All Medicare providers (e.g. physicians, NPs, PAs, etc.) are eligible to earn a 1 percent incentive on their total Medicare Part B allowed charges by electronically prescribing a total of 25 times from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 2011 and having at least 10 percent of their total Medicare Part B charges made up of denominator codes.
Additionally, providers who want to avoid a 1 percent penalty in 2012 must report an e-prescribing measure through their claims at least 10 times between Jan. 1 and June 30, 2011. Furthermore, providers who successfully report the e-prescribing measure in 2011 will also be exempt from a 1.5 percent penalty in 2013. CMS requires that this submission be performed through claims; providers are not allowed to use a registry or electronic health record (EHR) to avoid the penalty in 2012.
If you plan to participate in the EHR incentive program in 2011, you will not be eligible to collect the 1 percent e-prescribing bonus. CMS does not allow physicians to collect both bonuses. However, since NPs and PAs are not eligible for the Medicare EHR incentive program, they can continue collecting the e-prescribing bonus.
Clearly practicing medicine will continue to be more complex over time. If your wondering if there are better practice opportunities that fit your unique needs in these complex times reply [email protected]hcare.org.
To relieve the complexity, many physicians are eliminating Cecil, Harrison, and our other Hippocrates Modern Colleague, and just subscribing to the Medicare Newsletters which will guide and direct you to do the best practices for remuneration and not be influence by using the Best Practices Cecil, Harrison and their Kin.
A frequent occurrence in front line medicine as practice by family physicians, internists and emergency room physicians is the patient's demands for laboratory proof of almost any diagnosis, whether it's peptic disease or a fractured rib. Or even a sprained ankle. Articles have been written on the examination of the ankle, taking into account the type of injury and whether an x-ray will prove helpful. ER physicians who are experts in this diagnosis are not allowed to make clinical diagnosis by the patients who demand an x-ray. It the physician spends time explaining the reason for no further tests, the patient will listen politely and still demand an x-ray. A physician can spend the equivalent of two appointment times ($250) explaining why further testing is not necessary, the patient will always win having the unnecessary expense expended by either returning to the ER when the next doctor arrives and state his ankle is still painful. Frequently he may not have even taken the prescribed analgesics. That's why as an intern, I always carried a bottle of extra-strength Tylenol and would give out two pills with a cup of water in the triage room and continue my triage rounds. Sometimes before I returned to the same place in the triage ward, perhaps 45 to 60 minutes later in the busy county hospital, the ankle pain would be resolved. When asked, what were the two marvelous pills you gave my wife, I would only state they were extra strength PAIN pills. I found out rapidly in my internship, if I stated they were Tylenol, they would be back very soon with the same pain. By not mentioning Tylenol the pain would generally be resolved--sometimes permanently.
OBAMACARE = ROMNEYCARE: Your signature government-run health care experiment in Massachusetts was a dismal failure. Nonetheless, in May 2009, you cited it as one of your "best ideas," praised it in July 2009, and in May 2009 said that "the best path to healthcare reform is to let the American people make their own decisions, not have those decisions forced on them by government."
The recently enancted health care law was not reviewed by the congressmen who passed it nor by the citizens at large.
A report in the news stated that congress is fairly unknowlegeable about Medical Care. They depend on their staff assistants to modify and implement the law which they aggree is unworkable to make it work.
Since this is a major change in our personal health care, including it's confidentiality, this seems like a poor way of improving our health care in this country.
When the uninformed and medically illiterate attempt to improved health care, it will always be catastrophic.
The only solution is to vote all present incumbents out of office.
Elect a major constitutional and conservative majority to impeach the president and reverse all billls that he signed and resume health care reform.
Health care reform must include eliminating the socialistic HMO bureaucracy which the public misinterprets as free enterprise.
In free enterprise doctors would have the opportunity to compete with the doctor down the street both in fee and quality.
Under the HMO socialistic setup, the worst doctors get the same payment as the best, the very antithesis of a free market situation.
Under free enterprise, the best and most efficient doctors would compete not only on price, but also on quality of care.
It's ime to throw out all government programs such as managed care and allow competition to reduce health care costs. Competition or the free market is the most ruthless way to decrease the cost of health care. Everyone benefits--except maybe the HMOs.
The only way to do this is vote all incumbents out of officie in November.
Was Natasha Richardson's death preventable?
Natasha Richardson, 45, daughter of Vanessa Redgrave, died on Wednesday, March 18, 2009, at Lennox Hospital in New York after a ski accident on Tuesday, March 16, 80 miles from Montreal taking a skiing lesson on a bunny slope. She initially turned down medical treatment but an hour later complained of a severe headache and was taken by ambulance to a hospital.
Although she was only an hour ambulance ride away from Montreal, the worlds second largest French city, two days later she was taken to New York Lennox Hospital with emergency life saving surgery not having been done.
An autopsy of the actress Natasha Richardson on Thursday indicated that she died of a brain hemorrhage caused by "blunt impact" to her head, the chief medical examiner for New York City said. The official cause of death was an epidural hematoma.
Universal availability of care saves more lives than universal access. American has universally available care. Canada has universal access to a waiting list. Care may never be rendered. In this case it was tragic.
"Grandfathered" Board Certification? Fair or Unfair? Legal or Illegal?
Is it fair that the older board certified physicians do NOT have to undergo MOC (maintenance of cerfitication) or re-certificaton because they have been 'grandfathered' in?
Is it legal to do this? Is it ethical to do this?
The intent of MOC and re-certification is to maintain or increase the quality of healthcare, but if you exempt a large number or percentage of physicians from the process, are you really doing the public any good?
I feel that if a specialty organization requires its members to participate in the MOC or to re-certify, then all of its members should have to participate in the process. Elitism has no place in modern medicine and older physicians should undergo the same oversight and evaluation as younger physicians.
The certificate that was at one time a mark of special distinction is now required to make a living. The ABMS has actively fostered this trend, and as a result is now in the position to charge whatever they want for something you have to have. One of the wisest senior clinicians I ever knew told me (in a different context) "Beware of those who create the need for themselves". The unfortunate recertifiers have a lifetime of ever-increasing fees to look forward to, the proceeds of which will be used to create more and more hoops that they have to jump through. I refuse to apologize for not having to participate in this rat race. I would urge those that are required to recertify to consider banding together and boycotting the whole process. It needs to be torn down and reconstructed.
Okay. I'm an old guy; I don't have to take the recertification exams.
But what's wrong with you youngsters?
First, no one has ever proven that recertification does, indeed, improve the quality of health care. It's a speculation. Possibly a valid one. But not proven.
Second, why is it that you youngsters put up with it?
Certification and recertification has created a multi-million dollar industry whose major goal isn't improvement of health care: the goal is to continue the growth and profitability of this multi-million dollar industry!
Do they have to justify the enormous costs of the examinations? No.
Do they have to justify the physicians' travel costs, lodging and meals? No.
Do they have to justify the length of time these recertification exams take away from patient care? No.
While the medical boards cannot quantify just how much recertification exams improve health care, they can quantify how they arrive at the costs of the examinations. Will they do that? Of course not.
In my estimation, a recertification examination should cost no more than $50 or $100.
That medical boards should be able to design effective examinations that a doctor can take at leisure in his home in front of his computer screen. As each question is answered, the system should easily be able to tell the doctor if the chosen answer is right or wrong, and it should be able to supply educational facts and reasons for the correct answer, along with educational facts and reasons about any selected wrong answer.
For no cost beyond that initial $50 to $100, the doctor should be able to re-take the examination again and again until he passes.
But, again, the agenda of the medical boards is not education and improvement of health care. The agenda is to maximize the income the boards receive from those examinations.
So why do you youngsters so blithely plunk down your money and proceed down the recertification path?
One malpractice study indicated that board certification has a high loss ratio than fully trained non-certifide physicians.
There was no such item as uninsured. Everyone was covered by his or her hospital insurance, by his personal check, or by the county welfare departments. Hospital insurance could be equated with high deductible insurance since the physicians' fees could be considered the deduction, although always affordable. For those that couldn't afford these fees, all the physicians I knew would provide them with free care. Physicians expected to give ten percent of their time to charity, either in their own offices or at the county hospital.
Social Security would have remained viable if the age of retirement would have been the index for life expectancy. Then over the past 80 years, the retirement age would have increased to 75 and Social Security would have remained viable. There was no way that with retirement years now twenty years longer than in the 1930s, the worker could pay an extra twenty years for everybody to live off of everybody else. There is no Social Security depository - benefits are paid out of the Social Security taxes.
It is estimated that 90 % of people with vision loss generally obtain glasses to correct their loss. It is estimated that only 25 % of people with hearing loss obtain hearing aids. Hearing aids are very good at amplifying the sound and bring the volume back to normal. However, all hearing loss is not conductive. Much of it is perceptive--unable to distinguish between many words.
The audiogram easily measures the hearing loss with a curve which we all are familiar with. However, it's the perception or discimination score that is far more important. This is the part of an audiogram when the audiologist turns up the back ground noise and repeats the works for you to say back to her. One frequently finds discrimination scores that are in the 80s and 90s which means that you are able to correctly identify 80-90% of the words stated. If it is 80%, you hear 8 words out of ten. Thus people with hearing impairment of the perceptive type with an 80 % score can discriminate 8 words out of ten. That is why people with hearing impairment don't hear the first word or two and always work backwards to determine the first word of a sentence. It is important for people talking to a person with hearing aids, to always speak in sentences. To say "yes" or "no" is seldom understood. So always say, "Yes, you can." or "No you can't" for proper understanding by the person with loss of hearing.
