OCTOBER 1973: RISE OF A KINGDOM OR EMPIRE?
Located in Western Asia, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is a country with a deep rooted cultural background and a tremendous appreciation for individual and communal privacy. Little is really understood about the intrinsic kingdom. It was only until the end of the twentieth century that the Saudi kingdom gained the perception as a dominant power in the Arab world and one of the few Arab countries that the average American is likely to be aware of, as Saudi Arabia was involved in multiple interstate conflicts and incidences throughout its short history. In October 1973, Saudi Arabia placed an oil embargo on countries that were deemed as supporters of Israel during the 1973 Arab-Israeli war.
The lack of historical or academic focus by Middle East historians on the incident may imply a belief that the incident was insignificant. This, however is far from the truth. The 1973 Oil embargo changed the perceptions of the United States Government on the capabilities and willingness of Saudi Arabia to achieve its political and economic interest as a sovereign state. The 1973 Oil Embargo changed the United States Government's perceptions of the Saudi monarchy from viewing it as an economically dependent country that could only guarantee a steady supply of cheap oil for the United States, to be perceived as a sovereign state that was willing to enforce its own economic and regional interest.
The focus of this paper is on the bilateral relationship between Saudi Arabia and the United States. Other Arab states and Israel are not primary factors in this relationship during the events of the oil embargo, hence the focus on the Saudi-American relationship.
This essay will analyze the Saudi-American relationship chronologically. To better understand the impact of the oil embargo on how it changed the perceptions of US policy makers towards Saudi Arabia. American perceptions of Saudi Arabia before the embargo will be first be outlined. The focus will be in the period after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and the transition from the Lyndon B. Johnson administration to the Nixon administration in 1969. The perceptions and changes in perceptions of Saudi Arabia by US policy makers will then be described during the oil embargo from October 1973 to March 1974. Finally, the impact of the oil embargo and the changes of perceptions that resulted from it will then be described. The time period will be from the end of the embargo until 1979, before the second oil crisis.
Bin Saud, Saud, "OCTOBER 1973: RISE OF A KINGDOM OR EMPIRE?" (2018). Cadet Senior Theses in History. 2.


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One Nation's Mark Latham pays tribute to Margaret Court
Jordan Hirst 14 November 2019
Photos: YouTube/Nine News
The New South Wales parliament has backed a motion from Mark Latham to honour the sporting career of controversial tennis legend Margaret Court.
The One Nation NSW leader moved the motion in the state's Legislative Council on Wednesday, with MPs voting for it.
The motion celebrates her achievements, recognises the upcoming 50th anniversary of her 1970 Grand Slam year, and congratulates Court on her welfare and pastoral work.
It comes after Margaret Court last week complained Tennis Australia had snubbed her for a tribute. Next year is the 50th anniversary of Court winning four grand slam titles in a single year.
Court demanded the sport's governing body honour her in the same way as tennis champion Rod Laver earlier this year.
Tennis Australia later said it will "formally recognise" Court's achievement but "there will be no celebration," according to reports.
Mark Latham said Tennis Australia should celebrate Margaret Court's milestone at the Australian Open in January.
"If Labor, Greens, Nationals, One Nation, Animal Justice Party, Christian Democratic Party and The Shooters can unite today as we did in honouring Mrs Court, it sends a powerful message to Tennis Australia," he said.
"If we don't fully honour our sporting and community champions, it sends a negative message to young people about the importance of excellence, hard work and community service in life.
"NSW should be proud to have produced the greatest female tennis player ever.
"[She is] someone who has gone on to undertake amazing pastoral and welfare work helping needy people in Perth."
Margaret Court's controversy over her LGBTIQ views
Margaret Court, who is now a pastor in Perth, made headlines in 2017 for boycotting airline Qantas over its support for same-sex marriage.
Court later described homosexuality as an ungodly "lust for the flesh" and compared the "gay lobby" to the Nazi regime.
"That's what Hitler did. That's what the communists did. There's a whole plot in our nation … to get in the minds of the children," she said.
She also claimed legalising same-sex marriage would lead to the end of Mother Day's, Father's Day, Christmas and Easter.
Former Labor leader Mark Latham is now One Nation's New South Wales leader. He won a seat in the state's Legislative Council in March.
Latham attacked "leftist elites" and left-wing "cultural invaders" in his maiden speech. He also slammed LGBTIQ-inclusive schools for transforming into "gender fluidity factories".
In an anti-trans rant in January, he claimed school students were switching gender "daily" for "novelty purposes".
Latham announced a One Nation policy to make legal recognition more difficult for trans people to obtain.
In September, he announced he would introduce his own "religious freedom" bill to the New South Wales parliament in a bid to prevent future cases like that sacking of Israel Folau.
margaret courtmark lathamNSWpoliticssport
'Purely because I'm gay': Teachers sacked by faith schools speak out
Retiring Sam Stosur just got a standing ovation at the Australian Open
Moana Hope blasts Victorian government's 'heartless' Covid decision
Australian Open 2022 to light up in rainbow for first AO Pride Day
Gay male AFL player would be welcomed like Josh Cavallo, captain says

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Alcoholics Anonymous has launched a free national telephone service to help those wanting to quit drinking.
Now suffering alcoholics need not pay for calls to the AA helpline and will be able to find out where to get help from either a landline or mobile.
The launch of the free new number comes as AA says it wants to be able to be accessible to everyone seeking help from alcoholism whatever their means.
AA's national helpline offers support and help for those wanting to escape the illness of alcoholism and find their way to an AA meeting. Many sufferers have found sobriety and managed to turn their lives around as a result of calling the AA helpline.
First time callers are offered help by an AA volunteer who will share their experience and story of recovery and offer to put them in touch with an AA member who will take them to their first AA meeting.
The helpline also receives calls from AA members needing to find a meeting and from professionals wanting to know more about the AA fellowship.
Last month AA celebrated its 80th birthday and in that time has grown from the two original founders, a New York stockbroker, Bill Wilson and Dr Robert Smith, an Akron surgeon, to a Fellowship spanning the world with more than 2 million recovering members.
In Great Britain there are about 4,500 groups meeting weekly with a membership estimated at around 40,000.
The national free number is 0800 9177 650 and covers the whole of Great Britain.


