@feedyourfriends.org.


Let me know who approves that loan and then I'll try.
They changed the name from "impactonator" to jetovator just so people could get a loan.
Loan officer: "What is this loan for?"
You: "It's this really cool machine that you hook to a PWC, that allows you to "fly" over the water. Until you lose control or tug on the hose and then you are sent into the water at a very high rate of speed. Thus impacting the water at all sorts of angles. Detaching your retina, compacting your internal organs, and causing loss of bowel control. But they decided "Impactonator" was the best descriptor."
L.O.: "No, they should change the name".
I think I'll pass, but I do have to say if I saw one at the lake, I'd have to stick around and watch for a while..
Saw one up close and personal on Lake Weir in FL today. Looked cool until the dude did a header into 4ft of water.
"Saw one up close and personal on Lake Weir in FL today. Looked cool until the dude did a header into 4ft of water."
Not to be too morbid, but that would be worth seeing. Pity you didn't have the video on, huh?
Sorry, I did not. I think some others that were there did, so I'll keep my eyes open to see if they post it.
Looks like fun, but the price is rediculous!!!


I recently upgraded my Mac to Leopard, whose marquee feature is Time Machine, a nice backup mechanism.
I already had a NAS box. I originally got this primarily as a backup target. It's got a half-terabyte hard drive in it, and it supports AFP, so it seems like a logical target for Time Machine backups. And apparently in the betas of Leopard, it was possible to use a hard drive attached to an Airport Extreme as a Time Machine target. This was disabled in the shipping version, but there's a simple hack to re-enable it. Which I applied: as it happens, this made also it possible to use Time Machine with my NAS box.
One critical difference between my NAS box and a hard drive hanging off an Airport Express is the disk format. Time Machine requires an HFS+ disk. My box is using something else. Time Machine actually deals with this cleverly by creating a disk-image file on the target drive, but that's also the root of the problem: Mounting this disk image over the network (even GigE) gets slower and slower as the file gets bigger and bigger. I had set up a very stripped-down backup profile (home directory only, no media files), but still, after a couple of weeks, it had gotten to 42 GB and took forever to mount. Eventually it took so long to mount that Time Machine would stop waiting for it and give up.
So until I get a Time Capsule or something, I'm using my previous backup app, Synk. Even after, it might be worth it to use Synk to back up my media files, which don't need quite the obsessive hourly backup that Time Machine offers.


A religious "none" is, simply put, a person who does not identify with any particular religion. They are not all atheists, however, as 61% of religious "nones" believe in God or some kind of a universal spirit. While the term "none" is used across the board, the reasons these individuals have for not identifying with any particular religion vary greatly. 20% of religious "nones" categorize themselves as anti-organized religion. 36% attribute their lack of religious affiliation to disenchantment with religion or simply lack of belief in God. Only about 1% of "nones" experienced a great crisis of faith that lead them to abandon religious association. Regardless of the path they took to get there, many different people of different upbringings end up in the category of "none." That the ranks of "nones" continue to grow at an exceptionally high rate in our society perhaps indicates great changes at work among the fundamental characteristics which have long defined our country.
Before delving into the link between the rise of religious "nones" in America and the nature of our modern day culture, however, it is necessary to note a few important statistics. By far, the age group with the highest percentage of "nones" is Millennials. There is also a gradual increase in the percentage of "nones" from the Silent generation (born between 1928-1945) through Generation X (born between 1965-80) before a large, 11% spike from Generation X to Millennials. Millennials mark the first generation where the number of unaffiliated "nones" outnumbers the number of Protestants, both evangelical and mainline combined. Furthermore, while many people of religious upbringing become "nones"—a shocking 78% of "nones" were actually raised in religious households—few "nones" find religion and later associate themselves with organized religious groups. While it is possible that some Millennial "nones" might turn to religion as they grow older, evidence from various Pew Research Center studies suggests that people from every generation gravitate less toward religion as they age. What should we expect in the future, then? An increase in religious "nones" that will likely only escalate as time goes on.
One possible reason for this spike in Millennial "nones" is that they are simply products of the world in which we live. Everything from the total separation of church and state to the growing political incorrectness associated with putting "Merry Christmas" as opposed to "Happy Holidays" on a greeting card points to the secularization of our society. While this does not necessarily mean that there should be a shift in the personal religiosity of individuals, it is understandable why there would be. For instance, there is less cultural esteem nowadays associated with being a practicing Christian, whereas a couple hundred years ago being Christian gave individuals some semblance of "cultural savvy." Another factor that may play a role in the rise of "nones" is the increasingly technological nature of our world. In this age of smartphones and Twitter and constant stimulation, it is hard not to feel like our attention is being pulled in a plethora of different directions. 56% of Millennials say that they attend a religious service only once a year or less, and 10% of "nones" describe themselves as being simply "too busy" to go. The pace of our world today is undeniably faster than at any other point in history, and, as these pieces of data demonstrate, many people (Millennials in particular) have cut out religious practices in order to keep up.
Another important, possible cause for the increase in "nones" may simply be how Millennials stay in "adultescence," as Ross Douthat calls it, for a longer period of time than any previous generation. Douthat explains that it is normal, historically, for people to deviate from religion in their twenties before returning once they get married and have children. With this in mind, the question then shifts to whether there will be an increase in religiosity once Millennials decide to settle down for good. Given current trends, however, this seems ever more unlikely.
Regardless of the causes of this widespread secularization, the effects it holds in store for our country are manifold. And it does not just mean that churches' weekly collection numbers are down. As more and more people separate from religion, the general value system of our society will continue to change. If the next generation grows up in a world where religious phrasing and ideals have fallen out of the vernacular, they may form a collective moral code far different from any that American society has yet held or seen.
While surely different, in no way is this shift in societal morality inherently bad. For instance, in recent years, Millennials have pursued the causes of social justice and respect for human rights with a fervor and tenacity unmatched by any previous generation. If this trend continues to take hold, our world may look very different fifteen years from now. Just think about it: the numerous and increasing social justice initiatives, as well as the advent of a politically correct society (that is enforced now in seemingly every aspect of our lives), were non-existent fifteen years ago.
Of course, it is impossible to predict the future with anything but feigned confidence, so those who see religious values as irreplaceable or incorruptible, but definitely under attack, need not be worried yet. The changes we see are simply a reflection of the natural social trends of the contemporary world. Only time will tell whether Millennials become more religious and revert back to more traditional ways as they reach certain milestones such as marriage and parenthood. If they continue on their current track, however, it will be fascinating to see how the moral and social landscape of our world evolves.