However, if your discrimination score, when the audiologist plays street noise or restaurant or kitchen noise and goes through the same work recognition test and your score drops to 40%, that means you hear four words out of ten and you no long can put a sentence together. That's why people with hearing aids watch your lips very carefully since lip reading helps understanding. Never talk to a person wearing hearing aids from his back or side. Wait until you have his attention and speak to him directly from the front.
People with hearing problems of the peception type with poor discrimination scores, have huge problems when dining. WIth back ground noise, they have great difficulty communicating across the table.
We are in the process of rating restaurants to facilitate those with hearing loss dine. We would like your help when you dine to rate the restaurant whether they are sensitive to people with hearing loss. When you make a reservation and ask for a quiet table was it quiet? Were they sensitive to your predicament and tried to accommodate?
Please respond to this blog with your rating of the restaurants. Although we are in the Sacramento area, we are interested in restaurants throughout California and adjacent states being rated for travelers. Our long term goal is to rate restaurants throughout the country for all travelers.
Do the CMA and CNA still represent Doctors and Nurses?
Doctor's organizations as well as the nurses' organizations are for government medicine. Both have supported single payer issues in past elections. Are both organizations working against their own members' welfare? Do these professional organizations give a bad image to the public in regards to their members? Don't the sick and dying assume that doctors and nurses think like their leadership? Do both professional groups need to find another professional organization to represent them? What organizations? Should the local medical societies affiliate wtih the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons represents doctors in private practice?
Tell Congress: Keep Your Medicare Money!
We don't want your pay raise, says a leading physician group, responding to the American Medical Association's effort to stop payment cuts scheduled to go into effect beginning in January 2006, and replace them with a pay raise.
"But here's what you need to know: the reason they do so is NOT because of money. When asked, it's the government 'hassle factor.' The two leading reasons given were 'billing and regulatory requirements, and hassles and/or threats from Medicare carriers/government.' Payment rates were down the list." To read more, please go to www.medicaltuesday.net/medicare.asp.
On Was Natasha Richardson's death preventable?


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Ruling Democrats in Indonesia endorse Prabowo
June 30, 2014 Kevin Lees	Leave a comment
In a stunning surprise that highlights the shifting momentum in Indonesia's presidential election, the ruling party of outgoing president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono ('SBY') has endorsed the presidential campaign of former general Prabowo Subianto.
Though many members of the Partai Demokrat (PD, Democratic Party) were already sympathetic to Prabowo's campaign, its leaders indicated that the party would take a wait-and-see approach to the election earlier in the spring, when polls showed that Jakarta governor Joko Widodo ('Jokowi') would win the presidency by a wide margin.
Over the past month, the race has tightened as Prabowo (pictured above, left, with SBY, right) has waged a spirited campaign, high on economic nationalism and populism, and relentless in his attacks on Jokowi's relative inexperience.
RELATED: Will Prabowo Subianto become Indonesia's next president?
The PD's embrace is not so incredibly important from an organizational standpoint because the Democrats, founded by SBY in 2004, are still a relatively new force in Indonesian politics, and there's no guarantee the party will even survive SBY's retirement. Accordingly, the Democrats lacks the local grassroots structure of Jokowki's Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P, Partai Demokrasi Indonesia Perjuangan), which dates to the socialist government of Sukarno in the 1950s and Golkar (Partai Golongan Karya, Party of the Functional Groups), which dates to Suharto's 'New Order' regime that spanned from 1967 to 1998. Continue reading Ruling Democrats in Indonesia endorse Prabowo →
democratic partygolkarhattahatta rajasaindonesiajakartajoko widodojokowijusuf kallakallanational mandate partyPANPDI-Pprabowoprabowo subiantoSBYsuhartoyudhoyono
Photo of the day: Manmohan Singh in defeat
From Scroll.in comes this piercing photo of former Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh in January, four months before the landslide election that delivered to Singh's ruling Indian National Congress (Congress, भारतीय राष्ट्रीय कांग्रेस) its worst defeat in Indian history.
Raghu Rai, a photographer and journalist, captured images of both Singh and India's current prime minister Narendra Modi for his new book, The Tale of Two: An Outgoing and An Incoming Prime Minister.
The photos of both candidates are compelling, but the shots of Singh are particularly so, coming after a decade as prime minister that most Indians (and non-Indians) consider disappointing.
An economist by training, Singh made his international reputation as the finance minister in the government of P. V. Narasimha Rao between 1991 and 1996, spearheading the most thoroughgoing set of economic liberalization reforms in India's post-independence history.
When Sonia Gandhi, the Italian-born widow of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi and daughter-in-law of former prime minister Indira Gandhi, demurred from taking the premiership after Congress won a surprise victory in the 2004 parliamentary elections, she turned to Singh instead, boosting hopes that India might enact further reforms, especially with respect to liberalizing foreign development. It also gave India its first leader from the Sikh community.
But those economic reforms never happened, which voters didn't seem to mind in Congress's first term. After all, the economy was still growing at breakneck speed and Indian voters hadn't become acquainted with the dozens of scandals (e.g., Coalgate, the 2g spectrum scandal) that would come to define Congress's second term, which Singh and Gandhi won easily enough in 2009 under the steam of India's stellar growth.
Continue reading Photo of the day: Manmohan Singh in defeat →
2g spectrum scandalbharatiya janata partyBJPcoalgateCongressINCindiaindian national congressraosinghsonia gandhi
Will Prabowo Subianto become Indonesia's next president?
Joko Widodo has the opposite problem of US president Barack Obama, whose more unhinged opponents claim that Obama, who spent four years of his childhood in Indonesia, is secretly a Muslim.
In Indonesia's presidential race, it's the young Jakarta governor who has to assure voters he's a Muslim and not, as the dirty-trick accusations suggest, a secret Christian.
With the campaign to elect Indonesia's next president in full gear, everyone assumed that the political phenomenon that is Widodo (know universally in Indonesia as 'Jokowi') would easily win on July 9.
Though the race was invariably set to tighten, it's now a toss-up — and Prabowo Subianto (pictured above), a Suharto-era 'military strongman,' may yet manage to steal an election that's long been considered Jokowi's to lose.
RELATED: In Indonesia, it's Jokowi-Kalla against Prabowo-Hatta
Jokowi's meteoric rise began with his surprise election as Jakarta's governor in September 2012. Since then, he's accomplished an astonishing amount of policy reforms, including the implementation of a universal health care program for Jakarta.
Going into the April parliamentary elections, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P, Partai Demokrasi Indonesia Perjuangan) named Jokowi as its presidential candidate, ending months of speculation with an announcement designed to maximize excitement over Jokowi's presumed candidacy — and also foreclosing the possibility that former president Megawati Sukarnoputri would make a third consecutive run.
Though the PDI-P won the April elections, it didn't do nearly as well as polls indicated, garnering just 18.95% of the vote, narrowly leading Golkar (Partai Golongan Karya, Party of the Functional Groups), the vaguely liberal party founded by Indonesia's late 20th century strongman, Suharto. Golkar continues play a strong role in Indonesian politics today, most recently as the junior partner in the government led by Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono ('SBY') since 2004.
RELATED: 'Jokowi' effect falls flat for PDI-P in Indonesia election results
Yudhoyono is term-limited after winning the 2004 and 2009 presidential elections in landslide victories, though he'll leave office with somewhat mixed ratings. His own party, the Partai Demokrat (Democratic Party) won just 10.2% in the April legislative elections, falling to fourth place overall.
Golkar, in turn, only narrowly outpaced Prabowo's party, the nationalist Gerindra (Partai Gerakan Indonesia Raya, the Great Indonesia Movement Party), which he formed in 2008 when he left Golkar, hoping to use a new party vehicle to power his own 2009 presidential run.
For much of 2013, earlier this year, and even after the parliamentary elections, Jokowi led every poll survey in advance of the July 9 election. But Prabowo, age 62, has hammered against Jokowi, age 53, for his relative inexperience, chipping away at what's perhaps Jokowi's chief strength — his novelty, reformist instincts, and the lack of any trace of corruption.
Prabowo is neither novel nor reformist nor corruption-free.
He's a battle-toughened veteran of Indonesian politics, who has shifted from one alliance to another over the past decade.
Some critics argue that he's essentially 'Suharto 2.0' — or worse.
Most publicly available polls from May and early June still show Jokowi with a lead, sometimes even with a double-digit lead. But there's a sense that, as the parties engaged in post-April elections over alliances and running mates, and as Prabowo and Jokowi have engaged on the campaign trail and in three of five scheduled presidential debates, the race is tightening — and the momentum is with Prabowo. Dirty tricks, including rumors that Jokowi is Christian and that Jokowi is Chinese, have marked the campaign in its final weeks.
it's hard to know exactly where the candidates stand because polling is still unreliable in Indonesia and, moreover, there's been a lack of recent polls from more reliable pollsters. But a poll taken between June 1 and 10 by the DC-based International Foundation for Electoral Systems and the Indonesian Survey Institute found 42% of Indonesian voters support Jokowi and 39% support Prabowo, with 19% undecided. Other pollsters are rumored to have withheld polling that shows Jokowi's lead sharply narrowing or, in some cases, a Prabowo lead.
In opposition since leaving Golkar six years ago, Prabowo has powered Gerindra into a force in Indonesia with a platform of populist rhetoric high on economic nationalism in a country with particular anxiety about global markets since the 1997-98 Asian currency crisis that caused a 13% contraction in the Indonesian economy in 1998, precipitating Suharto's downfall after three decades in power.