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text:
The MERS week in snapshots...
Labels: humour, meme, MERS-CoV
MERS-CoV in the Netherlands...a detail analysis of cases
Red arrow indicates where Dutch
MERS-CoV case sequences sit.
Click on tree to enlarge
This comes from a shiny newly released Eurosurveillance report from Dutch researchers.
I've marked up my earlier tree to show where (based on partial 4,000nt fragment) the sequence from the Netherlands MERS-CoV positive cases (near identical) sits.
I've also charted Case 1's laboratory testing course, to show the variability of virus detection when a very thorough sampling and testing investigation is conducted.
Viral RNA remained detectable in the blood for all days tested demonstrating viraemia (well, RNAaemia technically) from day-4 onwards. Urine was not positive but a faecal sample was, on day-5. The latter has implication for infection control in hospital settings whereby flushing toilets creating aerosols could be another contributor to spread.
Reverse transcription real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-rtPCR) results are shown as positive (tall bars), negative (stumpy bars) or not tested (empty space) plotted against day of sampling.
This is, as far as I'm aware, is only the second time human faeces or urine have been found to contain signs of MERS-CoV.
A throat swab was positive early on and then again after a 2-day period of negativity. This points to the possibility of shedding for over a week, when associated with cough. But given that this case was part of a tour group and they didn't all become symptomatic, MERS-CoV still didn't spread efficiently or result in disease very often (if it did spread), for whatever reason(s). Antibody testing would be interesting here too.
It would also be very interesting to know whether virus was being shed during the initial diarrhoea in Case 1, which predated his return to the Netherlands by about 8-days, or whether that was unrelated to the MERS-CoV infection. Perhaps testing faeces for gastrointestinal viruses would be useful, or interesting, here.
Labels: faeces, laboratory confirmation, MERS, MERS-CoV, serum, The Netherlands, throat swab, urine, viraemia
Updated MERS-CoV full genome tree...
With thanks to @arambaut for some tips, and for tying my home computer up for 2-days running PHYML on the sequences (super-computer it ain't) - this is a slightly more robust tree of the MERS-CoV complete (or near-complete) genome nucleotide sequences published to date. This follows from my previous post and tree here.
Very little from 2014 despite the majority of MERS-CoV variants circulating then. But of course we have to wait because next generation sequencing is the main way we roll with MERS-CoV.
Alignment of 56 complete or near complete MERS-CoV genomes and an Egyptian divergent variant from a camel. Alignment made using Geneious v6.1.7. The PHYML v2.2.0 plug-in was added to make this tree, using 1000 bootstraps. Red stars indicate
virus which is reportedly from the same patient (seems doubtful). Vertical bars to the right indicate Clade A (dark blue) and B (pale blue). Sequences from the the 2013 Al-Ahsa hospital outbreak are boxed in pink; from the Jeddah 2014 hospital outbreak in blue; from the Hafr Al-Batin community cluster in green. Camel icons indicate genomes from camel variants for MERS-CoV. GenBank accession numbers are indicated at the end of each sequence name which also includes region of detection, host (human if not specified) and year of sample collection.
The tree really highlights how remarkably interwoven the camel and human MERS-CoV genome sequences are; remembering that these 30,000nt genomes don't differ from each other by more than 1% at the nucleotide level.
Some new sequence analyses from the Netherlands cases should be coming out in the next issue of Eurosurveillance so get a tab ready and keep hitting refresh. Or, ya know, go get a life or something (I'm hitting refresh).
Labels: camel, MERS-CoV, phylogeny
Updated MERS map moves stars around....
This new version adds a blue star to Iran, as it seems likely there has been some local transmission.
That star has been taken away from the USA (it's been a bad boy) since there has now been no sign of local transmission after the overnight retraction of the Illinois man's positive antibody test result.
Labels: epidemiology, Iran, MERS, United States of America
MERS-CoV did not just transmit via 2 meetings and a handshake...the retraction [UPDATED with CDC Press Release]
There must be a couple of internally relieved people around the US CDC today. Relieved. Why? Because they have got off their chest something they must have had a growing inkling about for at least a few days now. That being the news result that the Illinois 3rd US case was in fact not infected by MERS-CoV via a handshake and 2 meetings, 1 lasting 40min.
So that didn't happen.
And the implications for much simpler transmission of MERS-CoV did not result. And that all kinda makes more sense in the broader scheme of things MERS-related. This result always looked like an outlier.
Additional lab tests indicate IL resident wasn't infected by IN MERS patient. No evidence of spread of #MERS in US.
— Dr. Tom Frieden (@DrFriedenCDC) May 28, 2014
Not a fun thing to have to report. Kudos to the team though for going back to correct an error. MERS reporting could definitely do with some more dynamic editing, and ownership, of it's mistakes.
That said, for the life of me this morning, I cannot work out why the CDC announced part of the antibody (Ab) testing result without having put such an important preliminary piece of diagnostic information, with so many epidemiological implications, through an even more rigorous testing pipeline first. I had certainly assumed that had happened when I previously wrote in support of antibody-testing on the back of this result over a week ago...and made note that that hiccups in the Ab testing process could follow!
Let's look at what we know publicly about this test method. The CDC team have published 2 different papers [1,2] where they use an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) first (the same one as used in the Illinois case I presume), then confirmed those results with either an imunofluorescence assay (IFA) or a virus neutralization (NT) test. The latter is the most specific method of showing that the MERS-CoV antibodies in a patients serum, if present, can block, or "neutralize", the ability of a virus to infect permissive cells in the lab. However, there has been a previously recorded issue with sera from SARS-CoV positive people cross-reacting in a MERS-CoV neutralization test. [3]
So the 2 papers have the following definitions relevant to antibody testing (my highlighting).
In the study of a possible MERS-CoV related stillbirth, the CDC team used the definition..
"MERS-CoV antibody positivity was defined as having positive a serologic result from the HKU5.2N Enzyme Immunoassay (EIA) and a correlated test-positive result from either the MERS-CoV Immuno-fluourescent assay (IFA) or MERS-CoV microneutralization titer assay (MNt) developed at CDC."[1]
*The HKY5.2N is a bat CoV antigenically related to MERS-CoV.
When they went back to the original Jordan cluster from 2012, the same definition was used..
"To maximize specificity, we defined MERS-CoV antibody positivity as subjects having correlated, positive laboratory results from the HKU5.2N screening ELISA as well as confirmed positive results by either the MERS-CoV immunofluorescence assay (IFA) or the MERS-CoV microneutralization assay (MNT)."[2]
What we know in the Illinois retraction story is that the IFA results did support the ELISA (less specific test) results (both were positive) before that result was announced.[4] They were clearly not supported by virus-specific MNT though. So the definitions above will need to be changed, perhaps to include all 3 results for a definitive answer or definitely have MNT in the tetsing mix somewhere. This has an impact on a result from the Jordan retrospective study[2] since 1 of those "positive" cases was defined using only ELISA and IFA-reactive without support from MNT (see Outbreak member 11; Table 1).[2]
Oh well. Just goes to show, no-one is perfect and everyone is subject to a little hysteria when the pressure is on.
I've gone back to strike-through the text relating to this retraction in my previous posts (might take me a little while to complete). I'm leaving the text in place as it was, but adding new comments in red. I've also deleted this line from my personal MERS-CoV line list.
While this sadly incident does nothing to help people trust antibody testing in the future, at least for MERS-CoV, the literature for MERS-CoV antibody testing contains good examples of well-validated assays that require and conduct multiple tests to yield robust results. I still think rigorously determined positive antibody test results should still be considered as valid indications of a MERS-CoV positive result. Clearly not in this instance because this seems to be a pipeline "in process".
Stillbirth During Infection With Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus
http://jid.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2014/02/17/infdis.jiu068.full
Hospital-associated outbreak of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus: A serologic, epidemiologic, and clinical description
http://cid.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2014/05/14/cid.ciu359.short
Cross-reactive antibodies in convalescent SARS patients' sera against the emerging novel human coronavirus EMC (2012) by both immunofluorescent and neutralizing antibody tests.
CDC concludes Indiana MERS patient did not spread virus to Illinois business associate
http://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2014/p0528-mers.html
Iran reports 2 MERS-CoV cases: 20th country [UPDATED]
Click on map to enlarge.
Head of Communicable Disease Control (CDC) at the Iran Ministry of Health (MOH), Dr. Mohammad Mahdi Reports seem to indicate 2 sisters, one critically ill, have been confirmed as cases and 2 suspected cases, perhaps family members, are being observed/investigated for MERS-CoV.
I'll await the WHO report (which will hopefully appear soon) with more details but what we have so far suggests local spread, so the pink (unknown origin of case acquisition) will change to another colour of some sort, in the future.
The WHO were awaiting official notification from Iran's MOH about 10-hours ago.
@HelenBranswell Aware of reports on this, but have not receive official notification as per International Health Regulations (IHR)
— WHO (@WHO) May 26, 2014
A story from AFP [7] notes that the 2 sisters are being treated in the same hospital in Kerman, where they were believed to have acquired their infection from a pilgrim returning to Iran from Saudi Arabia. No mention of whether that pilgrim was tested and found to me MERS-CoV positive.
h/t to @Malaekeh and @HelenBranswell for alerting us to the CDC report.
Resources...
Crawford Kilian's post..
http://crofsblogs.typepad.com/h5n1/2014/05/iran-reports-first-mers-cases.html
MOH announcement..
http://www.behdasht.gov.ir/?siteid=1&fkeyid=&siteid=1&pageid=127&newsview=108713
FluTracker's thread..
http://www.flutrackers.com/forum/showthread.php?t=223788
Treyfish's post
http://swineflumagazine.blogspot.com.au/2014/05/iran-identification-of-novel-virus-2.html
Mike Coston's post..
http://afludiary.blogspot.com.au/2014/05/irans-moh-reports-2-mers-cases-testing.html
PressTV - English detail
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/05/27/364327/iran-confirms-two-cases-of-mers/
http://www.interaksyon.com/article/87818/iran-reports-first-2-mers-cases
Labels: case announcement, Iran, MERS, MERS-CoV
Camels and MERS: links to peer-reviewed scientific literature...[UPDATE #2]
Camels at the centre, aerosol all around...
I thought this might be a useful page for anyone who would like to know just how much data has been generated that supports a link between camels and MERS-CoV, and studies that have shown near identical viral genomes from camels, and the humans in contact with them.
Its also worth nothing only 1 ~180nt PCR fragment from 1 bat in 1 study has had a MERS-CoV sequence detected in it and yet they are still considered the most likely ancestor of the MERS-CoV because bats seem to be the ancestral source of many CoVs.
No studies have found MERS-CoV or infection-blocking (neutralizing) antibodies to MERS-CoV in any non-human or non-dromedary camel animal despite investigation of:
bactrian camels
While rats and mice have not been tested in the wild, deliberately inoculated lab mice and Syrian hamsters do not support growth of MERS-CoV and 2 rat cell lines (Chan et al. J Infect Dis. 2013;207:p1743-52) did not support viral transcription or growth. Not the end of the small animal story of course and more testing of small animals is a good thing, but neither has the camel story been completed yet (finding infectious virus in milk, urine and meat and some air sampling and testing from around camels would be nice). However, the camel story does already have some very solid chapters suggesting humans could be coming into sporadic contact with the virus.
So a few quick thoughts to put camels in context with sporadic infections that are not traceable to contact with a known human case.
I don't think any scientist has ever suggested every camel is carrying/shedding MERS-CoV all the time. Nothing supports that.
Most MERS-CoV cases have been from spread between humans and most of those are now linked with hospital-based settings (thanks Jeddah outbreak!). Whether community spread is ongoing is completely unknown until someone tests the community, post-Jeddah outbreak, and not people linked to hospitalized confirmed cases (they only bias the results).
As we saw in 2nd and 3rd US MERS-CoV detections, 2 face-to-face business meetings, 1 with at least 40-min of face time, and a handshake, was sufficient to pass along MERS-CoV between humans when the index case was not all that ill.
I hope the R0 guys can build this sort of event into their predictive models and
I think this has real and major implications for what "contact" with a camel actually means. I have serious doubts that people who are RT-rtPCR positive and being interviewed and asked about their exposure to camels would think of being near a camel as contact with camels. Is that how they are being asked?
THIS RESULT WAS RETRACTED 28-May-2014 FOLLOWING A NEGATIVE NEUTRALIZING ANTIBODY TESTING.
Better understanding the proximity-possibility needs experimental testing but in the meantime it is also very important for those who are asking infected people about their animal exposures and contacts to understand that respiratory viruses don't just spread by physical contact. I am unaware of what is being asked and in how much detail - this may already be well understood.
If people being asked about past contact with camels are thinking "hey, yeah, I was walking between camel pens for 20 minutes, but no I didn't kiss one or lick its nose or feed it or anything touchy-feely" (I'm 100% certain those would be exactly the words in their heads) - then they may well say "no contact". To my mind, that level of proximity in that example, especially if 1 or 2 of those camels was symptomatic, would be contact.
Anyway, do let me know if I've missed any papers below - or if new references come out.
Camels in the literature...
Reusken CB, Haagmans BL, Muller MA, Gutierrez C, Godeke GJ, Meyer B et al. Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus neutralising serum antibodies in dromedary camels: a comparative serological study. Lancet InfectDis 2013 October;13(10):859-66.
Perera RA, Wang P, Gomaa MR, El-Shesheny R, Kandeil A, Bagato O et al. Seroepidemiology for MERS coronavirus using microneutralisation and pseudoparticle virus neutralisation assays reveal a high prevalence of antibody in dromedary camels in Egypt, June 2013. Euro Surveill 2013;18(36):ii.
Hemida MG, Perera RA, Wang P, Alhammadi MA, Siu LY, Li M et al. Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) coronavirus seroprevalence in domestic livestock in Saudi Arabia, 2010 to 2013. Euro Surveill 2013;18(50):20659.
Reusken CB, Ababneh M, Raj VS, Meyer B, Eljarah A, Abutarbush S et al. Middle East Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) serology in major livestock species in an affected region in Jordan, June to September 2013. EuroSurveill 2013;18(50):20662.
Haagmans BL, Al Dhahiry SH, Reusken CB, Raj VS, Galiano M, Myers R et al. Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus in dromedary camels: an outbreak investigation. Lancet Infect Dis 2014 February;14(2):140-5.
Alexandersen S, Kobinger GP, Soule G, Wernery U. Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus antibody reactors among camels in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, in 2005. Transbound Emerg Dis 2014 April;61(2):105-8.
Alagaili AN, Briese T, Mishra N, Kapoor V, Sameroff SC, Burbelo PD et al. Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus infection in dromedary camels in Saudi Arabia. MBio 2014;5(2):e00884-14.
Meyer B, Muller MA, Corman VM, Reusken CB, Ritz D, Godeke GJ et al. Antibodies against MERS coronavirus in dromedary camels, United Arab Emirates, 2003 and 2013. Emerg Infect Dis 2014 April;20(4):552-9.
Hemida MG, Chu DKW, Poon LLM, Perera RAPM, Alhammadi MA, Ng H-Y et al. MERS Coronavirus in dromedary camel herd, Saudi Arabia. Emerg Inf Dis2014;20(7).
Nowotny N, Kolodziejek J. Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) in dromedary camels, Oman, 2013. Euro Surveill2014;19(16).
Raj VS, Farag EABA, Reusken CBEM, Lamers MM, Pas SD, Voermans J et al. Isolation of MERS Coronavirus form a Dromedary Camel, Qatar, 2014. Emerg Inf Dis 2014;20(8).
Corman VM, Jores J, Meyer B, Younan M, Liljander A, Said MY et al. Antibodies against MERS Coronavirus in Dromedary Camels,Kenya, 1992-2013. EmergInf Dis 2014;20(8).
Chu DKW, Poon LLM, Gomaa MR, Shehata MM, Perera RAPM, Zeid DA et al. MERS coronaviruses in dromedary camels, Egypt. Emerg Infect Dis 2014;20(6).
Ziad A. Memish, Matthew Cotten, Benjamin Meyer, Simon J. Watson, Abdullah J. Alsahafi, Abdullah A. Al Rabeeah, Victor Max Corman, Andrea Sieberg, Hatem Q. Makhdoom, Abdullah Assiri, Malaki Al Masri, Souhaib Aldabbagh, Berend-Jan Bosch, Martin Beer, Marcel A. Müller, Paul Kellam, and Christian Drosten. Human Infection with MERS Coronavirus after Exposure to Infected Camels, Saudi Arabia, 2013. Emerg Inf Dis 20(6) (online May 16).
Esam I. Azhar, Ph.D., Sherif A. El-Kafrawy, Ph.D., Suha A. Farraj, M.Sc., Ahmed M. Hassan, M.Sc., Muneera S. Al-Saeed, B.Sc.,Anwar M. Hashem, Ph.D., and Tariq A. Madani, M.D. Evidence for Camel-to-Human Transmission of MERS Coronavirus
NEJM June 4.
NB. This study is the same human case and camel herd tested in #14. Sampling times differ subtly.
Labels: camel, Literature Review, MERS-CoV, Reference resource
Raj VS, Farag EABA, Reusken CBEM, Lamers MM, Pas SD, Voermans J et al. Isolation of MERS Coronavirus form a Dromedary Camel, Qatar, 2014. EmergInf Dis 2014;20(8).
Jeddah changed the MERS-CoV age:sex landscape...
Note. Not every death or case is listed.
See bottom-left corner for breakdown.
Click on charts to enlarge.
I've broken down the age and sex in these charts.
As usual, it's mostly about males and older people until we get to the Jeddah outbreak.
In the top pair of charts (note the different scale used here compared to that used in the charts below) we see the breakdown for all MERS-CoV detections to date on the left and the fatal cases from among those on the right.
An apple in terms of people shapes.
In the middle pair of charts we look at all cases form 2012 up until the day before the Jeddah outbreak. The total case pyramid shows an older age bulge but the deaths look very similar to those for all fatal outcomes. M:F is similar to the total case charts above.
