text:
Feeling the Vancouver Bern
Rod Mickleburgh: Bernie Sanders in Vancouver, Washington
Tilting at the windmills of politics called Super PACs, Bernie Sanders seems perfectly comfortable playing the modern equivalent of Don Quixote
By Rod Mickleburgh
VANCOUVER, WASH. — The 74-year old, white-haired politician advanced to the podium, and the roof nearly came off the Hudson's Bay High School gymnasium. No wonder. For nearly four hours, thousands of us had been standing in line, braving a cold, miserable rain, without even knowing whether we would be among the 5,000 or so lucky enough to make it inside. Our little group, friends after sharing the miserable ordeal outside, scraped through by the skin of our chattering teeth, but the doors soon closed on thousands more.
As the cheers continued to cascade down from the packed, rickety benches of the high school gym, Bernie Sanders leaned forward and shouted in his hoarse, Brooklynese. "All I can say is: WHOA!" The roar got louder. "It sounds to me like the people of Vancouver and the state of Washington are ready for a political revolution." Clearly they were, along with millions of other Americans across the country, who have been rallying in such astonishing numbers to the political phenomenon that is Bernie Sanders.
While the headlines and pundits focus on the truly frightening Donald Trump, Sanders has been going about his business, undeterred by numbers that show him with little chance of wresting the Democratic Party nomination from the well-connected Hillary Clinton. He pursues his quixotic quest with no sign of flagging enthusiasm, urging the crowd to register and show up for the coming caucuses to determine convention delegates for the State of Washington.
Feeling the Bern: Young people make up the biggest slice of Sanders pie.
Now it was our turn for the Bernie Sanders Socialist Revival Hour. The rally in Vancouver showcased just how much the Sanders campaign and its captivating slogan "A Future to Believe In" remains full of vigour. A pleasant but otherwise nondescript, mid-sized city just across the Columbia River from Oregon, founded by the Hudson's Bay Company, Vancouver is hardly a hotbed of political activism. Yet people began lining up at the crack of dawn for Sanders' early afternoon appearance. "There are a lot of people here I never thought would show up for a political rally," one soaked, early arriver told a reporter. Indeed, that has been a feature of the Sanders campaign from the beginning. Many of those flocking to his side are first-timers from well outside the traditional political spectrum. Millennials, in particular, were everywhere in the sea of Gortex and hoodies that stretched in all directions outside the school. "Maybe we can start a revolution," said the young nursing student ahead of us in the rain-lashed line.
And maybe they can. Later that day, 25,000 showed up to hear Sanders in Seattle, another 10,000 in Spokane. Campaign organizers have now audaciously booked Seattle's 45,000-seat Safeco Field for another mass public gathering. So far, Sanders has scored victories in 11 primaries and caucuses, securing a total of more than 900 delegates. Not bad for a Noam Chomsky-loving, self-proclaimed democratic socialist in a country where, until recently just to be branded a liberal was considered political death. It's really quite amazing.
Few, maybe not even Bernie Sanders, saw this coming when he announced his bid for the Democratic nomination last year. "The general consensus was that we were looking at a coronation, that there was an anointed candidate," said Sanders. He paused. "Well, ten months have come and gone, and it doesn't look to me like that's the case…." The fired-up crowd erupted in a frenzy of sign-waving and cheers.
As the primaries pile up and the convention nears, Sanders has not watered down his radical rhetoric and progressive policies one bit. There is no move to the mushy centre in search of undecided voters. His targets remain the billionaires, Wall Street speculators, multi-national drug companies, the corporate media "who talk about everything except the most important issues facing the American people", "militarized" police forces… The list is lengthy. His platform is pitched at the young and the powerless, low-wage earners struggling to make a living in a land, said Sanders, where corporations pack up and move, if they can make even a few dollars more somewhere else. The "real change" the United States needs is unlikely to come from "Secretary Clinton", he asserted bluntly, with her millions in campaign donations from Wall Street and trusts that include the fossil fuel industry and big pharmaceutical companies.
He laid it all out in a direct, forceful 45-minute speech, short on humour and niceties, long on all the ills of American society and, in the words of Lenin, "What Is To Be Done." Wild applause greeted every point he hammered home.
Like an old-time blues shouter, Sanders asked: "Are you ready for a radical idea?" The "Yes!" was deafening. "We are doing something extremely unusual in American politics," he confided. "We are telling the truth." And what is that truth? Sanders didn't mince words. "The truth is that the ruling class of this country is so powerful that a handful of billionaires believe that with their billions they have a right to win elections for the wealthy and the powerful…But we say 'no' to the corporate billionaires on Wall Street. We are a democracy, and we are not going to allow billionaires to take it away from us."