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St. Augustine Commissioner-elect John Valdes says Santa Maria, zoning among priorities
Sheldon Gardner
Aug 30, 2018 at 6:11 AM Aug 30, 2018 at 6:11 AM
John Valdes won St. Augustine City Commission Seat Four in the primary contest on Tuesday, and he has several priorities in mind as he prepares to take over the seat in December.
One of those is helping the city communicate better with residents. He said he sees negative posts about city government on social media, and he said part of the issue is a lack of knowledge about what's happening at City Hall.
"I want to focus on communication more than anything," Valdes said.
Valdes received 54.3 percent of the votes cast. He defeated Jill Pacetti and Wade Ross. Pacetti received about 32.4 percent of the votes, and Ross received about 13.2 percent of the votes cast.
"It was exciting and gratifying. ... I think I can do some good," Valdes said.
A primary candidate in the city races, which are nonpartisan, needs to get 50 percent of the votes cast plus one vote in order to win the whole race. Had no one reached that threshold, the top two candidates would have faced each other in the general election.
This won't be the first time on a city board for Valdes. He has served on the city's code enforcement board, the Historic Architectural Review Board and the Planning and Zoning Board.
Some issues on his mind as he moves forward: Finding a resolution to the development of the Santa Maria building, which sits over the Matanzas River east of the city's downtown bayfront. Negotiations have been stalled because of conflicts between the city and the building's owners. Meanwhile, the building is deteriorating.
"It's just a case of everybody recognizing there are no winners here. There are all losers now," Valdes said.
He said he plans to outline specific ideas on the project once he gets to the Commission table.
Other focuses include traffic improvements, finding more revenue for the city's operation, revamping zoning codes and easing the impacts of homelessness and panhandling in the city.
"There are no silver bullets," he said. "It's going to take working together."


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On January 16th, 2014, the cast of PIPPIN (the infamous Broadway musical) displayed a teaser performance in the lobby of the Carlton Hotel while also sitting down with KIMA x Lomography to do a pre-performance, exclusive, photo-booth style shoot moments before the show! We were equipped with the one-of-a-kind Lomography PETZVAL Zenit Lens which has unique effects not capable of being reproduced by post-processing. It would be my first time with the legendary lens and, although not too shabby, with more practice (since Lomography has so kindly granted us the use and testing of the lens in our upcoming shoots) I'll be able to perfect the shooting techniques it outright demands (like purely manual focusing via a knob and manual metering with cartridge like aperture slip in rings….with a 5-minute lesson pre-shoot…!).
Meanwhile, the cast of PIPPIN had a great time in our pop-up booth and quickly set off to the Carlton Lobby to preview songs and performances from the show, featuring Billy Tighe, Gabrielle McClinton, and Bethany Moore. We had a blast with the sneak preview of PIPPIN's new cast and look forward to watching the Broadway show.
Special thanks to Juan Hoyos @ Lomography.


Via LinkedIn : I often get asked "what does it take to be a successful entrepreneur?".
In my opinion, successful entrepreneurship is a combination of three things: (1) Genetics, (2) Circumstance, and (3) Perseverance.
Let's go through all three.
Over the last six years, we at the Founder Institute have been social-science testing over twenty thousand prospective entrepreneurs, measuring things like "Big 5 Personality Traits", Fluid Intelligence, IQ, and more. We then watched who became successful, and correlated back the measured traits that best predicted success, in a scientific process along with highly respected social scientists.
Being in the proverbial "right place at the right time" matters a lot towards your ultimate success as an entrepreneur.
Circumstances are not all market-specific, either. You can have perfect market-timing, but your personal circumstances might not be optimal. For example, you could have the best idea and timing while you are a high school student, and start to execute on that idea to the the best of your ability – but then a veteran entrepreneur does the same business with millions in venture capital and captures the whole market right from under your feet.
I know the Founders of some of the most successful technology companies in the world, and there almost always were (and still are) times when the Founders simply refused to give up despite unbelievable problems, stress, and negative signaling.
An entrepreneur faces all of the debilitating problems of their own life, coupled with all of the personal problems of their team, as well as hostile operating environments, limited capital, stretched resources, no time, regulatory burdens, changing technology… the list is endless.
This fact is why I created the Founder Institute, to create a teamwork-oriented environment to help entrepreneurs persevere, and the Founder Lab, to show entrepreneurs the best practices for building an enduring startup in Silicon Valley.
You will notice that I have not mentioned your idea as important to success as an entrepreneur. This is intentional.
I am not saying the ideas are worthless, because they are not. And, there are definitely ways to help you determine if a startup idea is good or bad. But, the key operator in my last sentence is "help". Nobody can ever know for sure, and at best you are making an educated guess.
We see "great ideas" flop all the time, while "bad ideas" become worth billions. For example, Google was a "bad idea": it was another search engine at a time when everyone thought search engines were dead. Ebay was another "bad idea": they asked you to send used merchandise through the mail to people that you met online, and mail a $0.23 commission check to eBay (when stamps cost $0.25). These "bad ideas" have a combined market cap of $440 billion today.
In the end, genetics, circumstance, and perseverance are much more important for entrepreneurs than ideas.
Previous Say goodbye to HR?


"B.T." Dial-A-Bus Fast Fact: Senior citizens and riders with disabilities may use this door-to-door service from any Bettendorf residential location. Dial-a-Bus telephone # is (563) 386-1350. 24 hour advanced reservation is suggested for this service as same day service is based upon availability.
Both Dial-A-Bus service and Saturday fixed route service on Routes 1, 2 and 3 is provided (via contract) by River Bend Transit. These buses run hourly from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. The servicing vehicle is a RBT bus.
An aide may accompany for free. Exact change or token is required.