In the bottom pair of charts we're looking at what happened from the beginning of the Jeddah outbreak until now. We see a marked change in distribution with many more younger adults being positive for MERS-CoV. We also see a major shift towards more females than we'd seen beforehand. All the result of more widespread testing and a greater healthcare worker contribution I presume. Strangely though, given the younger adult demographic here, we see no accompanying jump in numbers of children. Are they not subject to testing? Are the younger adults often foreign workers who do not have children/children with them with them? There is no reason for children to test any less frequently MERS-CoV-positive and they are also just as likely as healthy adults to get mild or asymptomatic disease (as far as we know). If positive, children will have an important potential role in the MERS-CoV transmission story, especially when visiting elderly relatives.
The recent Al Qunfudhah teacher who is MERS-CoV just reinforces that children are shaping up to be a strange data gap. Yeah. I know. Another one.
Labels: Age bias, HCWs, Jeddah, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, MERS, MERS-CoV, outbreak investigation, sex bias
MERS-CoV cluster in Al Qunfudhah...
5 cases in 4 days from a city we haven't seen prior MERS-CoV detection in (as far as I can tell) = a cluster.
The south western coastal city of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) is home to ~200,000 people[1].
While the cases have been asymptomatic when reported, the first, a 65-year old male (65M; was isolated at home [2]), came into contact with another case (see below) while at a government hospital. Which case that was and at what hospital, is unclear.
But there are other worrying issues here:
This city is in Makkah region, home to the 2 holiest Mosques and not a site in which anyone wants to see active spread of this virus again as we get closer to the Hajj; we don't want to see it spread anywhere at all of course.
FluTrackers has a thread on this (when don't they!?; my thanks to Sharon Sanders for pointing me to it) from 21-May and at least one of the 5 cases seems to be a teacher at a school in Al Quoz, 25 km south of Al Qunfudhah. No school-children have been reported positive to date though. The 4 cases after 65M were aged 25, 28, 25 and 45 - could some be teachers or are they all family of 65M? Family accompanied 65M to visit a relative in a Jeddah hospital (presumably the contact for 65M?). We no longer get any information from the KSA's Ministry of Health (MOH) about occupation, so one is left to guess...as usual. There seems to be mention of symptoms among some of these cases?
Could healthcare workers in Al Qunfudhah be among these younger asymptomatic (presumable) contacts of 65M?
This city may be seen written as Al Qunfudah, Qunfudah, Qunfutha, Kunfuda, Gonfodah or Gonfothah. I was helped out on the naming of this city recently - my thanks to @AmboceptorBlog
@MackayIM Arabic only has 3 vowels- usually translated A/I/U (each has short&long forms) This also depends on dialect. Short U -> O in Egypt
— Amboceptor (@AmboceptorBlog) May 22, 2014
Sources...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Qunfudhah
http://www.moh.gov.sa/en/CoronaNew/PressReleases/Pages/mediastatement-2014-05-22-001.aspx
http://www.flutrackers.com/forum/showthread.php?p=535788#post535788
Labels: Al Qunfudhah, case announcement, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Makkah, MERS, MERS-CoV
MERS-CoV among healthcare workers: no longer identified or the end of a hospital cluster?
Just looking at @maiamajumder's vast array of MERS-related charts on Twitter and had a thought.
She and I and others have been wondering for a while if perhaps the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's (KSA) Ministry of Health (MOH) reporting has decided to simply no longer identify healthcare workers (HCWs) as such. That would not be the strangest thing to occur with these data, believe me (deaths that have been "previously reported" that actually haven't, people who were discharged from hospital who were previously not described as being hospitalised, and of course, some instances of HCWs in KSA being identified as MERS-CoV positive by their country of origin and not by the KSA MOH). Perhaps not identifying HCWs is a way of attempting to stop pointing to what was a huge problem in infection prevention and control just last month?
But perhaps that is not entirely what is happening.
Perhaps there is another reason and there may be some precedent to support it; HCW numbers have in fact realistically decreased because they are no longer being infected as often. Why not? Perhaps because April's Jeddah hospital-based MERS-CoV outbreak is under control. Have a look at the chart below. Some things to note afterwards:
HCW numbers have stopped accumulating so rapidly. That mirrors total MERS-CoV detections of course. See some recent posts on the now receding wave of April's MERS surge here and here.
The precedent I mentioned? When the Al-Ahsa hospital-related outbreak stopped in May 2013, so did the number of HCW positives/week dropped away.
There have clearly been a bunch of other HCW peaks which may also have been related to hospital-clusters that were not so obviously publicised (I'll have a loo over this some time in the future). Those spikes of HCW infections have narrower bases and higher peaks than does the Jeddah outbreak, so perhaps that can be used as an indication of them being short-lived clusters that were better controlled than Jeddah. Not rocket science I guess and probably stating the obvious to the experts out there.
Infections in HCWs serve, as we already know, as a kind of sentinel system for identifying a spike in overall cases since more severe disease shows its face in hospitals and most likely represents the presence of other cases out in the community. His statement is much more believable now that we ;can look back and know that milder signs and symptoms of disease, or none at all, do not infrequently follow MERS-CoV infection).
I hope that our original hypotheses - that the KSA MOH has quashed identifying HCWs - was wrong. Heading towards Hajj-2014, it would be best to be polishing the very tarnished reputation of of the KSA MOH on matters ;of communication, not further damaging it.
Labels: HCWs, Healthcare workers, infection prevention and control, MERS, MERS-CoV
The impact of cell culture on virus as highlighted by deep sequencing..[UPDATED]
Alignment of complete or near complete MERS-CoV
genomes made using Geneious v6.1.7.
The Neighbor-Joining tree was made using MEGA with
1000 bootstraps. Red stars indicate virus from same patient.
Vertical bars to the right indicate Clade A (dark blue)
and B (pale blue). Sequences from the the 2013 Al-Ahsa
hospital outbreak are boxed in pink. GenBank
accession numbers are indicated at the end of
each sequence name which also includes region
of detection, host and date of sample collection.
Just a quick post to note the difference that "passage" in cell culture (isolation of an infectious virus using lab cells inoculated with the original virus-positive patient material, some of which is taken off and added to a new flask of cells and this process repeated as needed) can do to the virus as it changes to grow most effectively in the new environment...this is akin to the adaptive changes seen when a virus first jumps to a an entirely different species.
Apparently the 2 starred (red stars in the figure) virus genomes are from the same 60-year old male patient [1,2,3; ] but the original variant, EMC/2012, was sequenced from material after 6 rounds of cell culture [3] while the Bisha_1 variant was not [1]; it was subjected to deep sequencing directly after nucleic acid preparation using an original respiratory sample aliquot (nasopharyngeal swab)[1].
Given that cell culture passage seems to be related to the positioning of EMC/2012 in Clade A versus Bisha_1 in Clade B (indicated by a pale blue line), does this mean there is no Clade A (dark blue vertical bar) and that it's just an artefact??
Probably not. Why? Because the Jordan-N3/2012 virus that is also found in Clade A and it also originates from a human specimen collected in 2012. It is listed as having been sequenced from a bronchial sample. There is no mention of cell culture on its GenBank record - which does not mean there was no culture. But when that sample was passaged through culture and sequenced (N3/2012 MG167; sequence not shown in this tree) it remained 99.95% identical to the original sequence; just 2 nucleotide differences out of 30,028nt. 1 difference in the spike gene and 1 Open Reading Frame 1a). These are unlikely to be enough to switch its clade but I'm realigning with this sequence included just to be sure about that!
I thought that was kinda interesting.
NB. There may be some concern over the specimen labelling used to identify samples for sequencing of EMC/2012 or Bisha_1. I'm attempting to sort our by following this up with the lead author.[1]
Reference...
Transmission and evolution of the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus in Saudi Arabia: a descriptive genomic study. Cotten et al. Lancet 2012;382:1993-2002
60-year old man from Bisha who died in a Jeddah hospital (EMC/2012 variant)
Isolation of a Novel Coronavirus from a Man with Pneumonia in Saudi Arabia. Zaki et al. N Engl J Med 2012; 367:1814-1820
Genomic workup on EMC/2012
Genomic Characterization of a Newly Discovered Coronavirus Associated with Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome in Humans. van Boheemen. mBio 2002; 3(6): e00473-12
Labels: adaptation, cell culture, genome, MERS, MERS-CoV
MERS by day, testing by night...
Now that we can look back over more than a month (from 20-April to the latest Kingdom of Saudi Arabia [KSA] Ministry of Heath [MOH] report of 7 cases dated 22-May), we see that the downwards trend in MERS-CoV detections has been pretty consistent.
I noted it looked likely to be dropping at the beginning of May, but it's much more clear now.
So now we wait and see what happens next.
None of the pressure is off the KSA to try and reduce animal-to-human exposures, to determine how those exposures lead to human infection/what bits of animal are virus positive, to tighten hospital infection and prevention protocols, to see how much of the community has been exposed to or is currently infected by MERS-CoV, to sample more of 2014's MERS-CoV variants and determine how the virus is evolving with more time among, and passages through humans...and other things!
It was interesting to read recent Lancet articles on Mass Gathering Medicine which, apart from a backgrounder to its "Father", Dr Ziad Memish, make note of the preparedness required each year by the healthcare sector in the KSA to ready hospitals to receive and treat ill pilgrims during their mass journey for Hajj. Clearly the hospitals, having played such a central role in the spread of most human MERS-CoV detections to date and so they have a lot of work ahead them, in a very short period, to ensure a much bigger MERS-CoV outbreak does not result from Hajj-2014. And of course MERS-CoV is neither the only nor the major respiratory virus in town when people descend on that town from all seasonal corners of the globe.
Respiratory virus testing, as I understand it from discussions on Twitter, is not a regular nor a routine tool to support clicnial decision-making in the KSA. Not like it is in the UK, USA or Australia for example. If that's true, then it really should be. he fund exist to support it and clearly Central labs is capable of getting good RT-rtPCR results. It's perhaps just a mater of scale then. Such testing supports and complements a modern healthcare system. And it's important for public health. Respiratory viruses are one of the most common causes of hospital visits. Among the elderly and those with comorbidities, as we have seen with MERS-CoV, these viruses play a big role in stressing or damaging an already damaged tissue/organ/system and spreading among individuals with underlying disease (e.e. those undergoing dialysis) conveniently gathered under one roof within range of each others aerosols. Some disease can be prevented (flu vaccines, which are already used in the KSA), some can be quarantined but knowing which virus is present may lead to better patient management, cohorting and understanding of prognosis. Such a testing system would devolve to the MOH to initiate, organize and manage I suppose.
Labels: case accumulation, MERS, MERS-CoV
Snapdate: Avian influenza A(H7N9) virus...
There seem to have been more announcements of late than previously so I thought I'd plot this and see.
These are a little adrift as the last 7 or so have not been through the WHO scrubbing process (which adds extra bits of data) so we will see a little shifting the last 2 or so blue dots on the chart below.
Guangdong and Anhui provinces have the most active case generators in May.
Anhui province has reported 3 cases in a week and there seem to have been a constant stream of cases in May, but they they don't, in reality, seem to be out of what's become the ordinary in 2014 for a virus that is happily ticking over in several provinces.
Labels: Anhui province, avian influenza, case accumulation, H7N9
Snapdate: MERS-CoV detections by where they were probably acquired...
...yeah its "probably" because sometimes it's just not clear to anyone. I've about 14 (554 in total) more cases attributed to a likely source in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) compared to the Ministry of Health tally on their website (540), but such is life.
Anyway, I haven't updated this chart for 17-days (woah - sorry about that). The latest version now has the two major hospital-related outbreaks shown in pink - I'm still liking the Janadriyah festival as the possible source of community cases that then filter back throughout the country as visitors and tourists return to different areas or travel afterwards for other reasons. That would be on my 2015's "festivals that need to be tweaked to avoid camel contact" list.
As per yesterday's post, these accumulation curves highlight that new detections of MERS-CoV have slowed right down in the KSA and in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). However, the UAE are now the reporting slow pokes, if the last batch posted by the World Health Organization is anything to go by, so we should stay tuned to what's happening there (and also stay tuned to the extent of upper respiratory tract signs and symptoms in those cases which continue to bug me).
Labels: acquisition, case accumulation, MERS, MERS-CoV, snapdate
v2 12JUN2015
A droplet (and perhaps airborne)-centric view of how the camel could be a source of sporadic human infection by MERS-CoV, a virus that is genetically very similar whether found in camels or humans.
The inner ring (orange) is more about bigger wetter droplets and aerosols-if you must differentiate on size.
These are potential routes by which a human in contact with, or near to, camels might acquire virus from them, when those camels are actively infected. Keep this in context though- because of a number of large hospital-based outbreaks, most cases of MERS seem to have occurred by virus transmission between humans and their environments rather than from camels to humans.
Camels are not all infected all the time. This is probably why there wasn't a rash of camel herdsmen coming down with MERS after the YouTube camel-kissing outbreak...at least as far as we know there wasn't.
Camels have been found to be actively infected more often when young, but adult camels have also been found actively infected by MERS-CoV as well so there is risk of exposure to camels at any age, when they are infected.
Sometimes camels do not show signs of illness (e.g. no runny nose) but other times they do, so illness alone cannot be used as a warning sign.
There are also some data to suggest adult camels can be reinfected. This makes sense if you remember that MERS-CoV is well entrenched among camels spread over large areas of the Arabian Peninsula and Africa. The virus would disappear if there were no susceptible hosts left among the adults to maintain it in the herds between camel breeding seasons. Plus, there is nothing to physically stop a new infection anyway. That's a conversation about whether that infection leads to notable or debilitating disease or not.
The outer (Blue) ring in the picture above is more about consumption of camel products. As you can see in the inner ring, some of these activities could also generate aerosols and it is important to think about, and recognize, that avoiding consuming of camel products may still be about reducing your risk of exposure to virus that you can breathe in during the process of preparing the camel products to consume, when the camel is infected.
We don't yet have any evidence that the virus can infect after eating/drinking material contaminated with it. Or whether many camel products are contaminated with it. I tend to think that if eating/drinking were a route to acquiring MERS, then a lot more people would be infected by such a deliberate process of viral delivery. Plus. the disease almost always shows up as a respiratory tract illness with gut issues thrown in sometimes, not the other way around. And the physiology underpinning a virus being ingested, disseminating systemically and mostly showing up as pneumonia? Plus the few exported cases that have forward transmitted probably weren't consuming camel products at their destinations. Meh. Droplets. Respiratory
So we still need to find out which bits of the camel actually have virus in them. No milk testing has been done yet but nasal swabs and faeces have been positive for MERS-CoV RNA and have had infectious virus grown from them.
On cleaning this blight from the camels, I'd like to see more talk about quarantine and isolation processes now. Can camel herds be kept separated for long enough that the virus is "burned out" of each herd by limiting its ability to infect new herds? It would be a huge job but it may be a way to rid areas, countries and perhaps the Peninsula of MERS-CoV while routine animal testing can be put in place for imported camels. Just a thought. In the meantime, finding ways to perhaps do this on a small scale for the incoming pilgrims so that they could still visit with "safe" camels, might be a matter of priority.
Make no mistake, camels host this virus and they have done so for at least 20-years.
That's not the end of the story - but it's one chapter of it and it's written in stone.
Version history.
v2-changed some use of the term 'airborne' as my understanding of the word has mutated over the past year
Labels: camel, camel meat, camel milk, camel urine, MERS, MERS-CoV, risks
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text:
Image-Reuters
CAIRO: Egypt has opened a new international airport on a one-month trial basis to service the city which will become the country's new capital from mid-2020. The Capital International Airport is located some 70 km (44 miles) to the east of Cairo and is intended to relieve pressure on Cairo International Airport. A third airport, near the Giza Pyramids west of Cairo, the Sphinx International Airport, also opened in January.
"The importance of the Capital Airport is that it partially eases the pressure on Cairo International Airport and Sphinx Airport," Aviation Minister Younis Al-Masry told reporters at a ceremony on Tuesday, after a flight left Cairo and landed at the new airport, which is about 48 km (30 miles) from the city.
"It will be a new outlet for Cairo specifically," he said, adding that the airport would serve areas east of the capital including cities along the Suez Canal. Workers are rushing to build core areas of the new capital city that will be the seat of Egypt's government, away from bustling Cairo on the Nile that has become a traffic-clogged, urban sprawl of more than 20 million people.
The Capital International Airport will operate with an hourly capacity of 300 passengers during the trial phase that is expected to last a month, the head of the Civil Aviation Authority, Sameh al-Hefni, said. (Agencies)