So who is Prabowo? And how would he govern Indonesia differently than Jokowi? Continue reading Will Prabowo Subianto become Indonesia's next president? →
basukidemocratic partydemokrateast timorgerindragolkarhanurahattahatta rajasaindonesiajakartajoko widodojokowijusuf kallakallamegawatimegawati sukarnoputrimodinahdlatul ulamanational awakening partynational mandate partyPANpancasilaPDI-PPKBprabowoprabowo subiantoSBYsuhartosukarnowidodowirantoyudhoyono
European Council proposes Juncker as Commission president
Bowing to pressure from European parliamentary leaders, the European Council has proposed as its candidate for the presidency of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker, the former prime minister of Luxembourg and former head of the Eurogroup, the informal gathering of the eurozone finance ministers.
That makes it virtually certain that the European Parliament will elect Juncker (pictured above) as the next Commission president, likely with the full support of the two major pan-European parties in the Parliament, Juncker's own center-right European People's Party (EPP) and the center-left, social democratic Party of European Socialists (PES). It also likely means that the PES candidate for the Commission presidency, Martin Schulz, will become the Commission vice president.
It's obviously a defeat for British prime minister David Cameron who, just last week, was still holding out hope that he could pull together a blocking minority to keep Juncker from receiving the Council's endorsement. But by the time the Council gathered to vote, only Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán joined Cameron in opposing Juncker. Not only did Cameron fail to win over allies, he failed to keep both Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte and Swedish prime minister Frederik Reinfeldt, neither of whom are enthusiastic about the prospects of a Juncker candidacy.
Contacted by a reporter for the Moscow-based RIA Novosti earlier today, I had a chance to put together some quick thoughts on what the Juncker decision means. Here are my real-time responses, which will double as my real-time analysis on where things go from here.
On how the choice reflects the European parliamentary elections on May 25:
The choice reflects the fact that Juncker was the candidate of the European People's Party, the pan-European group of center-right, Christian democratic parties, and the EPP won the greatest number of seats in the European parliamentary elections on May 25. The EPP nominated Juncker as its candidate for the European Commission presidency prior to the May 25 parliamentary elections, just as several other European parliamentary parties nominated their own candidates. The candidates — the German term 'Spitzenkandidaten' developed widespread use across Europe — campaigned throughout the spring, and they participated in a set of debates on the EU's future.
Under the Lisbon treaty, the European Council is supposed to 'propose' a candidate for Commission president, which will be 'elected' by the European Parliament, with the Council 'taking into account' the results of the parliamentary election. No one knows exactly what that means, but Juncker and the other parliamentary leaders believe firmly that the Council must propose Juncker as its candidate. In so doing today, the Council has set an important precedent for future parliamentary elections, though national leaders will be loathe to admit it.
Proponents of the Spitzenkandidaten system argue that Juncker represents the will of the European electorate, because he's the candidate of the party that won the most votes, but it's not so simple as that. There's no real indication that the majority of European voters were voting on the basis of this or that Commission presidential candidate. Voter turnout has dropped significantly since the first European elections in 1979, and voters often cast their ballots on the basis of national governments or other factors. To the extent there was a unifying theme to the elections, it was the rise of euroscepticism on both the far right and the far left, with the victories of groups like the United Kingdom Independence Party, France's Front national (National Front) and Denmark's Dansk Folkeparti (People's Party). Whatever 'mandate' you take away from the European elections, it's hard to argue there's a groundswell of genuine democratic support for Juncker. It was only last October that Juncker's own center-right Christian Social People's Party suffered so many losses in Luxembourg's national elections that he was forced out as prime minister after 18 years.
Continue reading European Council proposes Juncker as Commission president →
ashtonCameronconservativeeuropean commissioneuropean parliamentEuropean Unioneuropen councileuroscepticismHollandejunckermerkelorbanreinfeldtrenzirutteschulzspitzenkandidatenvan rompuy
Hong Kong: One country, one-and-a-half systems?
June 25, 2014 Kevin Lees	7 Comments
Normally, an unofficially referendum conducted online isn't worth paying much attention — just ask the residents of Venice who organized a deeply flawed, overwrought poll on Venetian independence that attracted just 135,000 participants after initially claiming 2.4 million.
But it's worth noting the ongoing online referendum that the Hong Kong-based 'Occupy Central with Love and Peace' has organized, because it's one element of a larger struggle between democracy activists and Beijing that could have major repercussions — not only for Hong Kong, but for the future political development of Macau, the Chinese mainland and, possibly, Taiwan.
Occupy Central's chief goal is to open the nominating process for the 2017 election of Hong Kong's chief executive. Hong Kong's Basic Law, promulgated prior to the 1997 handover to govern the Hong Kong special administrative region, provides for the eventual democratic election of a chief executive. It's a development that dates back over two decades to the negotiations between the British and Chinese governments over the 1997 handover. Ten years ago, Chinese officials finally relented and committed to some form of universal suffrage for the 2017 race.
Trouble began brewing earlier this month, however, when Beijing released a provocative 'white paper' on Hong Kong that took an aggressive posture with respect to Hong Kong's future:
Published by the State Council Information Office, the unprecedented white paper states that "many wrong views are currently rife in Hong Kong" with regard to the "one country, two systems" principle that governs the territory's relationship with Beijing. Some residents are "confused or lopsided in their understanding" of the principle, it adds.
"The high degree of autonomy of the HKSAR (Hong Kong Special Administrative Region) is not full autonomy, nor a decentralized power," said the paper. "It is the power to run local affairs as authorized by the central leadership."
Local media have gone so far as to describe the white paper as an outright repudiation of the 'one country, two systems' principle that has guided China-Hong Kong relations since Deng Xiaoping (邓小平) coined the concept in the 1980s during the initial handover negotiations. Continue reading Hong Kong: One country, one-and-a-half systems? →
basic lawbeijingCCPchief executivechinachinese communist partyCY leungdemocracyhong kongleungleung chun-yingmacauoccupy centralone countryPRCshanghaitaiwantangtsangtwo systemswhite paper
EU rewards Rama, Albania with candidate status
Maybe the decision to hire former British prime minister Tony Blair as an advisor to Albania's new government was an astute move after all.
The European Council will formally name Albania as a candidate for eventual EU membership at its summit this weekend, following a decision by British prime minister David Cameron to allow Albania's candidacy to move forward on its fourth attempt to win candidate status since 2009. As the EU membership negotiations unfold for Albania, as well as for other Balkan countries such as Serbia and Montenegro, Cameron is expected to seek carve-outs that make it more difficult for laborers from new EU member-states to enjoy free movement throughout the EU single market.
The move follows a largely successful parliamentary election in June 2013 and aggressive steps by Albania's new, energetic prime minister Edi Rama (pictured above, left, with Blair, right) to stamp out corruption and organized crime. Albanian police moved last week, for example, to subdue Lazarat, a village in southern Albania that's known as a chief source of marijuana throughout Europe, with an estimated annual production of €4.5 billion. Continue reading EU rewards Rama, Albania with candidate status →
albaniaalliance for a european albaniabalkansberishaCamerondemocratic partyedi ramaeu accessionlazaratorganized crimePDPSramasocialist partystefan fuletony blair
Ready or not, Libyan voters will elect a new parliament
Amid growing political turmoil, during which the interim General National Congress (GNC) has lost even the pretense of control, Libyans will vote for a new 'permanent' parliament in elections tomorrow as the country slides into ever greater insecurity.
Since the ousting of Muammar Gaddafi in August 2011, repeated attempts to introduce a measure of effective governance have failed, first by the National Transitional Council, and now by the GNC.
On the eve of Libya's elections, international observers say the voting was organized much too hastily and without adequate preparation. The risk is that, following the July 2012 elections for the GNC and the February 2014 constituent assembly elections to appoint a body to write Libya's new constitution, a third set of botched elections could further undermine democracy. That's especially true if voters in the eastern Libya of Cyrenaica don't particularly bother to turn out. Just 1.5 million voters have registered to participate in the elections, down from the 2.865 million voters that registered for the 2012 vote. If those numbers hold up, turnout tomorrow will be much lower than the 1.76 million that participated in July 2012.
RELATED: Libya hits new security low as interim prime minister resigns
Rather than wait for a new constitution to come into effect, the GNC hastily renamed itself the 'House of Representatives,' and late last month announced elections for June 25 to elect 200 members to the newly formed parliament. The GNC acted under considerable pressure from militia forces loyal to former Libyan general Khalifa Hifter (pictured above), who is waging an increasingly effective campaign, chiefly in Benghazi, to eliminate Islamists and Islamist-sympathetic militias throughout the country.
Since the collapse of former prime minister Ali Zeidan's government in March, Libyan governance has essentially crumbled. Zeidan, a liberal human rights attorney who lived in Geneva before returning to Libya after the 2011 civil war, was first elected prime minister in November 2012 after a contentious vote within a body that, from the outset, was severely divided between liberals and Islamists. Though elected with the support of liberals, Zeidan only narrowly defeated Mohammed Al-Harari, the candidate of the Islamist Justice and Construction Party (حزب العدالة والبناء), the political wing of Libya's Muslim Brotherhood.
Over the course of his premiership, Zeidan presiding over an increasingly fractious interim government that gradually lost control of much of the country outside Tripoli. In fairness to Zeidan, it's not clear if any government could have effectively asserted control over Libya over the past two years. As security increasingly faltered, Zeidan himself was kidnapped from a Tripoli hotel in October 2013 and held for hours in an aborted coup attempt.
The final straw for Zeidan came earlier this year when, after growing tensions with conservative militias in Benghazi, eastern rebels commandeered an oil tanker, the Morning Glory, and sailed it halfway across the Mediterranean Sea before US Navy SEALS apprehended it. Though Zeidan initially fled Libya, he returned earlier this week, claiming that he is still legally Libya's prime minister.