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Monday, September 17, 2009. Chaos and violence continue, Human Rights Watch issues a report on the targeting of Iraq's LGBT community, Barack Obama tosses out pretty words to the VFW that aren't so pretty if anyone pays attention, too bad for Barry's vacation because Peace Mom Cindy Sheehan is paying attention, the benchmarks are forgotten, a census is called off and more.
Today Celebrity in Cheif Barry O! spoke to the VFW and made comments such as this: "When communism cast its shadow across so much of the globe, you stood vigilant in a long Cold War -- from an airlift in Berlin to mountains of Korea to the jungles of Vietnam." If your mouth just dropped open at the stunning historical ignorance of that single sentence, grasp that Barry O is whomever he thinks audiences want. He never means one damn word. That's the most frightening thing about him. George W. Bush's Iraq 'plan' was 'we'll stand down as they stand up' and Barry revealed the same 'strategy'. He also noted, "But as we move forward, the Iraqi people must know that the United States will keep its commitments. And the American people must know that we will move forward with our strategy. We will begin removing our combat brigades from Iraq later this year. We will remove all our combat brigades by the end of next August. And we will remove all our troops from Iraq by the end of 2011. And for America, the Iraq War will end." Yeah, we'll see. Barry O didn't argue "Trust me!" with comments about how he's working to ensure that troops in Iraq get more: "and for all those serving in Afghanistan and Iraq, including our National Guard and Reserve, more of the protective gear and armored vehicles that save lives." Uh, excuse me, he's been president for seven months. If US troops in Iraq (or Afghanistan, but this is the Iraq snapshot) need "more of the protective gear and armored vehicles that save lives," as commander in chief, he should have ensured that they received it. Don't tell us what you're going to do. You've been president for seven months, it's time you have accomplishments to point to and if you're saying US troops are at risk because they lack "protective gear and armored vehicles," and you haven't already taken care of this? He brags about how its in his (proposed) budget and how he's not hiding the costs of the wars. On the latter, he means that he's not doing supplementals. As Bette Davis tells Joan Crawford in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?, "But you are, Blanche, you are." The night of June 16th, the US House voted on his War Supplemental (and passed it): 226 members (221 Democrats, 5 Republicans) voted for it, 202 members (32 Democrats, 170 Republicans) voted against it. June 18th the US Senate voted for it (91 voted for it, five -- Russ Feingold, Bernie Sanders, Jim DeMint, Mike Enzi and Tom Coburn -- voted against it.) Barack should remember that because June 24th he signed the $106 billion War Supplemental. So he's telling the American people in August that the US troops in Iraq do not have the equipment they need and in June he was signing a multi-billion dollar supplemental and not taking care of the troops in that?
Cindy Sheehan (Cindy's Soapbox) observed last week:
There has been no significant removal of troops from Iraq and there has been a very significant increase of troops to Af-Pak, with the unfortunate commensurate increase in casualties on all sides, yet there is very little movement in the "movement."
McCain would be doing the exact same thing that Obama is doing in Iraq-Af-Pak: the EXACT same thing. There is no difference between what Obama is doing and what McCain would be doing, except Obama has a (D) behind his name.
The profound difference to us here in the grassroots would be that if McCain were president, faux-gressives would still be up in arms about the wars and, even though our protests wouldn't change McCain's mind, at least we could retain our moral high-ground, that has been sold out to the Democrats for absolutely nothing in return.
Cindy's not sitting still. Barack vacations on Martha's Vineyard from Sunday through the 30th and Cindy will be there:
From her home in California, Ms. Sheehan released this statement:
"There are several things that we wish to accomplish with this protest on Martha's Vineyard.
First of all, no good social or economic change will come about with the continuation or escalation of the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. We simply can't afford to continue this tragically expensive foreign policy.
Secondly, we as a movement need to continue calling for an immediate end to the occupations even when there is a Democrat in the Oval Office. There is still no Noble Cause no matter how we examine the policies.
Thirdly, the body bags aren't taking a vacation and as the US led violence surges in Afghanistan and Pakistan, so are the needless deaths on every side.
And, finally, if the right-wing can force the government to drop any kind of public option or government supported health care, then we need to exert the same kind of pressure to force a speedy end to the occupations."
Cindy Sheehan will arrive on the Vineyard on Tuesday, August 25th.
Late last night Ernesto Londono (Washington Post) reported Human Rights Watch would be releasing a report today on the targeting of Iraq's LGBT community: "Although the scope of the problem remains unclear, hundreds of gay men may have been killed this year in predominantly Shiite Muslim areas, the report's authors said, basing their conclusion on interviews with gay Iraqi men, hospital officials and an unnamed United Nations official in Baghdad." The Austin-American Statesman (compiling various wire reports) noted, "The campaign has been largely blamed on Shiite extremists who target behavior deemed un-Islamic, beating and even killing women for not wearing veils and bombing liquor stores." B-b-but, the New York Times told us the Shi'ite militias are standing down! And that they're lovely! Why, they're not just lovely, they're de-lovely! Imagine the New York Times ever being wrong about Iraq -- it's one for Ripley's. This morning the BBC added, "The report says members of the Mehdi Army militia group is spearheading the campaign, but police are also accused even though homosexuality is legal. Witnesses say vigilante groups break into homes and pick people up in the street, interrogating them to extract the names of other potential victims, before murdering them." CNN notes, "Interviews with doctors indicate hundreds of men had been killed, but the exact number was unclear because of the stigma associated with homosexuality in Iraq, the New York-based watchdog group said in its report." BBC correspondent Natalia Antelava interviewed gay men in Baghdad who report that no attempts are made by security forces to stop the assaults against them.