text:
Entertainment, Politics, Business, Books, Society, Art and designAir Date 01/01/2007
Charlie remembers 26 notable personalities we lost this year including Shelley Winters, William Rubin, Ed Bradley, Jack Palance, R. W. Apple, Jr., and others.
Remembering Wilson Pickett
EntertainmentAir Date 02/02/2006
Charlie remembers Wilson Pickett with a look at their last conversation and Pickett's iconic song, "In the Midnight Hour."
Joe Roth; Bryce Dallas Howard; Remembering Wilson Pickett
Roth, fmr. film studio chairman, on directing "Freedomland." Howard on "Manderlay." In memory of the iconic singer-songwriter Wilson Pickett.
'Only the Strong Survive'
Musicians Wilson Pickett, Mary Wilson, Sam Moore, and Carla Thomas talk about the soul music documentary, "Only the Strong Survive."
Rep. James Clyburn; Profile of John Kerry; 'Only the Strong Survive'
Entertainment, PoliticsAir Date 01/29/2004
Rep. Clyburn on his endorsement of Kerry. Who is John Kerry? Soul music stars in "Only the Strong Survive."
Related Guests 5
Joe Levy
David Browne
Jann Wenner
Entertainment, Education
James Lipton talks about his life and hosting "Inside the Actor's Studio." 30:51
General David Petraeus
World, Politics
General David Petraeus reflects on the success and future of the coalition forces in Iraq. 24:13
Books, Law
Michael Waldman, President of Brennan Center for Justice at NYU, on his new book, "The Second Amendment: A Biography." 10:35
Politics, Books
David Wise on his book, "Molehunt: The Secret Search for Traitors that Shattered the CIA." 14:14
Remembering Ella Fitzgerald
A conversation about Ella Fitzgerald, after her passing. 10:09