His successor, former defense minister Abdullah al-Thinni, tried to step down nearly a week later as interim prime minister after an attempt on his life. The GNC's replacement candidate, Ahmed Maiteeq, a Misrata native and businessman, was disputed, and Libya essentially had two competing potential prime ministers until the Libyan supreme court ruled on June 9 that Maiteeq's election was invalid, thereby restoring the reluctant al-Thinni as interim prime minister.
Hifter's rise has coincided with the political and security tumult. With significant support in western Libya, militia forces loyal to Hifter effective shut down the GNC earlier this spring, accelerating the decision to hold what amounts to snap elections for the new parliament. Today, Hifter's leading the most notable anti-militia effort in Benghazi, after declaring himself the leader of 'Operation Dignity' in mid-May. Though Hifter's offensive isn't sanctioned by the GNC (nor by al-Thnni nor Zeidan nor Maiteeq), his efforts haven't necessarily been unwelcome by some members of the Libyan government, notably within the interior ministry, which has struggled to implement law and order on a nationwide basis.
Critics worry, however, that Hifter has aims to become a new Gaddafi-like dictator. Hifter has expressed high regard for Egypt's newly elected president, former army chief Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, especially regarding el-Sisi's crackdown on the Muslim Brotherhood within Egypt. Critics worry that Hifter is launching a military offensive to win the same kind of quasi-authoritarian power that El-Sisi now enjoys in Egypt.
Intriguingly, Hifter is actually a US citizen. Once a Gaddafi partisan, Hifter led a disastrous military campaign in the 1980s in Chad. After his defeat and his subsequent capture by Chadian forces, Hifter joined forces with the anti-Gaddafi opposition and fled to exile, living in northern Virginia between 1990 and 2011, when he returned to Libya to help lead the anti-Gaddafi rebel forces. He was initially mistrusted by other leading rebel generals, however, and he's the subject of significant speculation that he once worked with US military or other clandestine government officials.
That means, as national voting takes place, Hifter's forces are engaged in a dangerous showdown in Libya's second-largest city against Ansar al-Sharia (كتيبة أنصار الشريعة), an Islamist militia that wants to adopt harsh shari'a law across Cyrenaica, the oil-rich region that's home to Benghazi, if not the entire country.
But it's not the only place where violence is marring the election campaign. In Sabha, the historical capital of the southern Fezzan region, largely desert and sparsely populated, a parliamentary candidate was killed by gunmen on Tuesday.
Ibrahim al-Jathran, another militia leader, who also fought to topple Gaddafi in the 2011 civil war, last summer took control of four eastern ports, thereby shutting down much of the Zeidan government's ability to export oil. In a deal with Libya's interim government soon after Zeidan's ouster, Jathran permitted two of the ports to reopen, but oil production is still just around 12.5% of Gaddafi-era levels, gas stations in Tripoli are closed, and Libya remains subject to recurring power outages.
Despite some temporary progress, Jathran still advocates a much more autonomous Cyrenaica, if not outright independence. Though Cyrenaica is home to 1.6 million people (the bulk of Libya's 5.7 million people live in Tripolitania, along Libya's northwestern coast), much of Libya's oil wealth is located in the eastern region.
As if that weren't enough, US special forces last week arrested Ahmed Abu Khattala, a Benghazi-based militia leader believed to be responsible for the September 2012 attack on the US consulate in Benghazi. Though Khattala's arrest was widely hailed in the United States, Libyans have largely decried what they call the US's violation of Libya's national sovereignty.
All of these issues — the standoff between Hifter and Ansar al-Sharia, Khattala's arrest, the blockage of the country's dwindling oil exports — threaten to dwarf this week's election. The February elections to appoint the constitutional constituency assembly attracted just 500,000 voters. If the June 25 parliamentary elections feature similarly low turnout, it will be hard to argue that any party or group will have won much of a mandate for anything.
That's especially true if Islamists, which have typically been the most organized forces in elections held across North Africa since the Arab Spring revolts of early 2011, win the largest share of seats in tomorrow's vote. That could empower Islamist militias in Cyrenaica and beyond, setting the scene for a long war of attrition between Hifter's supporters and Islamist militias.
Even before Zaidan took power, Libya has struggled in the post-Gaddafi era to form a coherent government, in no small part due to the failure of the Gaddafi regime to establish truly national institutions in Libya, where he came to power in a 1969 military coup, just 18 years after the country won full independence from British and French oversight. Under both Ottoman rule, beginning in 1510, and Italian rule, between 1912 and 1947, Tripolitania and Cyrenaica were governed as discrete provinces, with modern 'Libya' taking shape chiefly as a political construct in 1951. Up until independence, when the British relinquished full sovereignty over Tripolitania and Cyrenaica, the French were administering Fezzan separately.
Mahmoud Jibril, a secular liberal, served as Libya's first interim leader, between March 2011 and October 2011 when he chaired the executive board of the National Transitional Council. He stepped down just three days after Gaddafi was captured and killed by a mob in Gaddafi's own hometown of Sirte. Jibril leads the National Forces Alliance (تحالف القوى الوطنية), a very mildly Islamist, liberal group that won the largest group of seats in the GNC in the July 2012 elections. At the time, however, Jibril's influence was at its peak, and no one expects his group to repeat the successes of the 2012 election.
Abdurrahim El-Keib was elected by the National Transitional Council in November 2011, and he guided Libya through the September 2012 election of the interim GNC.
Photo credit to Reuters / Esam Omran Al-Fetori.
al-thinniansar al-shariabenghazicyrenaicaegyptel-keibel-sisifezzangaddafigeneral national congressGNChifterjathranjibriljustice and construction partykhattalalibyamaiteeqmilitiamuslim brotherhoodoperation dignitytripolitripolitaniazeidan
Abdelaziz wins reelection as Mauritania's president
Mauritania's president Mohamed Ould Abdelaziz won a fresh term in elections on Saturday with 81.89% of the vote.
The outcome wasn't particularly in doubt in the Sahelian country of 3.8 million.
Abdelaziz came to power in August 2008 in a coup against Mauritania's elected president Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi, who had been elected in a rare competitive election in 2007.
From within the military, Abdelaziz also played a key role in the coup that pushed Maaouya Ould Sid'Ahmed Taya out of power. Ould Taya had served as Mauritania's prime minister or president consecutively from 1981 until his ouster in August 2005, which was supposed to pave the way for greater democratic participation and genuine multi-party democracy, leading to the 2007 elections.
But Mauritania's experiment in democracy came to halt with the 2008 coup, a return to form in a country that has now seen six leaders ousted in coups since Mauritania won independence from France in 1960.
RELATED: Mauritania warily eyes internationalized
conflict in neighboring Mali
A former general, Abdelaziz previously served as Abdallahi's chief of staff at the time of the coup. Abdelaziz reaffirmed his power in a 2009 presidential election.
Perhaps Abdelaziz's most important accomplishment has been his aggressive stand against radical Islam and Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), which so effectively destabilized neighboring Mali in 2012 and early 2013. Despite a long, porous border with Mali, Abdelaziz preemptively attacked AQIM and associated forces, sometimes sending Mauritanian forces into Mali to rebuff jihadists. Continue reading Abdelaziz wins reelection as Mauritania's president →
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What's the factual basis for killing Awlaki?
Though we don't necessarily know incredibly much more about the US government's factual basis for the targeted killing in September 2011 of Anwar al-Awlaki, a US citizen, the release of an Obama administration memo earlier today by a federal appeals court sheds new light on the administration's legal rationale:
A federal appeals court in New York on Monday made public a redacted version of a 2010 Justice Department memo that signed off on the targeted killing of an American citizen, Anwar al-Awlaki, without a trial, following Freedom of Information Act lawsuits. The memo, signed by David Barron, who was then the acting head of the department's Office of Legal Counsel and is now a federal appeals court judge in Boston, concluded that it would be lawful to target Mr. Awlaki for killing if his capture was not feasible. Intelligence analysts had concluded that Mr. Awlaki was an operational terrorist.
The Obama administration fought the disclosure, initially refusing to confirm or deny the memo's existence. In January 2013, a Federal District Court judge ruled that it could keep the memo secret. But in April, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled that portions of the memo containing legal analysis — but not those compiling the evidence against Mr. Awlaki — must be made public.
The memo argues that 18 U.S.C. § 1119, which addresses the foreign killing of US nationals, must incorporate the public authority exception, and it further argues that the exception permits either the US Department of Defense and/or the US Central Intelligence Agency to carry out the contemplated operation against Awlaki.
The memo also argues that Awlaki's US citizenship doesn't preclude DoD or CIA action, citing Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, the 2004 Supreme Court ruling that, subject to certain due process requirements, permits the detention of a US citizen as an 'enemy combatant.'
Sharper legal minds will parse the contents of the memo, parts of which were redacted, and it presents many obviously difficult questions:
Even if the US military is justified in killing Awlaki under the public authority exception, the CIA's justification is a lot more controversial because it's a US government agency, not the military. The heavy redactions in the memo, as it relates to the CIA, make the Justice Department's rationale unclear.
The US government's statutory basis for targeting Awlaki lies in the Authorization to Use Military Force Against Terrorists (AUMF), originally enacted in 2001, which authorizes efforts not only against al-Qaeda, but also against forces 'associated with' al-Qaeda, including Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). The argument is that this as true in Yemen (which, the Justice Department attorneys admit, is 'far from the most active theater of combat' between the United States and al-Qaeda.') as it is in Afghanistan or anywhere in the world that al-Qaeda and 'associated forces' operate. But that broad global-battlefield interpretation isn't universally accepted, even among many members of the US Congress that enacted the AUMF.