The Human Rights Watch report is entitled "'They Want Us Exterminated': Murder, Torture, Sexual Orientation and Gender in Iraq." For the 67-page report [PDF format warning] click here. The report opens with Hamid relating how his partner was murdered:
It was late one night in early April, and they came to take my partner at his parents' home. Four armed men barged into the house, masked and wearing black. They asked for him by name; they insulted him and took him in front of his parents. All that, I heard about later from his family.
He was found in the neighborhood the day after. They had thrown his corpse in the garbage. His genitals were cut off and a piece of his throat was ripped out.
Since then, I've been unable to speak properly. I feel as if my life is pointless now. I don't have friends other than those you see; for years it has just been my boyfriend and myself in that little bubble, by ourselves. I have no family now -- I cannot go back to them. I have a death warrant on me. I feel the best thing to do is just to kill myself. In Iraq, murderers and thieves are respected more than gay people.
Their measuring rod to judge people is who they have sex with. It is not by their conscience, it is not by their conduct or their values, it is who they have sex with. The cheapest thing in Iraq is a human being, a human life. It is cheaper than an animal, than a pair of used-up batteries you buy on the street. Especially people like us.
His partner of ten years is murdered and he has to live in fear, hide his own grief and hide who he is. And this is the country the US 'liberated'. Human Rights Watch's report notes that most of the Iraqis interviewed self-label as "gay" but the murderers would "describe the victims and excuse the killings with a potpourri of words and justifications, identifying those they abominate in shifting ways -- suggesting how concerns about an Iraq where men are no longer masculine drive the death squads, as much as fears of sexual 'sin.' 'Puppies,' a vilifying slang term of apparently recent vintage, implies that the men are immature as well as inhuman. Both the media and sermons in mosques warn of a wave of effeminacy among Iraqi men, and execrate the 'third sex'.'' The report also notes that while "gay" may be a new term in Iraq, homosexuals and lesbians are not new to Iraq ("always existed in Iraqi society, as in all societies"). HRW also notes that the hatred towards "'feminized' men reveals only hatred of women."
Tariq shares with HRW:
At the end of March, I started to hear from friends that the Mahdi Army was killing gays. The newspapers also reported there was an increase in the "third sex" in Iraq, also known as "puppies" [jarawi]. Then on April 4, I found out that two of my gay friends, Mohammed and Mazen, had been killed. I think those were their names; within a gay group, gays rarely give out their real names. We were friends, we met in cafes or chatted on the Internet, and
one day they just disappeared.
A few days later, I met the brother of one of them and he told me they were killed. They were kidnapped on the street and then their bodies were found near a mosque, with signs of torture. One was 18, one was 19.
A couple of days after that, on April 6 or 7, I was in my parents' house, and someone threw a letter at the door. I didn't see who. Inside the envelope was a bullet. It had brown blood on it, and the letter said, "What are you still here for? Are you ready to die?"
I think those two were tortured into giving my name, because two days after I learned they were killed I got this threat. ... I spoke by phone to a friend of mine yesterday night: he is also gay but he's very masculine and no one knows about him. He said, "Get out if you can and save yourself. They are killing gays left and right."
I said, "Who is doing it?" He said, "Everyone knows. Who do you think? The Mahdi Army."
The report traces how militias originated from the security vacuum created by the US invasion. The Madhi 'Army' billed itself as the protector of society and "an agent of social cleansing." An unnamed journalist floats the idea that the Mahdi militia is now targeting LGBTs because "[g]etting rid of the Sunnis and the Americans is less important". Mashal was kidnapped by the Mahdi militia and he's quoted explaining:
It was about 4 p.m. and four men came inside the shop. They lingered and when I tried to get them to leave, they pulled out guns. They had three cars -- one a black Daewoo -- and they put me in one and covered my eyes.
It was the Mahdi Army -- they are the ones who operate in the area. The place they took me to wasn't far away: it was very close to a mosque or actually in the courtyard, because I could hear the call to prayer very clearly. When they hauled me out of the car they beat me until I fell unconscious.
Late the next day, they came to me and said, "We know you are gay, we know you're farakhji" [a derogatory term used in Iraq for men who have sex with men]. They pulled out a list of names and started reading them: you know these perverts, you know X and Y and Z. They gave the first name and the neighborhood where he lived. I knew four who were still alive. One they had already killed. They had killed my friend Waleed in February, before I was kidnapped. He was walking down a big street between Hayy Ur and al Shaab [in northeast Baghdad near Sadr City] at dusk. I asked Waleed's brother about it later, and he told me, "Waleed was slaughtered in the street. Don't ask more." I am sure he was killed because he was gay. He was walking with a bunch of straight friends, and he was killed, not them: he was the one they targeted.
He was the first name on the list they read me.
There were many more names I didn't know. I admitted knowing those four, but I said it was only because they were customers in my shop.
They interrogated me for three hours that night. They kept me blindfolded and gagged, and when they wanted me to speak, they took out the gag. They demanded I give them names of other gays. At night they got a broomstick, and they used it to rape me.
After that, they negotiated a ransom. They asked my family for $50,000 USD.
My brothers sold my shop, my car, everything I had to put together half that. When they let me go they said, "We have our sources, and we know exactly what you do. If you step outside your house, you are dead." I never left the house for more than a month, until I fled Baghdad. One of the people whose names they read to me ran away from Baghdad, with his parents. Two others I know are just hiding in their houses. A few don't answer their phones and I don't know what has happened to them.
This is targeting of a population and it goes on while US service members are on the ground in Iraq but the US White House, State Dept and Embassy in Baghdad do nothing -- despite requests from US House Reps Jared Polis, Tammy Baldwin and Barney Frank, among others. And the problem includes Iraqi forces (and, I say, Nouri). The report explains:
Iraqi police and security forces have done little to investigate or halt the killings. Authorities have announced no arrests or prosecutions; it is unlikely that any have occurred. While the government has made well-publicized attempts since 2006 to purge key ministries of officials with militia ties, including the Ministry of Interior, many Iraqis doubt both its sincerity and its success. Most disturbingly, Human Rights Watch heard accounts of police complicity in abuse -- ranging from harassing "effeminate" men at checkpoints, to possible abduction and extrajudicial killing.
As the targeting has taken place, the Iraqi government has refused to call it out. The report points out, "Iraq's leaders must be defenders of all its people. The Iraqi state must desist from silence, and fully and immediately investigate the murder and torture of people targeted because they do not correspond to norms of 'masculinity,' or are suspected of homosexual conduct." Following the murders, the police look the other way. The murders are not punished, the killings are not investigated: "The brutality of the killings, the proliferation of mutilated corpses discarded in the trash, not only conveys the power of the killers and dispensability of the victims, but makes the dead a savage example. Bodies castrated, broken, tortured -- becomes billboards, on which punishment is less imposed than inscribed." The report makes recommendations for many bodies but here are the recommendations for the Iraqi government:
• Investigate all reports of militia or other violence against people targeted because they do not correspond to norms of "masculinity," or are suspected of homosexual conduct, and appropriately punish those found responsible;
• Publicly and expressly condemn all such violence;
• Investigate whether ties continue between the Ministry of Interior and militias that have operated in the past as quasi-independent security forces under the Ministry's protection, including the Mahdi Army;
• Investigate all claims of abuse by police or security forces, including abuses against people because they do not correspond to norms of "masculinity," or are suspected of homosexual conduct, and appropriately punish those found responsible;
• Investigate and prosecute all Ministry of Interior officials involved in death squad killings or other unlawful acts, including torture, assault, and extortion;
• Properly vet and train all police, security forces, and criminal justice officials, ensuring that this entails training in human rights inclusive of issues of sexual orientation and gender expression and identity, and establish effective monitoring and accountability mechanisms;
• Take all appropriate measures to end torture, disappearances, summary killings, and other abuses, including abuses based on sexual orientation and gender expression and identity;
• Repeal article 128 of the Criminal Code, which identifies "The commission of an offence with honorable motives" as a "mitigating excuse";
• Examine vague articles of the Criminal Code, including paragraphs 401, 402, 501, 502, and 200(2), that could justify arbitrary arrest or harassment of people due to their sexual orientation or gender expression and identity, or could be used to prevent civil society from addressing unpopular or stigmatized issues; repeal or modify them if necessary, or otherwise ensure that they are not applied in an arbitrary or discriminatory manner contrary to international human rights law;
• Create and support an independent National Human Rights Commission;
• Support the development of domestic independent human rights non-governmentalorganizations with the capacity to monitor the full range of human rights violations, and ensure that they can operate without state harassment or interference;
• Train all criminal-justice authorities in effective responses to gender-based violence against women and men;
• Promote gender equality by embodying in legislation explicit guarantees for women's equal rights to marriage, within marriage, at the dissolution of marriage, and in inheritance.
A large number of the LGBT community is fleeing or has fled Iraq and HRW calls on foreign governments to assist with this segment of the Iraqi refugee population. They note Jordan, Turkey and Syria -- three countries that house the majority of Iraq's external refugees -- are not countries where LGBTs are likely to feel welcomed.
The LGBT community is among the many communities targeted in 'liberated' Iraq today. The press is another target. Friday they demonstrated and that day's snapshot included a link to BBC video footage of the demonstration which somehow became "nearly 100 Iraqi journalists, news media workers and their supporters" when Sam Dagher showed up with a 'report' in Saturday's New York Times. Yesterday Adam Ashton (McClatchy's Kansas City Star) did a better job -- he notes around 200, as opposed to the Times' less than 100 who protested Friday -- but where's the draft law in his article? Not in his article. He does note: "Journalists' fears have been inflamed this summer by a decision from the Iraqi Ministry of Culture and Ministry of Interior requiring publishers to get their permission before printing books and by an Aug. 7 speech at a prominent Shiite mosque where an imam and lawmaker denounced a journalist's work, triggering fears for the writer's safety." (Here's a link to Ashton's story at McClatchy.) NPR's Deborah Amos (All Things Considered) manages to address the topic (and put the boys to shame):
Deborah Amos: The demonstrators chose a place in central Baghdad that sends an unmistakable message: Al-Mutanabi Street -- a literary center for generations is lined with book shops as well as an outdoor market that does a lively trade in racy romance novels and political magazines. Here book sellers joined journalists and authors for a rousing protest. Over the past few months, the government has been quietly proceeding on laws to register websites and ban certain books. But opponents say it's a first step to limit freedom of expression.
Emad al-Khafaji: I am afraid of the return of the censorship.
Deborah Amos: Iraqi journalist, Emad al-Khafaji.
Emad al-Khafaji: It's not enough to say, "For national security, I cannot accept this book or that book." No, this thing will remind us of Saddam era.
Deborah Amos: When Saddam's era was swept away after the US-led invasion, new media outlets came rushing in. Even the poorest neighborhoods sprouted rooftop satellite dishes. For the first time, Iraqis could feast on Lebanese music videos and Turkish soap operas. They soon discovered website porn and online gambling but in this media revolution more dangerous ideas appeared promoting hatred and sectarian violence. The prime minister's proposed law would prohibit websites that deal with terrorism but also drugs, gambling, negative comments about Islam and pornography. Hanna Edward, a human rights actvist, says these vague categories are aimed at stifling Iraq's diversity.