text:
Esta lista reúne as canções lançadas e/ou gravadas pelo Linkin Park, uma banda norte-americana de rock, formada em 1996 em Agoura Hills, Califórnia. Ao longo da carreira, o grupo já lançou mais de 200 canções, sendo elas, 86 somente em álbuns de estúdio. A banda gravou materiais para sete álbuns de estúdio: Hybrid Theory (2000), Meteora (2003), Minutes to Midnight (2007), A Thousand Suns (2010), Living Things (2012), The Hunting Party (2014) e One More Light (2017).

Em 2000, a banda lançou o seu álbum de estreia, Hybrid Theory, que contém doze faixas em sua edição padrão e quatro singles: "One Step Closer", "Crawling", "Papercut" e "In the End". A faixa "Points of Authority" foi lançado como um single promocional. Em 2003, foi lançado seu segundo álbum, Meteora, contendo treze faixas e cinco singles: "Somewhere I Belong", "Faint, "Numb", From the Inside" e "Breaking the Habit". "Lying from You" foi lançado como um single promocional. Posteriormente, em 2004, a banda fez uma parceria com o rapper Jay-Z no EP Collision Course, que contém seis faixas e dois singles: "Numb/Encore" e "Dirt Off Your Shoulder/Lying from You". "Numb/Encore" ganhou um Grammy Award na categoria "Melhor colaboração de Rap/Cantado".

Em 2007 e 2010, a banda lançou os álbuns Minutes to Midnight e A Thousand Suns, respectivamente. Minutes to Midnight contém doze faixas em sua edição padrão e foram lançados cinco singles: "What I've Done", "Bleed It Out", "Shadow of the Day", "Given Up" e "Leave Out All the Rest". A faixa "No More Sorrow", foi lançada como um single promocional de sua versão ao vivo, que está presente no CD/DVD da banda, intitulado Road to Revolution: Live at Milton Keynes. Já A Thousand Suns, contém quinze faixas em sua edição padrão e quatro singles: "The Catalyst", "Waiting for the End", "Burning in the Skies" e "Iridescent"; As faixas "Blackout" e "Wretches and Kings" foram lançados como singles promocionais. Anos mais tarde, em 2012, a banda lançou seu quinto álbum de estúdio, Living Things, que contém doze faixas e quatro singles: "Burn It Down", "Lost in the Echo", "Powerless" e "Castle of Glass"; A faixa "Lies Greed Misery" foi lançada como um single promocional durante a promoção do álbum.

Em 2014 e 2017 a banda lançou os álbuns The Hunting Party e One More Light, respectivamente. The Hunting Party contém doze faixas e três singles: "Guilty All the Same", "Until It's Gone" e "Final Masquerade"; As faixas "Wastelands" e "Rebellion" foram lançados como singles promocionais. Já o álbum One More Light, contém dez faixas e três singles: "Heavy", "Talking to Myself" e "One More Light". As faixas "Battle Symphony", "Good Goodbye" e "Invisible" foram lançados como singles promocionais durante o período de pré-lançamento do álbum.

Canções presentes em álbuns de estúdio

Canções não presentes em álbuns de estúdio

Ligações externas

Linkin Park
Linkin Park

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Justice Nnamdi Dimgba of a Federal High Court, Abuja, has sent the case file of the former Accountant-General of the Federation, Jonah Otunla to the Chief Judge for reassignment.
The development followed the transfer of the trial judge to the Asaba Division of the Federal High Court, and the repeated absence of Otunla to appear before the Court to take his plea.
Otunla was to be arraigned along with Ade Adelakun and seven companies for an alleged N2 billion fraud, before Justice Dimgba on December 7, 2017 on a five-count charge, but his absence caused the trial to be adjourned.
His absence, has however, caused several adjournments, until the transfer of the trial judge.
At the resumed sitting today, February 7, 2019, prosecuting counsel, Sylvanus Tahir, informed the court that "it will be better to transfer the matter back to the Chief Judge since the case was yet to feature, due to the handicap of the prosecution to bring Otunla before the court of justice".
Defence counsel, Ahmed Raji, SAN raised no objections.
Tahir further informed the court that he had received an affidavit from solicitors of Adelakun, now late, attached to his death certificate to further reaffirm that he had died, and so could no longer stand trial.
"The only possible person to be charged is Otunla, and someone from Goldreef Industries Nigeria Limited, Lambster Nigeria Limited, G.C. Electronics and Sinmilak Nigeria Limited, companies of the second defendant, who will have to stand in for the companies," he added.
Justice Dimgba, thereafter, ruled that: "This matter is hereby sent back to the Honourable Chief Judge for reassignment to any of the judges based in Abuja Division for reassignment in view of the special circumstance of this case."