The memo contemplates that Awlaki's US citizenship bestows some protections, even in Yemen, under the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause and the Fourth Amendment. As regards the Fifth Amendment, the memo again points to Hamdi, which uses a Mathews v. Eldridge balancing test. In a scenario where a US citizen/enemy combatant poses a continued and imminent threat, the Justice Department attorneys argue that the public interest far outweighs the private interest of guaranteeing due process. Though the memo also acknowledges that Awlaki's targeting constitutes a 'seizure' under the Fourth Amendment, the memo again points to the 'reasonableness' balancing tests elucidated by the Supreme Court in prior rulings on the constitutionality of seizures.
Nevertheless, the true heart of this case isn't necessarily the black-letter legal reasoning, fascinating and controversial though it may be. Throughout the memo, the Justice Department attorneys essentially assume Awlaki's guilt as fact. That's fine, because no one was asking the Office of Legal Counsel to assess Awlaki's guilt. But it's one thing to argue that the AUMF applies in full force to the US government's ability to target enemy combatants who are US citizens, and it's quite another thing to argue that Awlaki was an enemy combatant in the first place.
Even if you are willing to defer to the Obama administration's interpretation on all of the issues of the law involved — the applicability of the AUMF, the applicability of the public authority exception, the non-applicability of the Fifth Amendment, the Fourth Amendment or any mitigating factors that accrue on the basis of US citizenship — we still don't know how the US government determines how a US citizen can be lawfully targeted for legal force.
The most relevant question, still unanswered, is how the US government concluded that Awlaki crossed the line from 'preacher spewing noxious opinions' to 'operational al-Qaeda militant.'
First, what specific actions did Awlaki take that caused him to be enemy combatant?
Secondly, on the basis of what evidence did the US government determine that Awlaki was an enemy combatant?
Finally, does anything about the process that the US government deployed in targeting Awlaki meet any kind of standards for due process, let alone those typically granted to US citizens under the Fifth Amendment?
On all three questions, we don't know the answer because the Obama administration won't release any information. Until and unless it does, the evidentiary standard for assassinating a US citizen abroad seems to be 'when high-level government officials conclude it.' Continue reading What's the factual basis for killing Awlaki? →
abdulrahman al-awlakial qaedaanwar al-awlakiAUMFawlakiCIAdue processhamdijustice departmentobamaUnited Statesyemen
Who is Radek Sikorski?
In the latest fallout from an increasingly disruptive series of leaked audio conversations in Poland, its foreign minister Radosław Sikorski apparently called his country's ties with the United States 'worthless,' and otherwise disparaged the bilateral Polish-US relationship:
Mr Sikorski called Poland's stance towards the US "downright harmful because it creates a false sense of security", according to the new leak. He has not denied using such language.
According to the excerpts, Mr Sikorski told former Finance Minister Jacek Rostowski that "the Polish-US alliance isn't worth anything".
Using vulgar language, he compared Polish subservience to the US to giving oral sex. He also warned that such a stance would cause "conflict with the Germans, Russians".
At one point, Sikorski used the Polish word murzynskosc — meaning 'slavery' — to describe the bilateral relationship in a conversation with former finance minister Jacek Rostowski.
So who is Sikorski — and why do his comments matter so much? Continue reading Who is Radek Sikorski? →
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2022 World Cup scrutiny poses major test for Sheikh Tamim
Even as a global audience cheers on the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, things are looking increasingly dicey for Qatar, which is struggling to hold onto its successful bid four years ago to host the 2022 World Cup.
Amid complaints about everything from soaring Gulf temperatures to its LGBT laws to the abuses of Qatar's kafala system, the resource-wealthy emirate now faces losing the 2022 World Cup altogether following allegations that Qatari businessmen bribed members of the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA).
Needless to say, it's not been an incredibly smooth first year for Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, who assumed power as the eighth emir of Qatar when his father, Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, abdicated in June 2013 at the age of 61. Though the British-educated Tamim had been the Qatari heir apparent for a decade, at age 34, he is the world's youngest monarch. Though Shiekh Hamad and other members of the Al Thani family (most notably Tamim's mother, Mozah bint Nasser Al Missned) continue to wield significant influence, Sheikh Tamim's rise to power reflects a more seamless transition for Qatar. Sheikh Hamad kicked his own father, Khalifa, out of power in a bloodless coup in 1995.
Though he wasn't Qatar's emir at the time, the controversy surrounding the decision to award the World Cup to Qatar has become a major leadership test for Sheikh Tamim (pictured above), who led the Qatari committee that made the bid for the 2022 World Cup. Arguably, Tamim's most important role before assuming the emirship last year was his influence in building Qatar's growing sponsorship of regional and global sports events.
Facing a humiliating retreat with respect to Qatar's regional political agenda, and facing enhanced global scrutiny on all fronts due to the World Cup bid, losing the 2022 tournament would be a massive setback for Qatar's two-decade push to become an influential regional and global actor. Continue reading 2022 World Cup scrutiny poses major test for Sheikh Tamim →
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So far, so good? A look at Modi's first weeks as India's PM
It's been just over a month since the historic election that vaulted Narendra Modi to the top of India's government, and he took office on May 26, nearly four weeks ago.
So how has his tenure as India's prime minister gone so far?
Fairly smoothly, though of course it's still far too soon to tell just whether Modi (pictured above with Bhutanese prime minister Tshering Tobgay), ushering in a new government with the slogan of 'minimum government, maximum governance,' can achieve the transformational economic and other policy achievements.
With his first day in office, Modi made global headlines by inviting Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif to attend his swearing-in ceremony, which saw the two regional leaders hold closed-door discussions on Modi's second day in office.
On June 1, his government marked the relative seamless creation of the new state of Telangana, out of what was formerly a much larger Andhra Pradesh, and the rise of its first chief minister Kalvakuntla Chandrashekar Rao (known as 'KCR'), though KCR is already making headlines for his blunt approach to press freedom.
Modi has already started to outline his economic policy priorities, which will kick off with a concerted effort to lower inflation. His government will unveil its first federal budget in July, but for now, Modi has signalled that he's willing to deliver tough policy to improve fiscal discipline that will almost certain including cuts to fuel subsidies and further liberalization of India's economy, especially with respect to foreign investment. That was clear enough from Indian president Pranab Mukherjee's address to the Indian parliament earlier this week.
Modi has also appointed a strong, streamlined cabinet that was met with approval among both domestic and global observers: Continue reading So far, so good? A look at Modi's first weeks as India's PM →
bharatiya janata partybhutanBJPforeign investmentgadkariINCindiaindian national congressinflationjaitleyKCRmaneka gandhimodimukherjeepakistanprasadrajnath singhsharifswarajtelanganatobgaytshering tobgay
Jamaican government targets legalizing ganja by September
It may seem natural that Jamaica should have relatively lax rules on marijuana use, given the association among the country, Rastafarians and smoking ganja.
Nevertheless, cannabis has been illegal on the island since 1913, when it was still a British colony, and under the Dangerous Drugs Act, possession, sale and cultivation of cannabis is illegal.
That may change soon, with the government of prime minister Portia Simpson-Miller preparing to loosen Jamaica's drug laws.
Last week, the Jamaican government introduced a proposal that would, to a significant degree, decriminalize cannabis use on the island. Notably, the reforms would decriminalize possession of up to two ounces of cannabis (though users would still be subject to ticketing and a fine if caught) and use for all religious, medical and scientific purposes. Though just between 1% and 10% of Jamaica's 2.9 million people are Rastafarians, they believe the use of ganja in religious ceremonies is sacred.
The Rastafari movement arose in the 1930s, and it worships the late emperor of Ethiopia, Haile Selassie, as a central sacred figure (before he became emperor, he was born Tafari Makonnen Woldemikael, hence the reference to Ras 'prince' Tafari). It was popularized in the late 20th century largely through the influence of reggae music, most particularly by Jamaican songwriter Bob Marley, an adherent of Rastafarianism.
Simpson-Miller's center-left People's National Party (PNP) controls a two-thirds majority (42 out of 63 seats) in the Jamaican House of Representatives, and a nearly two-thirds majority (13 of 20 seats) in the Jamaican Senate, so the proposals are very likely to be enacted as law in a vote that the government hopes will take place in September.
As in many Latin American countries, Jamaica has resisted liberalizing its drug laws out of fear of US retribution, including the withdrawal of aid and other support. A former Jamaican commission on ganja recommended decriminalization years ago, but no Jamaican government wanted to risk the wrath of the United States.
Today, however, two US states — Washington and Colorado — have decriminalized the personal use of marijuana after ballot initiatives in November 2012 and the US justice department under president Barack Obama and US attorney general Eric Holder are largely allowing, and even encouraging, the state-level experimentation.