Hanna Edward: This really hinders our democracy, diversity of expression, diversity of opinions. Without it, I fear that we are going again to some dictatorship.
Deborah Amos: Iraq's National Library and Archives has already been a target for government censors. Saad Eskander, the executive director, tells the story in his office filled with books. He's rescued old texts, hidden in basements and personal libraries, written in Hebrew from the day when Iraq had the largest Jewish community in the region. He's also rescued books written by Saddam Hussein. The new censors wanted those books gone.
Saad Eskander: They say we have no right even they are written in a way that not acceptable to us but they are an Iraqi [no idea on the word].
Deborah Amos: A part of Iraq's heritage's Eskander says, he won that fight for now.
Saad Eskander: It reflect old mentality its part of our historical memory and should be read and studied and analyzed in order to prevent the emergence of such dictatorship and brutality in our society.
Deborah Amos: Which is why he says he will stand against the prime minister's proposed censorship law.
At the end of last week, Laith Hammoudi (McClatchy Newspapers) reported on the lack of electricity in Baghdad, how graffiti can be found proclaiming "Electricity is dead. Pray for its soul" and noting, "Electricity long has been a benchmark for reconstruction success in Iraq. Even as American troops have withdrawn from Iraqi cities and there's talk of a faster U.S. pullout from the country, however, electricity remains elusive for millions of Baghdad residents." Hammoudi notes the benchmarks. No one seems to remember them. The White House proposed them. They were supposed to be the way 'success' could be measured. Congress was all for them. Nouri al-Maliki signed off on them. That was 2007. By 2008, movement on any benchmark would be hailed as 'success!' That's all you needed, movement. Wasn't movement 'achievement'? Weren't they the same thing. As the 'results' demonstrate in 2009, no. They weren't the same thing. And by 2009, they're all but forgotten even though, generally, when two parties sign off on something, what you have is a binding contract.
Staying with benchmarks, in 2005, Iraq created a Constitution and ratified it. The Constitution held that a census would be held in Kirkuk and a referendum held there to determine the will of the residents -- did they want to be part of the central government out of Baghdad or part of the Kurdistan Regional Government? The area was historically targeted by Saddam Hussein who moved Arabs in and forced Kurds out. It is a disputed territory. As 2006 came to a close, the Bush White House began talking "benchmarks" by which "success" in Iraq could be measured. They proposed a set of benchmarks to Congress and to Nouri al-Maliki which both signed off on. The benchmarks included resolving the Kirkuk issue. The referendum has never taken place. Repeatedly, Nouri manipulates bodies such as the United Nations which then whine that the Kurds need to wait -- as if this wasn't agreed to both in the Consitution and in the benchmarks. Provincial elections took place in 14 of Iraq's 18 provinces back in January and in three of the KRG's provinces in July. The missing one? Kirkuk. Nouri announced that a census would finally take place and that the entire country would vote in January elections in 2010 (kicked back from December 2009). Now BBC reports that Iraq's "has postponed indefinitely plans to hold its first nationswide census in 22 years". AFP adds that politicians (Arab and Turkmen) have declared that they will block the census and that they will work to overturn Article 140 of the Constitution. They quote Kurdish politician Sherzad Adil stating, "Article 140 is constitutional and the Iraqi government is obliged to implement it. The delay in implementing it is the fault fo the governments that followed the former regime and we hope the problems will be solved before the next (general) election." Aseel Kami and Michael Christie (Reuters) remind, "The census would have shed light on the actual ethnic composition of those areas. Many Arab and Turkmen leaders in Kirkuk opposed the survey there, and have also opposed holding a referendum on the city's fate."
And on the topic of northern Iraq, this morning Ernesto London (Washington Post) reported online that the top US commander in Iraq, Gen Ray Odierno, states US forces may be position "along disputed areas" and that Nouri's thrilled with the idea and quotes Odierno saying, "I think they all just feel more comfortable if we're there."
As Third noted yesterday, there were 122 reported deaths in Iraq last week and 414 reported wounded ("Last Sunday found the press reporting 6 deaths and 12 people injured. Monday saw 61 deaths reported and 252 injuries. Tuesday saw 11 dead and 57 wounded. Wednesday's numbers were 11 dead and 21 injured. Thursday 25 lives were claimed and 51 people were wounded. Friday there were 2 reported deaths and 6 reported injured. Saturday saw 6 dead and 15 injured.") Yesterday saw 13 reported dead and 41 reported injured. Violence continued today.
Bombings?
AFP reports a car bombing outside Taji which claimed 5 lives and left thirty-eight people injured according to "local police Lieutenant Sarmed Sami." Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Baghdad car bombing which claimed 2 lives and left eleven people (nine are police) injured. Dropping back to yesterday, Reuters notes a Kirkuk roadside bombing which injured six police officers.
Shootings?
Sahar Issa (McClatchy Newspapers) reports a Mosul checkpoint was attacked and 2 police officers were killed with a civilian wounded and 1 "off-duty" police officer was shot dead in Mosul and, dropping back to Sunday, 1 civilian was shot dead in Mosul. Reuters notes a Sunday night attack on a checkpoint in Mussayab in which 1 Sahwa was killed and three more were injured, a drive-by shooting in Mussayab Sunday night in which a Sahwa leader was shot dead and a Mosul shop break-in Sunday night in which the owner was shot dead. Note that Reuters' Sunday violence included under "Bombings" and "Shootings" today was not reported yesterday and not included as part of Sunday's count. It will be counted at this site as part of Monday's count. (And, yes, we will keep a running count because the press seems unable/unwilling to do so.)
Corpses?
Reuters notes the Iraqi government announced today they'd found 10 corpses in the last two weeks in Baghdad. Hope those weren't Sunni corpses -- it would destroy the New York Times' p.r. efforts. (As noted August 12th, "Mass graves turn up in a month is he going to retract? Hell no, they never do.")