text:
From sea to plate: genomically and phenomically enabling the Australasian snapper (Chrysophrys auratus) for aquaculture
CRAG Auditorium
Maren Wellenreuther
Plant and Food Research & School of Biological Sciences, University of Auckland (New Zealand)
Alex Clop
Laura R. Botigué
Maren Wellenreuther is a senior scientist at the Plant and Food Research and an associate professor at the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Auckland (New Zealand). Her research interest is broad but mainly aims at understanding how adaptive and non-adaptive evolutionary processes interact in nature. To this aim, she works on several areas including evolutionary ecology and genomics and focuses on topics such as sexual selection, adaptation, high-throughput phenomics, aquaculture, selective breeding and population demography. In recent years, she is mostly working on the development of accelerated breeding technologies to incorporate new fish species into aquaculture, but also on understanding the dynamics of genetic variation in the frame of evolution.
Follow the speaker on Twitter @MarenWellenreut and check her webpage and CV!
event_calendar
Add to Calendar 2019-07-15 10:30:00 2019-07-15 10:30:00 From sea to plate: genomically and phenomically enabling the Australasian snapper (Chrysophrys auratus) for aquaculture Maren Wellenreuther is a senior scientist at the Plant and Food Research and an associate professor at the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Auckland (New Zealand). Her research interest is broad but mainly aims at understanding how adaptive and non-adaptive evolutionary processes interact in nature. To this aim, she works on several areas including evolutionary ecology and genomics and focuses on topics such as sexual selection, adaptation, high-throughput phenomics, aquaculture, selective breeding and population demography. In recent years, she is mostly working on the development of accelerated breeding technologies to incorporate new fish species into aquaculture, but also on understanding the dynamics of genetic variation in the frame of evolution. Follow the speaker on Twitter @MarenWellenreut and check her webpage and CV! CRAG Auditorium Alex Clop Laura R. Botigué Maren Wellenreuther Europe/Madrid public
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Comments on Comments is a regularly irregular post, in which I attempt to respond to all thoughtful reader comments, inquiries, complaints, suggestions, etc.
How much would be acceptable? Preferably none. Would I be more satisfied with simply less? Well, yeah. But at that point, if the government were only in charge of one or two or three things, and the entire corpus of human needs and wants was otherwise satisfied by voluntary exchange in a free market, it should be easier to convince people that no government is a viable goal.
…Then I saw "free society" in your sentence.
The other night I was watching MTV and they took a "Sweet 16? rich kid into some jungle and made them live with a jungle tribe to show them what real living is all about. The tribe lives off the land. Has no currency. No wars. They trade with neighboring tribes. They have a chief who got the job just because he's old. I watched the show and I thought of the tribe as a "free society." Is this kind of what you mean as a free society?
If not can you please describe what your free society would look like or at least a glance on how it would operate. If I missed a post let me know.
All that aside, no, it's not exactly what I have in mind., although the "no wars" idea is pretty cool. It kind of makes you wonder, if the developed nations are so freaking civilized, why is it that most of their problems are resolved with bombs and bullets?
For a better treatment than I could ever hope to offer in limited space, with limited time, I'd recommend The Voluntary City. I'm not sure how much of it is available on Google, but you might try reading the foreword/introduction to get a glimpse. I own a copy of it, which presently is buried under the passenger seat in my car, I think.
Let me know if you'd like to borrow it.
My friend RJ recently read Ron Paul's Manifesto. I might borrow his copy. We were discussing it (I haven't read it) and he mentioned the list of suggested readings in the back of the book, which starts with Rothbard's What Has Government Done To Our Money.
I loaned him my copy.
Anarcho-mercantilist left a comment on Public Goods Do Not Justify Taxes. Thanks for clarifying the definitions of "public" vs. "club" goods. This is a distinction, I think, without a substantial difference, since most people are willing to stretch the definition of "public" to include just about any good or service that can be shown to have any positive spillover effects, e.g., we all benefit from education because educated people are more productive/less criminal, etc. These disputes are usually over some secondary or tertiary effect, the primary benefit of education accrues to those who are educated, just like the primary benefit of my garden is me.
I don't have any serious objection to anything in Anarcho-mercantilist's comment. I particularly like his comments on the subjectivity of value.
"not all goods provided by governments these days are really public goods." I wholeheartedly agree with that second assertion, but can't let you bootstrap it into the [public-goods-do-not-justify-taxes-argument], which you never even try to prove.
I tried not to spend the whole post tearing down public goods strawmen, but apparently failed. I buried my thesis at the very end and without much exposition.
That thesis is, the "public" nature of a good (i.e., the fact that it may be non-rival and non-excludable) tells us nothing about whether or not the good ought to be produced, nor does it tell us in any meaningful way, what the appropriate or adequate supply should be. What I mean by this is, if you'd like to make a case for taxation based on "public goods", you're going to have to do more than just demonstrate that some goods are "non-rival, and non-excludable," two facts which cannot be combined in such a manner as to prove (universally) that it is justifiable to force people to pay for those things which, although they may benefit from them, may be undesirable to them.
If you want to impress me, jump straight to Rand's "public goods" — a (defensive) military, a (rights-protecting) police force, and a civil court system to enforce contracts — and explain to me why THOSE don't justify taxes.
I'd like to explore some of the ideas that anarcho-mercantilist brought up in his comment, above, but in any event, these topics have been addressed by countless others. Maybe I'll discuss them in greater detail another time, they deserve their own blog post. At the very least, a Police force (or something very similar to a police force) could conceivably be a club good. All they need to do is not investigate alleged crimes against non-members. The very nature of a monopolistic police force, on the contrary, is that they will "protect" you, and compel payment from you, even if you don't wish to be affiliated with them in any way. A "rights-protecting" police force is accountable to the market, and its customers should be free to abandon it if the service is inadequate or oppressive.
Any further commentary on the topic of taxes should also address the moral problem of violently compelling individuals to pay for things which they do not even want. I have no noteworthy objections to paying for things I consume. My objection is principally that I'm obligated by law, under threat of violence, to pay for these things whether I want them or not, whether I plan to use them or not, and further that I'm compelled to purchase them at a monopoly price from an agency which precludes competition.
Commenting on Comments #30, my friend Brad suggested some new plugins. I've begun implementing them. I like the "related posts" one alot.
David, you seem to defend Prosper, which is another a government-granted patent monopoly.
There are (or were) a number of companies offering similar services prior to the SEC order, and almost every business model is "patent pending." I'm not going to waste my time objecting to that, and even if I were, certainly you can recognize there is a substantial difference in the degree to which Prosper's "monopoly" affects the market, and the degree to which the Government's monopoly affects the same market.
That said, I did not mean to defend Prosper per se, reviewing my post, I'm still unsure how you'd arrive at that conclusion.
People have burned banknotes in the past this way because that was the economic thing to do. Why is it that, having already seen this photo, tens of thousands or more do not run immediately to their neighbors ready to enlist in the revolution?
The photo to which Mike refers, was of a German woman feeding near-valueless Marks into a woodburning stove, in lieu of cords of wood, the latter being more valuable than the former.
Mike, I'm not sure I've got a good answer to your inquiry. The Germans literally watched their economy crumble, day-by-day, and give rise to a brutal, totalitarian regime, and they did nothing to stop it. Economic historians could point to a number of similar monetary calamities in the history of the world. Actions have predictable consequences; this is not uncharted territory. I think people prefer naivete to knowledge, especially in circumstances where knowledge is of things undesirable.


text:
KINETICS AND MULTIBODY DYNAMICS SIMULATION OF PARALLEL DELTA ROBOT
Jinsoo Choi, Kihyun Kim, and Hyo-young Kim
[1] R. Clavel, DELTA, a fast robot with parallel geometry, 18thInt. Symp. on Industrial Robots, Lausanne, Switzerland, 1988,91–100.
[2] Z. Pandilov and V. Dukovski, Comparison of the characteristicsbetween serial and parallel robots, Acta Technica Corviniensis-Bulletin of Engineering, Tome VII (Fascicule 1), 2014,143–160.
[3] L.W. Tsai, Robot analysis: the mechanics of serial and parallelmanipulators (New York: Wiley -Interscience Publication,1999).
[4] M. Pranav, A. Mukilan, and C.S. Sundar Ganesh, A noveldesign of delta robot, International Journal of MultidisciplinaryResearch and Modern Education, 2(2), 2016, 365–377.
[5] R.L. Williams II, The delta parallel robot: kinematics solutions,Department of Mechanical Engineering, Ohio University, Ohio,2016.
[6] D. Kanaan, P. Wenger, and D. Chablat, Kinematic analysis of aserial-parallel machine tool: the VERNE machine, Mechanismand Machine Theory, 44(6), 2009, 487–498.
[7] Q. Zhe, L. Xiao-Chu, and Z. Zhuan, Delta parallel robot basedon crank-slider mechanism, International Journal of Roboticsand Automation, 6(2), 2017, 112–120.
[8] J. Sanjuan, M. Rahman, and I. Rulik, Forward kinematicanalysis of Dobot using closed-loop method, InternationalJournal of Robotics and Automation, 9(3), 2020, 153–159.
[9] D.C. Carp-Ciocardia, Dynamic analysis of Clavel's delta paral-lel robot, Proc. of the IEEE International Conference Robotics& Automation, Taipei, Taiwan, 2003, 4116–4121.
[10] M. Lopez, E. Castillo, G. Garcıa, and A. Bashir, Delta robot:inverse, direct, and intermediate Jacobians, Proceedings ofthe Institution of Mechanical Engineers Part C: Journal ofMechanical Engineering Science, 220(1), 2006, 103–109.
[11] F.C. Can, M. Hepeyiler, and ¨O. Baer, A novel inverse kinematicapproach for delta parallel robot, International Journal ofMaterials, Mechanics and Manufacturing, 6(5), 2018, 321–326.
[12] O. Meng, F. Xie, and X.J. Liu, Conceptual design and kinematicanalysis of a novel parallel robot for highspeed pick-and-placeoperations, Frontiers of Mechanical Engineering, 13(2), 2018,211–224.
[13] F. Ionescu ad D. Stefanoiu, HYPAS – A modular structuredmodel design, simulation and control programming environ-ment, Proc. of the IASTED Int. Conf. on Artificial and Com-putational Intelligence, Tokyo, Japan, 2002, 324–239.
[14] Y.Z. Zhao, H.N. Yu, J. Zhang, J.T. Yang, and T.S. Zhao,Kinematics, dynamics and control of a stabilized platform witha 6-RUS parallel mechanism, International Journal of Roboticsand Automation, 32(3), 2017, 283–290.
[15] Q. Yu, G. Wang, T. Ren, L. Wu, and K. Chen, An efficientalgorithm for inverse kinematics of robots with non-sphericalwrist, International Journal of Robotics and Automation, 33(1),2018, 45–52.
[16] H. Tang, D. Zhang, S. Guo, H. Qu, and G. Huang, Kinematicsanalysis of a novel 2r1t parallel mechanism, InternationalJournal of Robotics and Automation, 33(2), 2018, 120–132.
[17] A. Codourey, Dynamic modeling of parallel robots forcomputed-torque control implementation, The InternationalJournal of Robotics Research, 17(12), 1998, 1325–1336.
[18] P. Xu, B. Li, C.-F. Cheung, J.-F. Zhang, Stiffness model-ing and optimization of a 3-DOF parallel robot in a serial-parallel polishing machine, International Journal of PrecisionEngineering and Manufacturing, 18(4), 2017, 497–507.
[19] M. Weck and D. Staimer, Parallel kinematic machinetools-current state and future potentials, CIRP Annals-Manufacturing Technology, 51(2), 2002, 671–683.
[20] P. Guglielmetti and R. Longchamp, A closed form inversedynamics model of the delta parallel robot, Proc. of the 1994Int. Federation of Automatic Control Conf. on Robot Control,Capri, Italy, 1994, 39–44.
[21] L.W. Tsai, Solving the inverse dynamics of a Stewart–Goughmanipulator by the principle of virtual work, ASME Journalof Mechanical Design, 122(1), 2000, 3–9.
[22] M.A. Laribi, L. Romdhane, and S. Zeghloul, Analysis anddimensional synthesis of the DELTA robot for a prescribedworkspace, Mechanism and Machine Theory, 42(7), 2007,859–870.
[23] M.A. Laribi, L. Romdhane, S. Zeghloul, and H Wu, Advancedsynthesis of the DELTA parallel robot for a specified workspace,in Parallel manipulators towards new applications (London:Intech, 2008).


We are glad to announce that Clarisse won the Best Narrative Award at Valencia Indie Summit the last 2 March of 2018.
This is a general version of the code used on Clarisse to write text giving the impresion that you are typing.
We are proud to say that Clarisse has been Greenlit by the Steam Greenlight's community.


Appdios Inc. is an entity registered at California with company number C3498375. Company is incorporated on 8th August 2012. Current status of the company is Active. Registered agent is Sumit Kumar, 39281 Red Hawk Terrace, C104 Fremont CA 94538.
Do you know this company? Do you have positive or negative experience with Appdios Inc.? Rate the company and help other users.
H P Gift Design, Inc.
Promejoramiento San Pedro Cajonos International Benefit Organization Inc.