"We are doing something extremely unusual in American politics," he confided. "We are telling the truth."
Despite the USA's deep-seated history of red-baiting and anti-communism, Sanders is thriving with a socialist message that hasn't changed all that much in the 40 years he's been preaching it, a perennial lone wolf from the left. Yet suddenly, out of nowhere, people are listening and lapping it up. He has tapped into a lot of the working-class anger that has also helped propel Donald Trump to his current, scary prominence. The difference is that Trump's poisonous brand is exclusive, while Sanders' message is resolutely positive and inclusive. He wants a fair deal for everyone.
Sanders ploughs forward, undeterred by the legion of mainstream critics. "I've been criticized for saying this, so let me say it again," he told us, drawing a rare laugh from the audience. "Every country in the world guarantees health care to all its people. Yet 29 million Americans still have no health insurance. Many others are being forced to pay huge sums for their coverage, while the drug companies keep ripping us off," Sanders said. "I believe health care is a right, not a privilege. Medicare for all!" The declaration drew one of the loudest responses of the day. "Bernie! Bernie!" chanted the crowd. The chanters included the woman beside us who had shared her umbrella during our lengthy wait in line. She had asked about Canada's health care system, after telling us that full coverage for herself, her husband and two kids would cost a thousand dollars a month. So her husband is doing without. These are the people joining the Sanders crusade. Left behind by the powers that be, they feel no one cares for them but Bernie.
In Vancouver, they were almost all white, befitting the city's demographics, and predominantly young, like the teenaged couple sitting in front of us who interrupted persistent smooching to raise their right hands in a fist whenever Sanders said something they liked, which was often. "We've received more votes from people under 30 than Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton combined," trumpeted the junior Senator from Vermont.
Progressive promises piled up throughout his speech.
A nation-wide, minimum wage of $15 an hour.
A tax on "Wall Street speculation."
An end to "corporate tax loopholes."
An end to the War on Drugs (deafening whoops).
Fixing a "rigged economy" that has the top one-tenth of one percent owning "almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 per cent".
"comprehensive" immigration reform.
Taking on the fossil fuel industry to combat climate change and enhance sustainable energy.
Diversifying police forces "so they look like the people they're policing."
And finally, most popular of all, judging by the prolonged ovation it received: free tuition for all public college and university students. "Last I heard, getting an education is not a crime or a punishment," said Sanders, to ringing cheers. "We need the best educated work force in the world. So why are we punishing young people with crushing debt by the time they graduate?"
Not since the hapless, 1948 run by Henry Wallace of the Progressive Party has there been such a radical, presidential platform from the left. Although it would undoubtedly be premature to write him off completely, Sanders remains a long shot to win the Democrat nomination. But he has tapped into a deep yearning for meaningful change among Americans struggling to survive, while the rich grow ever wealthier. No one seems deterred by the term "socialist" any more. As one of Sanders' pollsters told the New Yorker, explaining millennial support for his candidate: "What's their experience been with capitalism? They've had two recessions, one really bad one. They have a mountain of student-loan debt. They've got really high health care costs, and their job prospects are mediocre at best. So that's capitalism for you."
Sanders has already forced an increasingly worried Hillary Clinton to tack leftward on a number of issues, and he is showing signs of cutting into her strong support among Afro-Americans. According to the latest Bloomberg poll, "feeling the Bern" has totally erased Clinton's once enormous lead in popular support, and the two are in a dead heat. The remarkable journey launched by that old leftie codger has a ways to go yet.
To read more Mickleburgh, click here, or visit Mickleblog.
Photos: Rod Mickleburgh
THE EX-PRESS, March 25, 2016
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One, two, three strikes — and Canada is out!
1 Reply to "Feeling the Vancouver Bern"
Michael Fish March 27, 2016 (5:26 am)
great article. Something similar needed in Canada. End the TPP, taking us all back to a time before the Magna Carta when disputes were settled with swords instead of courts and trials and juries.
Brrrrrp: We drink film for breakfast.
Movie review: MARGARET ATWOOD A Word after a Word after a Word is Power Copy
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Q: Texture memory with READ and WRITE I'm developing one CUDA app where kernel has to go to global memory many times. This memory is accessed by all CTAs randomly (no locality, so cannot use shared memory). I need to optimize it. I heard that texture memory can alleviate this problem but can kernel read and write into texture memory? 1D texture memory? 2D texture memory? Also what about CUDA arrays?