Like many Caribbean countries since the 2008-09 financial crisis, Jamaica is suffering from lower tourist revenues and stagnant economic growth, as well as extremely high debt loads — in Jamaica's case, public debt of nearly 140%. Jamaica also suffers fromextremely high crime level, with the sixth-highest homicide rate in the world, and the highest of any Caribbean island country, according to a new UN report. Continue reading Jamaican government targets legalizing ganja by September →
cannabiscaribbeandrug lawseric holderganjaIMFjamaicamarijuanaobamaperez molinaPNPrastafarianismsimpson-milleruruguay
As world remembers Rwanda genocide, Burundi tilts into political crisis
I write for The National Interest on Thursday that as the world continues remembering the 20th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide, which resulted in the deaths of 800,000 mostly Tutsi Rwandans in three harrowing months in 1994, the world is largely ignoring Rwanda's southern neighbor, Burundi, as it slips further into a political crisis that could drag Burundi back into ethnic violence that marked its own civil war in the 1990s:
As the 2015 election approaches, however, [president Pierre] Nkurunziza (pictured above) has steamrolled the post-Arusha constitutional consensus by pushing through an election law that could allow him to run for reelection, despite growing opposition. Last year, Nkurunziza introduced a tough new law restricting press freedom amid a wider crackdown on journalists. This year has brought even more restrictions on political assembly and casual gatherings, and the imprisonment of regime opponents after a clash between protesters and the police in the capital, Bujumbura. The leading opposition figure, Alexis Sinduhije, a Tutsi and former journalist who heads the cross-ethnic Movement for Solidarity and Development coalition, was arrested earlier this spring in Belgium after fleeing Burundi, though Belgian officials subsequently released him. The government has also persecuted members of the National Forces of Liberation (FNL), the last major Hutu rebel group to sign the Arusha accords (in 2008). Numerous reports that the CNDD-FDD is arming its youth militia, the Imbonerakure, were sufficient to cause significant concern within Burundi's UN peacekeeping force earlier this year. That's especially chilling in light of the role that similar Hutu youth militias, known as the Interahamwe, played in the 1994 Rwandan genocide.
I add that the international community could play a role in boosting Burundi's fortunes through greater investment:
That doesn't mean there aren't promising areas of development. Incredibly, Burundians have known since the 1970s that their tiny country holds at least 6 percent of the world's nickel reserves. So far, however, those mineral deposits have gone unexploited. Investment to develop Burundi's industrial capacity and its ability to process nickel ore would be a game-changer. So would investment to improve Burundi's road and rail infrastructure, allowing nickel (as well as coffee, bananas and other agricultural products) to more easily reach a major port, like Dar es Salaam in Tanzania. Moreover, for a country that's still 90 percent rural, more efficient agricultural technologies could liberate a significant part of the population for more rigorous education and, ultimately, a more broad-based, services-heavy economy. With a median age of seventeen, Burundi is one of the ten 'youngest' countries in the world. Therefore, improvements in education could greatly benefit its youthful population and the country's developmental future.
But none of this can happen under the penumbra of increasing political violence or the threat of further civil war, whether it's Hutu-against-Tutsi or Hutu-against-Hutu. Though a surge of development might ameliorate some of the worst of Burundi's political tensions, greater political stability is a prerequisite for attracting the investment that Burundi needs to fuel that growth. As in many of Africa's struggling states, Burundi is trapped in a tragic "catch-22."
africaburundiCNDD-FDDhutuimbonerakurekagamenkurunzizarwandatutsiUPRONA
It won't necessarily take much to block Juncker in Council vote
One fact that's becoming increasingly clear in the current tussle over electing a new president of the European Commission is that the eventual candidate must win a qualified majority on the European Council, as well as an absolute majority in the European Parliament.
Though the rules for qualified majority voting on the Council are greatly simplified under the Treaty of Lisbon, it's worth noting that those rules don't take effect until November 2014.
That means that the old rules, under the Treaty of Nice, will be in effect during the current fight this summer over whether former Luxembourg prime minister Jean-Claude Juncker, the candidate of the European People's Party (EPP), can become the next Commission president.
RELATED: Here come the Spitzenkandidaten! But does anybody care?
RELATED: The mother-of-all-battles over
European integration has begun
With the current president of the Council, Herman Van Rompuy, currently taking the lead on the process, the Council will submit a formal proposal for Commission president during its next official summit on June 26 and 27.
That explains why the focus of the fight over Juncker has moved from the Parliament to a fight between German chancellor Angela Merkel and British prime minister David Cameron (pictured above, last week, left, with Swedish prime minister Frederik Reinfeldt and Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte).
Under the Lisbon rules, qualified majority voting means that a proposal under consideration by the Council must meet three requirements:
a majority of countries within the European Union (15 out of 28 countries);
a supermajority (74%) of countries according to a formula of voting weights; and
a supermajority of countries representing at least 62% of the EU-wide population.
The trickiest hurdle is meeting the 74% hurdle. The system assigns weights, roughly corresponding to population, to each country, with a maximum of 29 for each of Germany, France, the United Kingdom and Italy, and a minimum of three for the smallest member, Malta. With a total of 352 weighted votes after Croatia's July 2013 EU accession, that means Juncker must win at least 260 weighted votes. Conversely, it means that a minority consisting of 93 weighted votes can block Juncker.
Cameron is committed to opposing Juncker.
Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán, who belongs to the EPP, has also opposed Juncker in retribution for Luxembourg's outspoken role on the Commission in the past five years attacking Orbán's questionable respect for democratic norms and press freedom in Hungary.
Reinfeldt, the Swedish prime minister, has also voiced doubts about Juncker's candidacy, even though he also belongs to the EPP. If Juncker fails to pass muster in the Council, Reinfeldt himself has been mentioned as a compromise candidate, given the likelihood that his center-right Moderata samlingspartiet (Moderate Party) is expected to lose national elections in September.
Rutte, the Dutch prime minister, has joined Reinfeldt in his hesitation over Juncker. Rutte, like Cameron and Reinfeldt, is generally a Merkel ally on European economic policy and the need for trimming national budgets, but he belongs to the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats in Europe (ALDE), the third-largest European parliamentary bloc.
If Sweden (10 weighted votes) and The Netherlands (13 votes) join Hungary (12 votes) and the United Kingdom (29 votes), Cameron will have 64 votes to block Juncker — and he'll need just 29 more votes to do so.
Those votes could come from Italy, where prime minister Matteo Renzi has demanded a more flexible interpretation of EU budget rules and a greater emphasis on economic growth stimulation (instead of austerity) in exchange for backing Juncker. A deal seemed imminent earlier this week, though Renzi hasn't yet declared either support or opposition for Juncker.
Right now, the momentum seems to be with Merkel and Juncker, and flowing away from Cameron. Either Rutte or Reinfeldt could back down from their criticisms. Furthermore, Renzi might be wary of alienating Merkel just four months into his premiership and days before Italy assumes the six-month rotating Council presidency. But Cameron, who has suggested Denmark's social democratic prime minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt as an alternative Commission president, might yet persuade Renzi to join him for at least one shot at obtaining a more reformist Commission president than Juncker.
It's worth noting that French president François Hollande, like Renzi, would like to see a greater emphasis on growth at the European level, and he hasn't firmly indicated that he'll support Juncker, either.
Continue reading It won't necessarily take much to block Juncker in Council vote →
ALDECameronECREPPeuropean commissioneuropean councilEuropean Unionfront nationalHollandejunckerlisbon treatymerkelmoderate partynice treatyorbanPESQMVqualified majority votingreinfeldtrenziruttespitzenkandidatenthorning-schmidtUKIPvan rompuy

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


The pattern of men's hoodies, or rather anorak, in full size, is suitable for sewing comfortable and fashionable clothes for men with a chest girth of 104-108-112-116cm.
Men's sweatshirt with long raglan sleeves, a hood and a large kangaroo pocket. Sleeves and a bottom of a product on a knitted elastic band.
For sewing the proposed model will fit dense knitted materials of the average degree of elongation of natural or mixed fibers. Select the material depending on the season and the destination of the finished product.
The consumption of the main fabric is 2.4-2.5 m with a width of 1.5 m. For the cuffs and the stitched belt, you will need a knitted fabric into the elastic about 40 cm with a width of 1.2-1.4 m.
The pattern is sent instantly to e-mail.


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Nestlé wants to make all of its packaging - including its new Milkybar Wowsomes - recyclable or re-usable by 2025.
Food manufacturer Nestlé has announced its ambition to make all of its packaging recyclable or reusable by 2025.
The company – which employs 330 people at its factory in Dalston, near Carlisle – said it wants none of its packaging, including plastics, to end up in landfill or as litter in response to what it described as an "urgent need to minimize the impact of packaging on the environment".
Nestlé said it would focus on eliminating non-recyclable plastics, encouraging the use of plastics that allow better recycling rates and either changing or eliminating all together complex combinations of packaging materials.
Similar pledges have been made by a raft of businesses in recent months as pressure continues to grow from both lobby groups and consumers on the recycling of packaging, in particular single-use plastics.
Fast food chain McDonald's has set the same 2025 deadline for all of its packaging to come from sustainable sources. Its current rate is around 10 per cent.
Meanwhile, major retailers and packaging companies including Amcor, evian, L'Oréal, Mars, M&S, PepsiCo, The Coca-Cola Company, Unilever and Walmart have all pledged to meet the deadline in seven years.
Nestle's Cumbria factory recently celebrated a world first after developing a new "super sugar" which contains up to 40 per cent less sugar without any loss of taste.


When Life Gives you Sour Lemons, Use Genetics to Find Out Why!
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Up for your consideration is a pair of Kolarz-Leuchten crystal rod wall sconces. Company (Austria) known for their masterpieces in the art of lighting from the heart of Europe. Every KOLARZ lighting product is a unique creation, crafted by artistic minds and skillful hands to create the perfect ambience (Kolarz. Each sconce measures approximately 11" in height X 5" in width X 3 3/4 in depth overall.
Because of the artisan hand-crafted application, the rods are not exactly the same length. As part of my description and please read the condition description as I make every attempt to describe my items in great detail so there are no surprises when the package arrives. They do not appear they were ever used or hooked up. They are free of nicks, chips, cracks, and/or repairs.