Shane Bauer, Sarah Shourd and Josh Fattal are three American citizens who visited northern Iraq and allegedly went hiking and allegedly crossed over into Iranian territory. Saturday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton released a statement which noted, "Regarding the three American hikers, Joshua Fattal, Shane Bauer, and Sarah Shourd, who were detained by Iranian authorities on July 31, we once again call on the Iranian government to live up to its obligations under the Vienna Convention by granting consular access and releasing these three young Americans without further delay." They are being held by the Iranian government and, last week, they were moved to Tehran. Damien McElroy and Ahmad Vahdat (Telegraph of London) report that Iraqi tribal leader Farhad Lohoni is stating that eye witnesses (his family members) saw the Americans seized by Iranians who were in Iraqi territory and the Iranians were allegedly part of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Meanwhile Rahmat al-Salaam (Asharq Alawsat) reports that the governments of Iraq and Iran met "to discuss border problems and implementation of the Algiers Agreement." Kareem Abedzair (Azzaman) reports on the meeting as well and notes promises on both sides to create more "border controls."
Saturday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton released a statement on Ken Bacon, "The United States and the world lost a great humanitarian leader with the passing today of Ken Bacon, President of Refugees International. Most Americans remember Ken as the unflappable civilian voice of the Department of Defense, where he served with distinction as spokesperson for many years. But for millions of the world's most vulnerable people -- refugees and other victims of conflict -- Ken was an invaluable source of hope, inspiration and support. From Centeral Africa to South Asia to the Americas, Ken shone the spotlight on the causes of humanitarian suffering, and served as an impassioned yet reasoned advocate for the principles of humanitarian protection and assistance. We will miss Ken, but we will be inspired by the contributions he has made and the example he has set." Refugees International notes he was 64-years-old and "died . . . [Saturday] morning from an agressive melanoma that spread into his brain." They also note:
In 2006, Mr. Bacon pushed Refugees International to investigate the plight of Iraqi refugees at a time when no one was willing to acknowledge or speak out about this matter. Drawing on the findings of Refugees International's field research teams, Mr. Bacon was a leader in pushing the U.S. government and the UN to recognize the world's fastest growing refugee crisis at that time. His advocacy with senior administration officials and key members of Congress, such as Senator Edward Kennedy, was instrumental in achieving extensive press coverage and policy discussions on Iraqi displacement, the creation of a State Department task force on the problem, a sharp increase in international assistance for displaced Iraqis, and greater numbers of Iraqis are being resettled in this country.
For approximately 25 years, worked for the Wall St. Journal, first as a correspondent and then as an editor. Stephen Miller (Wall St. Journal) explains, "Mr. Bacon lived simply in Washington, riding a bicycle to work as a reporter, and walking to work as a Pentagon spokesman. He was legendarily frugal with the air conditioning in his family's townhouse in D.C.'s scorching summers. In 1994, he responded to incoming Secretary of Defense [William J.] Perry's summons to the Pentagon, where issues like U.S. involvement in Bosnia and Haiti dominated the agenda. As a former reporter, he mixed well with the Washington press corps and was retained by the subsequent defense secretary, William S. Cohen." Matt Schudel (Washington Post) adds, "Survivors include his wife of 43 years, Darcy Wheeler Bacon of Washington and Block Island; two daughters, Katharine Bacon of Brookline, Mass., and Sarah Bacon of Brooklyn, N.Y.; his father, Theodore S. Bacon of Peterborough, N.H.; a brother; and two grandchildren." The family is asking that those who wish to note the passing make a donation to Refugees International instead of sending flowers.
And finally, we'll note this from Sherwood Ross' "America's Warfare State" (Information Clearing House):
"On my last day in Iraq," veteran McClatchy News correspondent Leila Fadel wrote August 9th, "as on my first day in Iraq, I couldn't see what the United States and its allies had accomplished. ... I couldn't understand what thousands of American soldiers had died for and why hundreds of thousands of Iraqis had been killed."
Quite a few oil company CEO's and "defense" industry executives, however, do have a pretty good idea of why the war Fadel deplored is being fought. As Michael Cherkasky, president of Kroll Inc., said a year after the Iraq invasion boosted his security firm's profits 231 percent: "It's the Gold Rush." What follows is a brief look at some of the outfits that cashed in, and at the multitudes that got took.
"Defense Earnings Continue to Soar," Renae Merle wrote in The Washington Post on July 30, 2007. "Several of Washington's largest defense contractors said last week that they continue to benefit from a boom in spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan..." Merle added, "Profit reports from Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin showed particularly strong results in operations in the region." More recently, Boeing's second-quarter earnings this year rose 17 percent, Associated Press reported, in part because of what AP called "robust defense sales."
But war, it turns out, is not only unhealthy for human beings, it is not uniformly good for the economy. Many sectors suffer, including non-defense employment, as a war can destroy more jobs than it creates. While the makers of warplanes may be flying high, these are "Tough Times For Commercial Aerospace," Business Week reported July 13th. "The sector is contending with the deepening global recession, declining air traffic, capacity cuts by airlines, and reduced availability of financing for aircraft purchases."
cindy sheehan
ernesto londono
natalia antelava
deborah amos
laith hammoudi
adam ashton
aseel kami
michael christie
the telegraph of london
damien mcelroy
ahmad vahdat
rahmat al-salaam
sahar issa
rod nordland
sam dagher
sherwood ross
Posted by Common Ills at 2:39 PM
Nouri talks about his "open war"
Debating Wednesday's bombings
US military announces another death
40 reported dead in Iraq Thursday, 71 injured
I Hate The War
Smug US official feeds into Iraqi paranoia in wake...
'One of the deadliest days of the entire Iraq War'...
77 dead, 420 injured in Iraq; 1 US soldier reporte...
'Oh, Right, That Iraq Thing's Still Going On'
US forces to patrol northern Iraq?
The not-so-soft bigotry of Amy Goodman
Targeting Iraq's LGBT community and Iraq's press
The census is off, Kirkuk decisions again postponed
And the war drags on . . . .
Carole King is not dead (but that's why it's Crapa...