1. Meal Planning– Instead of winging it when dinner time rolls around or when we head to the grocery store, we're starting to actually plan out what we will enjoy for dinner each night. I've created this free downloadable meal plan & grocery list form to help get us on track. The form lists each day of the week, but we aren't going to be very rigid when it comes down to it. If we want to eat what we have listed on Thursday at dinner on Monday, we will.
2. Dave Ramsey Envelope System– We went through Financial Peace University prior to our son's birth in 2015. However, we have had multiple starts and stops on the budgeting train. To help get us back on track, we're going to start using the envelope system and FOOD is one of the categories that we'll be paying for in cash.
3. Coupons and Grocery Savings Apps- I am a huge fan of Walmart's Saving's Catcher app. I've saved $210.89 with the app, so far. I was just introduced to Iobatta and can see how combining this app with coupons will really help lower our bill and to earn money back.
We're new to saving on groceries and sure could use all the help we can get!
What's your biggest tip for saving money on your food bill?
I just started using the savings catcher. I used to make several stops to get sale priced items, but now I just let Wal-Mart pay me back.😉 I work for Wal-Mart, and get a 10% discount on some items already. Thankfully the app doesn't count my discount against my savings.
Good luck! I do budget and our food is always a big line item. I remember trying hard to reign in costs for a few years. It's amazing how constraints can sometimes feed creativity….


Although beekeeping is a global activity, this site is mainly about British beekeeping.
British beekeepers have the British weather and flora with which to work. This ranges from cold to warm and everything in between! Like all of us, bees aren't too keen on cold / wet weather.


This incredible Tree House comes with its own tree. Each tree house begins with a real 6' tall log that has been reclaimed from local ranches. The tree is hollowed out with a chainsaw; a little porch with a door is added, a window is cut in with an eave, add a flower box, and then a short ladder ascends through the clubhouse trap door. On top of the log is a cartoon inspired, whimsical clubhouse with crooked windows and sagging roofline. In keeping with our whimsical design, the pickets are recycled wine barrel staves which have been sanded and rustically painted. Every clubhouse features sturdy construction using Douglas fir framing and cedar board siding. Recycled cedar shingles cap off the roof, weather-proven paint accents the exterior, and fun 'rust' adorns the entire playhouse structure.


text:
Award enforcement
M&A Specific Risks
Patent Owners: Shield Yourselves from the Trolls
In the pressSubmit an application
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Litigation and Arbitration Insurance
By TheJudge
Trolls will typically either pay a relatively modest amount upfront to acquire A non-practising entity ('NPE') or "patent troll" acquires patents for the sole purpose of 'monetizing' those patents through litigation and licensing. A patent, or more commonly will share any revenue generated through licensing or litigation with the owner of the patent.
However, as an alternative, patent owners can use litigation funding and insurance to pursue their own patent enforcement campaigns, where they can crucially retain ownership and control of the IP rights, whilst maximising their net return. To find out more about how this can be acheived, contact us.
PATENT TROLLS – BACKGROUND
A patent troll is an entity which does not sell or manufacture the technologies in question, but instead seeks to acquire patents and generate revenue by actively and aggressively pursuing potential infringers through licensing and litigation.
Many patent owners who sell their IP rights to trolls may sacrifice control and future commercial value from the patent. A troll may offer the attraction of a short term financial gain however this may be at the expense of a significant share of future revenues. Even where the payment to the patentee is entirely revenue-based, the share may still be limited and significantly the NPE will dictate the strategy, potentially focussing on quick, low value settlements, rather than seeking to maximise value.
Trolls have increasingly become the focus of negative press in the US. Many companies operating in the high tech, telecoms or pharmaceutical sectors face the constant threat of troll litigation, which can be a significant draw on resource and capital. It is often felt that the patents being enforced are of dubious quality however the troll may seek a settlement below the likely defence cost, meaning that a nuisance settlement may nevertheless be extracted.
In England and Wales, the "loser pays costs" rule will typically deter unmeritorious claims, however in the US no such threat exists and therefore even highly speculative litigation may have a settlement value.
SHIELDING PATENT OWNERS FROM TROLLS
The US is seeking to protect patent owners from trolls through the Saving High-tech Innovators from Egregious Legal Disputes ('SHIELD') Act, which – it was announced earlier this month – may come into force later this year.
This would create a 'loser pays' system, whereby a patent troll would be potentially exposed to the legal costs of the defendant if it loses, however if the patent troll wins, the defendant would not be liable for the troll's costs. In this regard, the system would bear some similarities to the "One Way Costs-Shifting" regime which is currently being used in Personal Injury litigation in the UK (albeit with the costs-shifting flowing the other way).
However, it seems to us that defining what is or is not a "troll" may be difficult to achieve in reality. We are aware of several cases where a client has acquired a patent for genuine purposes, however having failed to successfully raise funds to commercialise the technology (possibly due to the infringement), they resort to litigation. On the other hand, there may presumably be loopholes potentially enabling trolls to circumvent the rules by say retaining close ties to the original inventor.
For more information on how IP litigation funding and insurance can help to protect patents and other IPR, please get in touch with one of our specialist brokers.
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The Judge is the trading name of TheJudge Limited — Registered in England & Wales no. 03941392 — Registered office at Amelia House, Worthing West Sussex BN 11 1QR.


So far, Altmetric has seen 430 news stories from 243 outlets.
Pharmacist Jim Pearce fills a Suboxone prescription at Boston Healthcare for the Homeless Program in Boston.
Now the GOP is defending the Obamacare repeal by attacking Hillary Clinton.
Aside from the wealthiest Americans, the GOP bill is all pain, no gain for everyone else.
Trump Says Obamacare Is 'Imploding.' That's News To California.
HUNTINGTON BEACH, Calif. ― There was a time when George Balteria worried the Affordable Care Act would put him out of business.
Obama lectured. Trump declares. The big difference between a Trump and Obama news conference.
Former president Barack Obama waves as he departs the U.S. Capitol after inauguration ceremonies in Washington, on Jan.
Was Obama a Transformational President?
More I began writing this column (originally in the form of a blog) in 2009, at the very beginning of Barack Obama's presidency.
If Hillary Clinton had been elected President, assessing Barack Obama's legacy would be a straightforward task.
Nancy Pelosi's one Obamacare regret? Relying too much on other Democrats for messaging.
Nancy Pelosi cannot think of a single part of the Affordable Care Act that has underperformed her expectations.


Transforming the World Heritage site into an immersive artwork.
teamLab continues to push the boundaries of its immersive light installations. Following the Japanese collective's "Summer Forest" exhibition in Kyushu is a brand new experiential work at a World Heritage site in Japan. Located at the Tadasu no Mori forest at Shimogamu Shrine, the forthcoming festival will boast a series of light installations including the organization's Resisting and Resonating Forest and Resisting and Resonating Ovoids piece along the road that approaches the shrine. Moreover, the tower gate will boast light artworks that change its appearance during human interaction.
"With the concept of 'delivering Japanese beauty and culture to the world,' we fuse opposing elements like technology and nature, progress, and tradition, or strength and beauty, and cherish the balance between them while we work to create a global beauty culture," said teamLab.
Get a closer look at the light festival below and expect the opening ceremony to commence on August 15. The installation will be on view until September 2. In related news, take a look at this week's best art drops.
Tom Hardy tries to handle his symbiote abilities.
Sherpa fleece, retro anoraks and watercolor camo.
Including collaborative surfboards by Krink and JunxJo.
Following its "Dark Stucco" edition.


text:
/* -*- Mode: C; c-basic-offset:4 ; indent-tabs-mode:nil ; -*- */
/*
 *  (C) 2006 by Argonne National Laboratory.
 *      See COPYRIGHT in top-level directory.
 *
 *  Portions of this code were written by Intel Corporation.
 *  Copyright (C) 2011-2012 Intel Corporation.  Intel provides this material
 *  to Argonne National Laboratory subject to Software Grant and Corporate
 *  Contributor License Agreement dated February 8, 2012.
 */

#include "scif_impl.h"

#undef FUNCNAME
#define FUNCNAME MPID_nem_scif_finalize
#undef FCNAME
#define FCNAME MPIDI_QUOTE(FUNCNAME)
int MPID_nem_scif_finalize(void)
{
    int i, ret;
    scifconn_t *it_sc;

    MPIDI_STATE_DECL(MPID_STATE_MPID_NEM_SCIF_FINALIZE);

    MPIDI_FUNC_ENTER(MPID_STATE_MPID_NEM_SCIF_FINALIZE);