I have since adjusted the brackets and now they fit snugly but caution needs to be exercised. They were tested for continuity, but it is recommended they be installed and checked by a professional. E box will measure 16" X 16" X 16 and will weigh no more than 10 pounds.
The item "Kolarz leuchten wall sconce crystal rods modern gold tone pair Elegant Buy Now" is in sale since Monday, February 26, 2018. This item is in the category "Collectibles\Lamps, Lighting\Shades".
The seller is "springvalley56" and is located in West Palm Beach, Florida. This item can be shipped to United States.


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Solar Frontier Builds 1.4MW Solar Plant Using Wooden Mountings
Solar Frontier has begun construction of a megasolar plant that uses mountings made from lumber, an unusual occurrence in Japan. The plant is scheduled to begin generating power in May 2015.
The project in the Yatsushiro region of Kumamoto Prefecture is being undertaken by SF Solar Power. The plant will leverage knowhow about wooden mountings from Xyence. The wooden mountings, made of Japanese timber, will comprise about 20% of all the mountings at the power plant facility.
High resistance to salt air damage and low thermal conductivity were important factors in choosing wooden mountings for this project. These characteristics will result in less damage from salt air in coastal areas and the effects of snow melting agents. The wooden mountings also offer better resistance to the effects of heat under strong sun conditions. In addition, once the domestically sourced lumber has been dismantled at the end of its life, it can be used to power woody biomass power plants, thereby reducing the project's environmental impact.
By leveraging its CIS thin-film solar modules and construction techniques, Solar Frontier will continue to build sustainable and environmentally friendly solar power plants.
Source: Solar Frontier
Solar Frontier (Solar Panels): https://www.enfsolar.com/solar-frontier


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Q: Unable to enter decimals in Android OS 4.2 and above For HTML5 form, I have a field amount(input type number). When the user tries to enter a decimal (".") from soft keyboard on an Android 4.2 or above he is unable do so as the decimal is not displayed on soft keyboard.
Please suggest if any other input type needs to be used for entering a decimal value?

A: I don't see this issue...
I've tried in Nexus 5 Emulator and device running Android 4.2.2 (API level 17) and Android 4.4.2 (API level 19) respectively, and in both when using the following, the decimal point is displayed in the numerical keyboard.
<form>
    Amount: <input type="number">
</form>

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


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Making medicine work for Black America: How Black students will answer the call for reform
Black Americans have suffered under an unjust health care system, and Black health care workers and students can help end the disparities in medicine.
Avery Ofoje, Victor Agbafe, Dr. Howard P. Forman and Dr. Cecelia L. Calhoun
Opinion contributors
The disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on Black people, coupled with the harrowing effects of police brutality, has once again laid bare institutional racism in America. This, along with growing support for the Black Lives Matter movement, necessitates that we work to eliminate racism in every space. In medicine, structural and social determinants of health in the Black community and gross injustices in health policy have produced inequities that are woven into the fabric of our society.
As members of the medical community — students, clinicians and educators — we must challenge this reality to fully honor the Hippocratic oath and begin to deliver on the promise of liberty and justice for all. To begin the multiplex work of confronting racism against Black people in our health care system, we must shore up the Black physician workforce, meaningfully address social determinants of health, close empathy gaps toward Black patients and recover the Black community's trust in medical institutions.
How to reform
Bolstering medical and research fields with Black leaders is a pivotal first step in improving Black health disparities. Systemic adversities that accompany being Black in America (toxified water, the biologization of race, a lack of health coverage, insufficient health literacy, and lower income and wealth) contribute to worse health outcomes.
External forces have an equal and internal reaction: Black patients treated by Black doctors are more likely to receive subsequent treatment, highlighting the role of race in access to optimal care. If we can activate an expansive network of Black health care leaders and pay health disparities the attention they require, Black patients will likely show greater trust in their care and better outcomes, too. This is best accomplished with investment in rigorous academic research that focuses on Black health. Well-endowed research institutes that seek to address social determinants and health disparities would result in tangible outcomes at every level of health care delivery. Improving care for Black individuals elevates the practice of medicine and will allow us to build more equitable policies for everyone.
Black people make up 13% of the U.S. population but only 4% of doctors.
This measure is even worse for Black men, the only demographic whose representation in medicine has dropped since 1978.
As our national shortage of doctors worsens, especially in minority communities, it is crucial that medical schools and residencies prioritize training underrepresented students through targeted programs so that the physician workforce better represents the people it serves. Research funding for medical schools should be contingent upon specific investments in underrepresented medical students — including representative mentorship, funding for elective learning opportunities, focused recruitment and retention efforts, and compensated representation in academic leadership and administration.
Further, Medicare should update the funding mechanism for graduate medical education based on the 2012 Institute of Medicine recommendations, which incentivize performance oriented toward health equity, particularly in underserved areas.
Health care and racial disparities:Black health matters. COVID has shown that improving care must be a national priority.
Ending racial bias in medicine
To mitigate health disparities, we must empower Black people with confidence to navigate our care systems through health literacy-based interventions. This approach must address Black distrust of the medical field, which stems from a history of deliberate discrimination ranging from eugenics, exploratory surgery without anesthesia, forced sterilization and other broadly unethical experiments on the Black body.
Today, implicit and explicit bias are pervasive in health care and impact health outcomes and disparities. As a result, discriminatory care has become a measurable and inherited element of health care delivery. This creates a tension in which lack of access is exacerbated by distrust and self-advocacy is dampened by bias.
In response, trauma-informed care and cultural humility should be ingrained in professional training. Substantive preclinical education should focus on histories of medical racism and the extent of disparities today, and no medical student should enter this career without a thorough education on how to pursue health equity in our work.
Trump and health care:Imagine a world with a COVID-19 pandemic and without the Affordable Care Act. Trump does.
The era of hollow words and racial allyship is over. Emphatic solidarity, rooted in tangible outcomes, is the new standard. We need results from stakeholders, and Black health care workers need to be elevated to well-resourced positions of leadership. Medical education needs to reflect the needs of every community, and taxpayer dollars should be reinvested in health education and advocacy for local residents. Importantly, each member of the health care system should hold health equity as the central and unshakable tenet of the mission of delivering care. Without it, we are failing to do our jobs and resigning ourselves to complicity in a racist paradigm. We are better. We can do better. We will do better.
Avery Ofoje is a 2020 graduate of Boston University and a prospective medical student. Follow her on Twitter: @averyofoje. Victor Agbafe is a dean's and medical innovation scholar at the University of Michigan Medical School. Follow him on Twitter: @VictorAgbafe. Dr. Howard P. Forman is a professor of Public Health and Management at Yale University. Follow him on Twitter: @thehowie. Dr. Cecelia L. Calhoun is an assistant professor of Pediatrics at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and a 2019 Pozen-Commonwealth Fund Fellow in Minority Health Leadership at Yale University.


As a result of quality analysis, it has been identified that a modification is required on certain models of Creda, Jackson and Electra washing machines produced between April 1988 and March 1989.
THESE WASHING MACHINES SHOULD NOT BE USED UNATTENDED UNTIL THE MODIFICATION HAS BEEN COMPLETED.
If you have purchased a machine since April 1988, with a serial number ending between C488 to C1288 inclusive, or between C189 to C389 inclusive, please contact us to enable the machines to be modified; e.g. 005209 C688.
The serial number is located either inside the door hinge (you will need to open the door) or under the powder drawer (you will need to remove the drawer and look underneath) and on the back of the machine.
Please quote the brand model and serial number.
Alternatively, please complete and return the coupon below and you will be contacted as soon as possible.


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Tour de France's downhill 'supertuck': Dashing or dangerous?
Julian Alaphilippe (Getty Images)
Calls to end 'sexist tradition' of TDF podium girls
Rowe expulsion blow to Ineos Tour de France chances
Alaphilippe 'ready for Alps' as Tour tension mounts
Gap - Tour de France leader Julian Alaphilippe is one of a clique of daring cyclists using a dangerous downhill crouch to gain extra speed and leave more nervous rivals trailing.
The daredevil Alaphilippe is far from the first rider to draw gasps from fans with Marco Pantani's swashbuckling crouch in the 1990s and Chris Froome's nerve-tingling forwards crouch from 2016 setting precedents.
Alaphilippe clutches the very tips of his handlebars, sticks his chin over the front and moves his behind off the saddle to sit on the frame of the bike, as he did coming down hill in the Champagne region to clinch the yellow jersey.
The Frenchman used the move to stunning effect on stage three when he used his trademark kick to chase bonus seconds atop a climb at 15km from the finish line at Epernay.
He clinched five seconds on the smallish Cote de Mutigny hill, but then charged downhill using his tuck, took another 10-second bonus at the finish line after a heroic effort for the stage win.
He came in 26 second ahead of the pack, with defending champion Geraint Thomas another five seconds behind.
A virtuoso downhill racer with nerves of steel, Alaphilippe uses the tuck position to pick up speed before getting back onto the saddle and kicking into the pedals, but most riders don't dare.
"I've no idea where it came from or who started it," Ireland's Dan Martin told the Cycling Weekly website.
The UAE Emirates captain is on record as saying he is more security conscious since the birth of his twins.
"When guys are on their own, fair enough, but in the peloton, it's just dangerous," says Martin.
Winner of three breakaway Tour de France stages, Sandy Casar told AFP he was divided on the issue.
"It works because aerodynamics are better, because you take less wind. And because you are leaning forwards, you pick up speed," he explains.
"But it's dangerous, look at Philippe Gilbert's fall last year. You have less control and because of the position your muscles are less relaxed."
Gilbert, a teammate of Alaphilippe, had been using a crouch going into a corner that he took too wide.