text:
Orthoperus cribratus är en skalbaggsart som beskrevs av Matthews 1899. Orthoperus cribratus ingår i släktet Orthoperus och familjen punktbaggar. Inga underarter finns listade i Catalogue of Life.

Källor

Punktbaggar
cribratus

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


About Organization: The Centre has its roots in the Radio Astronomy Group of TIFR, set up in the early 1960s under the leadership of Prof. Govind Swarup. The group designed and built the Ooty Radio Telescope. In the early 80's an ambitious plan for a new telescope was proposed - the Giant Meterwave Radio Telescope.
How to Apply: Candidates are encouraged to apply on-line at http://www.ncra.tifr.res.in/jobs/non-academic 2/2014. Signed application in the prescribed format can be sent in a sealed cover super-scribing the post applied for on the envelope to the Administrative Officer, NCRA-TIFR, Post Bag 3, Ganeshkhind, Pune University Campus, Pune 411007. Applications received after the last date will not be considered. For details such as advertisement, application format, experience etc., visit http://www.ncra.tifr.res.in/jobs/non-academic 2/2014.


text:
Aljmir Murati (born 18 September 1985) is a Swiss football player of Kosovar Albanian descent.

References

External links
 Profile on Football.ch

1985 births
Living people
Swiss men's footballers
Expatriate footballers in Germany
TuS Koblenz players
FC La Chaux-de-Fonds players
SC Young Fellows Juventus players
SC Cham players
FC Winterthur players
Potenza S.C. players
Kosovan emigrants to Switzerland
Swiss people of Albanian descent
Association football forwards


Plot Summary: Life isn't easy for Anne Shirley, an 11-year-old orphan with a vast imagination and a short temper. In a twist of fate, she gets taken into the Cuthbert house in Avonlea. The elderly occupants Marilla and Matthew Cuthbert were looking for a young boy to help in the fields, but they're in for quite a shock when they realize Anne is a girl. Adapted from the acclaimed classic Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery, the series portrays Anne's upbringing from 11 to 17 years of age and her encounters and separations with various people. Only time will tell what major decision Anne has to make that will change her life forever.


This is one of the few palms that has a crownshaft which is also capable of tolerating some cold. Coming, as it does from the mainland of New Zealand. Occurring mainly in the North Island, but also on the South Island as far south as Okarito (43.22�S) in the west and Banks Peninsula (43.5�S) in the east. The crown of feathery leaves grow quite upright forming a shuttlecock shape. Mature trees can tolerate -4�C / 25�F or thereabouts. Our seeds are collected near Okarito in the South Island, which is the provenance with similar levels of wet and cold to that of Cornwall in the UK, and is therefore the best provenance to grow here in the UK. The South Island palms are generally stockier and more robust than the North Island palms.
Rhopalostylis sapida Prekrivanje slike ©2019 Trebrown - Ne re-distribucije bez dopuštenja.


text:
The 10 best-value games you can buy and play for months
By Anna Washenko 2017-05-19T22:21:59.138Z Feature
A serious dedication to gaming often means a tough time for your wallet. Keeping up with the latest games, not to mention the hardware to play it on, is an expensive effort. Sometimes, you need to invest in a game that will guarantee you at least a hundred hours of entertainment to get you through the lean months. Fortunately, there are some excellent games that deliver this promise many times over. These ten titles have some of the best bang for your gaming budget's buck. Here's how we've figured it out. This list only covers games that are available on a console or mobile devices. It's also assuming that you will play the entire game. No shortcuts, no skimping. Finally, the calculations are based on a single play-through, but many of them encourage revisiting, which means the true value is even better.
1. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Formats: PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, Xbox One, Xbox 360
Release date: Original - 2011, Special Edition - 2016
Average play time: 241 hours
Average cost: Original - $19.99, Special Edition - $59.99
Cost to player: Original - $0.08 per hour. Special Edition - $0.25 per hour
Just one pass at Bethesda's sprawling open-world saga can easily eat up more than 100 hours depending on how many side quests you opt to do. That's a solid value for starters, but then you have many options for how to replay it. Will you be a Redguard stealth archer? A Nord brawler in heavy armor? A Khajiit wielding fireballs or a poison-making Argonian alchemist? The skill trees in this RPG present so many options, and each really does offer a unique flavor on the chilly world of Skyrim.
2. The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt
Formats: PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One
Average cost: $49.99
Cost to player: $0.29 per hour
The Witcher presents a different take on what a modern RPG can be. It's a world that's easy to get lost in. Roam around and talk to the locals - you never know who'll send you off on a fascinating quest line, or what desolate pocket of the country might have hints to solving the game's many mysteries. Even without the extra content of the expansions - Heart of Stone and the excellent Blood and Wine - finishing everything in The Witcher 3 will take you about 30 hours if you're going at top speed. Take your time to explore and finish every last bit, though, and you've got at least 160 hours of adventuring ahead.
Formats: PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3
The main story of Persona 5 takes about 100 hours to complete. That's without spending time to really luxuriate in the details of how this massive RPG recreates life at high school. It might seem counter-intuitive to pay money to go back to your teenage days, but it's a lot more fun to do so with these friends. Plus the powers and fighting off supernatural enemies make it way cooler. This game is wonderfully strange and, considering you could spend upwards of 200 hours in this world if you really take your time, Persona 5's value is gold.
4. Diablo 3
Replayability is the name of this game here. The character classes and scaling difficulty levels alone mean you could revisit the main story over and over without getting bored. Diablo 3's end game also adds many hours to the experience, with seasonal competitions, bounties, and rifts supplying a constant challenge even to the most skilled demon-slayers. Then there's the option to team up with your friends for the fight against evil. The wise-cracking and fun you have with those people keep the game fresh, even on your 12th crack at it.
5. Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate
Formats: Nintendo 3DS, Wii U
Value to player: $0.04 per hour
Across the entire Monster Hunter franchise, you're probably looking at thousands of available hours for role-playing, creature-slaying fun. But to make the best investment in just one title, Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate is the way to go. Any game that draws comparisons to World of Warcraft is bound to take a big chunk of your time. Kill loads and loads of monsters, gather impressive gear, and have a heroic good time.
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We are actively recruiting postdocs, technicians and students.
In his basic research, Dr. Loewen's lab is focused on bioengineering of the ocular outflow system to lower eye pressure. He spearheaded gene therapy for glaucoma with lentiviral vectors. He developed a technique to permanently genetically modify the outflow tract of the eye, the site of the primary pathology in glaucoma. His present research is focused on using these tools to reverse engineer a working outflow tract with stem cells as a novel treatment of glaucoma.
We are comparing two safer and faster glaucoma surgeries in early to advanced glaucoma.
We are measuring live how outflow changes in patients who underwent trabectome surgery.
We are using gene therapy and stem cells to improve outflow and lower eye pressure in preclinical model systems.