    for (i = 0; i < MPID_nem_scif_nranks; ++i) {
        it_sc = &MPID_nem_scif_conns[i];
        if (it_sc->fd == -1) {
            continue;   /* no connection */
        }
        if (scif_close(it_sc->fd) == 0)
            it_sc->fd = -1;
    }
    MPIDI_FUNC_EXIT(MPID_STATE_MPID_NEM_SCIF_FINALIZE);
    return MPI_SUCCESS;
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Elton Pollock
Elton Pollock, a 1995 graduate of Presbyterian College, will begin his 14th season as head coach of the Blue Hose baseball program in 2018. Pollock follows Tim Corbin and Doug Kovash as the third head coach to lead the program since its reinstatement in 1988.
Last season, the Blue Hose turned in their best season since making the move to Division I, coming under Pollock's guidance. PC totaled a Division I era best 32 wins and a program record 15 Big South victories. The Blue Hose finished third in the Big South regular season standings, its best ever finish, before making a run to the conference championship game in just its second appearance in the Big South Tournament. PC had four players named to the All-Big South teams, its most since joining the league, before four PC players were named to the Big South All-Tournament team, PC's first to earn the honor.
PC totaled 47 home runs in 2017, its second-most since moving to Division I, while setting Division I era school records for ERA (4.32), opponent batting average (.262), strikeouts (433) and saves (16). Cletis Avery stole 19 bases on the season, Ryan Hedrick amassed 10 saves and Eric Miles recorded seven wins on the year, all Division I era school records.
In 2016, Pollock led the Blue Hose to its second straight 27-win season, tying the program's Division I era single-season record for wins. PC made the biggest gains in conference play in 2016, winning a school record (at the time) 12 Big South games, a six-game improvement from 2015. The team went on to make its first appearance in the Big South Championship in just its fourth year of being eligible for the event. The team set a number of records in 2016, both at the plate and on the mound, with PC setting single-season records for runs scored (321), RBIs (286), doubles (114) and stolen bases (67), in addition to opponent batting average (.263) and strikeouts per nine innings (7.06).
In 2015, Pollock helped the program to a PC Division I-record 27 wins that included victories over South Carolina, Clemson, UCF (No. 7 at the time) and Indiana (No. 22 at the time). PC ended the season by winning its final seven midweek games and won 21 non-conference games, another program Division I record. Pollock's guidance helped PC earn a First Team All-Big South honoree and an Honorable Mention selection while setting new Division I records in runs scored, strikeouts and strikeouts per game. The Blue Hose posted winning records at the PC Baseball Complex and against other South Carolina programs.
The 2013 campaign saw numerous high points under Coach Pollock, including developing junior pitcher Bud Jeter into a Major League Baseball First-Year Players Draft choice by the Arizona Diamondbacks. Jeter became the first Blue Hose in the Division I era to go in the MLB Draft and incoming freshman Brad Keller went in the ninth round of the draft as well.
PC set new Division I program-best in two key statistics in 2013 as well. The team's .972 fielding percentage shattered the previous best of .966 set in 2012 and the pitching staff's 4.40 ERA improved on 2011's previous record of 5.34 by nearly a full run. The Blue Hose also took series from strong programs like UConn, Charlotte, Wofford and Furman.
Pollock, a former two-sport standout at Presbyterian College from 1992-1995, returned to his alma mater in 2002 after spending seven years in the business world. While attending PC, Pollock earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Sociology with a minor in Computer Science. He was a three-year letter winner with the football team and a four-year letter winner with the baseball team. Pollock finished an impressive baseball career at PC and is still in the top five in many career offensive categories, including homeruns (34), slugging percentage (.616), triples (11), runs scored (169), and total bases (382).
Following his graduation, Pollock was drafted in the 15th round of the 1995 Major League Baseball Draft by the Pittsburgh Pirates. He spent three years in their minor league system before retiring in 1997. During his time with Pittsburgh, Pollock was mentored by the late Major League Hall of Famer Willie Stargell. He finished his professional career with a .250 batting average, 25 doubles, seven homeruns, and 49 stolen bases. Pollock was named "Player of the Month" for the entire organization for his play in August of 1995. That same year he helped lead the Augusta Greenjackets to the South Atlantic League Championship.
Pollock is married to the former Karen Prioleau of Greenville, SC, and the couple has four children, Madison, Lauren, Jordan and Trey. The family lives in Irmo, S.C.
Parker Bangs
Parker Bangs is set for his third season as the pitching coach at PC in 2018.
Bangs led the PC pitching staff to a number of Division I bests in 2017. The Blue Hose recorded a 4.32 ERA, .262 opponent batting average, 433 strikeouts and 16 saves, all Division I era program records. PC also allowed its fewest runs (321) and earned runs (258) since 2013, as PC recorded a Division I era best 32 wins, including a program-best 15 Big South wins. Under Bangs's guidance, hurlers Ryan Hedrick and Brian Kehner earned honorable mention All-Big South honors.
The Blue Hose pitching staff also made significant strides in 2016 in Bangs's first season with the program. Bangs helped PC to its second straight 27-win season, tying the school's Division I era record for victories. In addition, PC also established a school record with 12 Big South victories, a six-game improvement from 2015, and made its first appearance in the Big South Championship.
In 2016, the pitching staff held opposing hitters to a .263 batting average, the team's best single-season mark in its Division I era. PC pitchers also set the school's Division I era record for strikeouts per nine innings at 7.06, while ranking second for a single-season in ERA with 5.02 mark. PC pitching totaled 500.2 innings pitched, a D1 era program record, but allowed the second-fewest hits (509) in its D1 era.
Bangs, a former pitcher at South Carolina, won a National Championship with in the Gamecocks in 2010 before going on to play three seasons in the minor leagues. He made 47 appearances over three seasons (2008-10) for South Carolina, compiling a 7-5 record in 74.2 innings pitched with 94 strikeouts. The native of Laurinburg, N.C. also batted .301 for his career while totaling 21 doubles, 10 home runs and 60 RBIs in 226 career at-bats. The Gamecocks advanced to the NCAA Tournament in each of the three seasons in which he saw action.
Bangs was drafted by the Kansas City Royals in the 31st round of the 2010 MLB First-Year Player Draft. He pitched parts of three seasons in the minors, making 17 appearances with 27.2 innings pitched. His best season of professional baseball came in 2011 when he pitched 22.0 innings and recorded 28 strikeouts while holding hitters to a .274 average against him.
Prior to joining the Blue Hose, Bangs was the head coach and pitching coach of the Wilmington Sharks in the Coastal Plain League for the past two seasons. He spent three seasons as the head baseball coach at Heathwood Hall Episcopal School in Columbia, S.C. from 2013-15. Bangs also spent time as the pitching and hitting coach for the Columbia Blowfish of the Coastal Plain League and as the hitting coach at Dutch Fork High School in Irmo, S.C., following his playing career.
Bangs graduated from the University of South Carolina in May of 2010 with a degree in experimental psychology while minoring in sociology. He then earned then a master's degree in public administration from South Carolina in May of 2015. During his playing days, Bangs was named to the All-SEC Academic Team in 2008, 2009 and 2010 and earned All-SEC Freshman Academic honors during his red-shirt season in 2007.
Gil Walker
Gil Walker is in his first season at Presbyterian, joining the program in August 2017.
Walker comes to PC after spending two seasons as the volunteer assistant coach at his alma mater, Samford University. There he worked primarily with hitters and catchers, while also working with pitchers on arm strength development and recovery. The Bulldogs saw seven players sign professional contracts and seven earn All-Conference honors in Walker's two seasons with the program.
Prior to his time at Samford, Walker spent two seasons as assistant coach and recruiting coordinator at Lawson State Community College in Birmingham, Ala., serving under former Blue Hose head coach Doug Kovash. He served as the team's hitting coach in addition to coaching the team's infielders and catchers. During his time with the Cougars, 19 players went on to play at four-year schools, including seven at Division I programs, with the team making the conference tournament for the first time in school history in 2015 as the No. 3 seed.
Walker, a native of Birmingham, Ala., capped off his playing career with two seasons at Samford in 2011 and 2012, after two seasons at Wallace State Community College. He was member of the 2012 Bulldog team that is considered one of the best in school history, as they won 41 games en route to a SoCon Championship and an NCAA Tournament Appearance, advancing to the final of the Tallahassee Regional against Florida State.
Walker graduated from Samford in December of 2012 with a bachelor of science degree in sports administration. He is married to the former Kathryn Heasley.
His father, Tommy Walker, was inducted in to the Alabama Baseball Coaches Hall of Fame in 2014. Tommy won 187 games as Samford's head coach from 1989-1997, three Class 5A state titles as Spanish Fort's coach from 2005-2012 and a pair of area championships in a three-year tenure at Vestavia Hills. In 16 years as a high school head coach, the eldest Walker has a 368-201 record with 14 playoff appearances and has coached 42 players who went on to college baseball careers with eight successfully making it to the major leagues.
Volunteer Assistant Coach
Marshall McDonald
McDonald is in his first season at Presbyterian, joining the coaching staff in August 2017.
McDonald comes to PC after four seasons at Catawba Valley Community College in Hickory, N.C., including three as hitting coach. There he led the team to a school record for home runs in each of his three seasons as a full-time coach, culminating with 63 last season compared to just 13 prior to his arrival. He coached the NJCAA National Player of the Year Chandler Jenkins, who batted .460 with 18 home runs and 74 RBIs last season, and two Region 10 Players of the Year in Jenkins and Ty Andrus.
McDonald has also spent time coaching in the collegiate summer leagues throughout the past three seasons. He served as associate head coach of the Statesville Owls in 2015, head coach of the Lenoir Oilers in 2016 and assistant coach for Lexington County Blowfish in 2017. McDonald led the Oilers to the CVCL Championship as the head coach in 2016, as the team compiled a 39-17 record and led the league in home runs (50), doubles (112) and RBIs (357).
As a player, McDonald spent one season at Catawba Valley Community College, earning All-Region X honors, before playing his final two seasons at Montreat College. As a Cavalier, McDonald was named a team captain as a senior and earned a spot on the Appalachian Athletic Conference All-Academic team as a junior. The native of Red Springs, N.C. graduated from Montreat in 2012 with a bachelor's degree in communications.
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The Georgetown Farmers Market opens Wednesday, May 2, for its tenth season in Rose Park.
The Friends of Rose Park, in cooperation with the D.C. Department of Parks and Recreation, sponsors the Georgetown Farmers Market in Rose Park for another season. The market will be open, rain or shine, every Wednesday until Halloween from 3 p.m. until 7 p.m. near the corner of 26th and O Streets.
"The Friends of Rose Park has been delighted with the neighborhood support for this project in Rose Park, and we hope the Georgetown community will join us on opening day," according to the group.
Neighbors and volunteers interested in helping at the market one day a month and local non-profit groups interested in getting on the calendar at the market should e-mail RoseParkMarket@yahoo.com.
Rose Park is located between M and P Streets, N.W., bounded on the west side by 26th and 27th Streets and on the east side by Rock Creek Parkway. Its facilities include three tennis courts, a basketball court, a baseball diamond, two playground areas and substantial open space.


A camouflage cap that evokes military fashion is an essential accessory for children with a strong spirit of adventure.
A trendy hat, this soft baby cap and intriguing will give a gritty style to the look of every little man.
The camouflage headgear is a elasticated cap that ensures maximum comfort for each child's head.


Geology of the Dusky Sound area, Fiordland, with emphasis on the structural-metamorphic development of some pyroblastic staurolite pelites.
Structure, stratigraphy, and metamorphism in the Dansey Pass area, Otago, New Zealand.
Geology of the eastern Mackenzie Pass area.
Geology of Maruwenua district, North Otago.
Stratigraphy, petrology and geochemistry of the Brook Street Volcanics and Drumduan Group, Eastern Nelson, New Zealand.
Basement geology, northern Franklin Mountains, northern Fiordland, with emphasis on the origin and evolution of Fiordland granulites.
Stratigraphy, petrology, mineralogy and metamorphism of mainly Triassic rocks, Hokonui Hills, Southland, New Zealand.
Geology of the Thomson Mountains, northern Southland, New Zealand.