He survived that corner but went over a verge on the next one.
"But for me, it works," insists Casar.
The University of Lige, in the city where the Liege-Bastogne-Liege race is run, has even been conducting research into the tactic.
They use a wind tunnel lab where researchers and engineers are studying the aerodynamics of professional cyclists' bicycle positions.
Former champion Froome's celebrated descent of the Pyrenean Col du Peyresourde on the eighth stage of the 2016 Tour caused a sensation as the Briton went on to win his third Tour de France.
According to studies at the Sart Tilman campus, it gave him a 'nine percent' advantage over a classic position.
While the one Alaphilippe uses is 12% to 17% faster, their study claims.
It also offers better security than Froome's position because of a more even body weight distribution over the wheels of the bike.
Should Alaphilippe hold on to his lead and become the first Frenchman since Bernard Hinault to win the Tour since 1985, the tuck will have played its part, and even if not the daring and the flair have won him fans all over the world.
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Chemicals & Resources›
U.S. leading natural gas producers by production volume 2016
Published by N. Sönnichsen, Jan 5, 2021
This statistic shows the leading natural gas producers in the United States in 2016. In that year, ExxonMobil was the second largest producer of natural gas in the U.S., with a daily production of 3.01 billion cubic feet per day.
Leading natural gas producers in the United States in 2016, by production volume (in million cubic feet per day)
Production in million cubic feet per day
Worldwide, United States
Largest natural gas consumption worldwide by country 2018
Global natural gas production 1998-2019
Natural gas production - European Union 1998-2019
Consumption of natural gas in the United Kingdom (UK) 2003-2019
Statistics on "Natural gas industry in the UK"
Natural gas - proved reserves worldwide 2000-2019
Global natural gas consumption 1998-2019
Proved reserves of natural gas in the United Kingdom (UK) 1995-2019
Natural gas production in the United Kingdom (UK) 2003-2019
Oil and gas extraction output index in the United Kingdom (UK) 2015-2019
Natural gas imports in selected European countries 2019, by type
Natural gas imports in the United Kingdom (UK) 2012-2019
Natural gas exports from selected European countries 2017-2019
United Kingdom (UK): Natural gas exports 2012-2017
Electricity and gas consumer price index (CPI) annual average in the UK 2003-2019
Gas consumer price index (CPI) annual average in the United Kingdom (UK) 2003-2019
Quarterly fuel price for major power producers in the United Kingdom (UK) 2012-2019
Primary energy consumption in the United Kingdom (UK) 2018-2019, by fuel
Natural gas consumption for energy use in the United Kingdom (UK) 1970-2019
Expenditure by end users on natural gas in the United Kingdom (UK) 1970-2019
Total household expenditure on energy from gas in the UK 2010-2019
Regional weekly gas expenditure in the United Kingdom (UK) 2016-2018
Number of oil & gas extraction companies in the UK in 2020, by turnover
Number of oil & gas extraction enterprises in the UK in 2020, by employment size
Number of crude petroleum and natural industry enterprises in the UK in 2020, by size
Projected GDP contribution of Alberta's gas developments by province 2015-2035
Projected GDP contribution of B.C.'s gas developments by province 2015-2035
Projected GDP contribution of Saskatchewan's gas developments by province 2015-2035
Natural gas share of energy production of top energy companies 2000 and 2015
Natural gas production worldwide by region in billion cubic feet 2015
Natural gas production growth in selected U.S. states 2014-2015
Distribution of the leading global natural gas companies by reserves 2014
Global natural gas production in oil equivalent 1998-2019
Production of natural gas in the GCC by member states 2015
Leading Canadian natural gas companies by market capitalization 2014
Natural gas production forecast in OECD and non-OECD countries 2012-2050
Qatar's natural gas production in tons of oil equivalent 2011-2015
Natural gas production in Kuwait 2005-2017
U.S. production share of ethane and other natural gas plant liquids 2010-2016
Russia's natural gas production 1998-2019
EBITDA of select U.S.-based oil and gas companies 2016
Production increase of natural gas worldwide by region, 2019 compared to 2018
Italy: market share of the leading gas providers in the regulated market 2017
Natural gas production in Europe and CIS: in exajoules 1998-2019
Natural gas in the UK Natural gas energy in the U.S. Global natural gas industry
Various sources (Marcellus Drilling News). (June 20, 2017). Leading natural gas producers in the United States in 2016, by production volume (in million cubic feet per day) [Graph]. In Statista. Retrieved January 19, 2021, from https://www.statista.com/statistics/799766/us-leading-natural-gas-producers-by-production/
Various sources (Marcellus Drilling News). "Leading natural gas producers in the United States in 2016, by production volume (in million cubic feet per day)." Chart. June 20, 2017. Statista. Accessed January 19, 2021. https://www.statista.com/statistics/799766/us-leading-natural-gas-producers-by-production/
Various sources (Marcellus Drilling News). (2017). Leading natural gas producers in the United States in 2016, by production volume (in million cubic feet per day). Statista. Statista Inc.. Accessed: January 19, 2021. https://www.statista.com/statistics/799766/us-leading-natural-gas-producers-by-production/
Various sources (Marcellus Drilling News). "Leading Natural Gas Producers in The United States in 2016, by Production Volume (in Million Cubic Feet per Day)." Statista, Statista Inc., 20 Jun 2017, https://www.statista.com/statistics/799766/us-leading-natural-gas-producers-by-production/
Various sources (Marcellus Drilling News), Leading natural gas producers in the United States in 2016, by production volume (in million cubic feet per day) Statista, https://www.statista.com/statistics/799766/us-leading-natural-gas-producers-by-production/ (last visited January 19, 2021)


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Fun Places to Take Kids in San Diego
List of Southern California Attractions
Activities to Do in San Diego
A.C. Bauer, Leaf Group
San Diego, California (Photo: san diego skyline image by Janet Wall from Fotolia.com )
Fun Places in Binghamton, New York
SeaWorld Orlando Facts
As California's second-largest city, San Diego is known for its idyllic climate. The Laguna and Cuyamaca mountains rise to the east, and the San Diego River runs through the city and divides it from east to west. San Diego boasts more than 70 miles of Pacific Ocean coastline and offers a variety of activities for residents and tourists of every age.
Located in Balboa Park, the San Diego Zoo (sandiegozoo.org) is one of the largest zoos in the world and boasts more than 4,000 animals and 800 species. It offers guided bus tours covering more than 80 percent of the zoo and a gondola for an aerial view. Most of the exhibits are open air. The zoo also runs the adjacent Wild Animal Park, where animals can be viewed in a larger setting. The zoo features many education programs and sleepovers and hosts several special events and group outings. Hours vary depending on the season, and day passes and multiday and multipark tickets are available.
SeaWorld (seaworld.com) is a theme park located along the shores of Mission Bay in San Diego. It features daily shows, animal exhibits, rides and restaurants. One of the park's main attractions is its orcas, which are housed in a 7-million-gallon area. The first orca brought to SeaWorld in the 1960s was Shamu, a stage name now used in park performances. Daily, resident and annual passes are available, along with vacation packages and special rates for group events.
San Diego is home to the National Football League's San Diego Chargers and the San Diego Padres Major League Baseball team. The Chargers play at Qualcomm Stadium, which is owned and operated by the City of San Diego. It is approximately 15 minutes northeast of downtown and hosts the Chargers during football season from August to December. The Padres play at PETCO Park, downtown near the Gaslamp District. Visitors can catch a game from April through October and should check team schedules for home games.
Coronado Municipal Beach
Coronado Municipal Beach has been recognized by The Travel Channel as one of America's finest beaches. It is a clean, family-friendly beach that features turn-of-the-century mansions along the coastline and yacht clubs along the bay. It is home to the historic Hotel del Coronado, many upscale restaurants and a skateboard park, and the beach is patrolled by lifeguards and features clean, well-maintained facilities.
San Diego Convention & Visitors Bureau
A.C. Bauer is a seasoned adventurist with explorations spanning four continents, including hiking Machu Picchu, snorkeling the Great Barrier Reef, running the Ice Age Trail and road biking out of her front door. She has written marketing materials for eight years and worked for Red Bull, Disney and Dick's Sporting Goods, and received a master's in recreation and sport science from Ohio University.
Kids Activities in San Diego for Free
Things to Do in Montevideo, Uruguay
San Diego City Attractions
The Closest Zoos to Paducah, Kentucky
Fun Stuff to Do With Kids in Tampa, Florida
San Diego Activities»


THE TOWN OF ANDERSON, TEXAS AUTHORIZING AND APPROVING A RESOLUTION SUPPORTING THE NO BUILD OPTION FOR THE BRAZOS VALLEY CONNECTION ELECTRICAL TRANSMISSION LINE PROJECT. THE TOWN OF ANDERSON SUPPORTS EXPANDING HOUSTON AREA POWER PLANTS, AND /OR BUILDING NEW PLANTS IN THE HOUSTON AREA.
Came before the Town Council of Anderson on the 8th day of January 2015, the matter of authorizing and approving a resolution supporting the no-build option for the Brazos Valley Connection electrical transmission line project. The Town of Anderson supports expanding Houston area power plants, and/or building new plants in the Houston area.
WHEREAS, the Town Council finds it is in the public interest and to the benefit of the residents of the town/county and the citizens of this state to support the no-build option for the Brazos Valley Connection electrical transmission line project.
The Town of Anderson supports the no-build option for the Brazos Valley Connection electrical transmission line project and supports expanding Houston area power plants, and/or building new plants in the Houston area to.
PASSED AND APPROVED on this the 8th day of January, 2015.