A: This is a follow-up to sgarizvi's answer.
Nowadays, cards with compute capability >=2.0 are much more common than in 2012, namely, at the time this question was asked.
Below, a minimal example on how using CUDA surface memory to write to a texture.
#include <stdio.h>

#include "TimingGPU.cuh"
#include "Utilities.cuh"

surface<void, cudaSurfaceType1D> surfD;

/*******************/
/* KERNEL FUNCTION */
/*******************/
__global__ void SurfaceMemoryWrite(const int N) {

    int tid = blockIdx.x * blockDim.x + threadIdx.x;

    surf1Dwrite((float)tid, surfD, tid * sizeof(float), cudaBoundaryModeTrap);
}

/********/
/* MAIN */
/********/
int main() {

    const int N = 10;

    cudaChannelFormatDesc channelDesc = cudaCreateChannelDesc<float>();
    //Alternatively
    //cudaChannelFormatDesc channelDesc = cudaCreateChannelDesc(32, 0, 0, 0, cudaChannelFormatKindFloat);

    cudaArray *d_arr;   gpuErrchk(cudaMallocArray(&d_arr, &channelDesc, N, 1, cudaArraySurfaceLoadStore));
    gpuErrchk(cudaBindSurfaceToArray(surfD, d_arr));

    SurfaceMemoryWrite<<<1, N>>>(N);

    float *h_arr = new float[N];
    gpuErrchk(cudaMemcpyFromArray(h_arr, d_arr, 0, 0, N * sizeof(float), cudaMemcpyDeviceToHost));

    for (int i=0; i<N; i++) printf("h_arr[%i] = %f\n", i, h_arr[i]);

    return 0;
}

A: This is a follow-up to Farzad's answer.
Farzad's point is highlighted in the CUDA C Programming Guide:

The texture and surface memory is cached (see Device Memory Accesses)
and within the same kernel call, the cache is not kept coherent with
respect to global memory writes and surface memory writes, so any
texture fetch or surface read to an address that has been written to
via a global write or a surface write in the same kernel call returns
undefined data. In other words, a thread can safely read some texture
or surface memory location only if this memory location has been
updated by a previous kernel call or memory copy, but not if it has
been previously updated by the same thread or another thread from the
same kernel call.

This means that one can modify the global memory locations the texture is bound to, but this must not happen in the same kernel in which texture fetches are operated. On the other side, "writing to a texture" in the above sense is possible across kernels since the texture cache is cleared upon a kernel launch, see cuda kernel for add(a,b,c) using texture objects for a & b - works correctly for 'increment operation' add(a,b,a)?.
Below, I'm providing an example in which the global memory locations the texture is bound to are modified. In this example, I call CUDA kernels in the following way
median_filter_periodic_boundary<<<iDivUp(N, BLOCKSIZE), BLOCKSIZE>>>(d_out, N);
...
square<<<iDivUp(N, BLOCKSIZE), BLOCKSIZE>>>(d_vec, pitch, N);
...
median_filter_periodic_boundary<<<iDivUp(N, BLOCKSIZE), BLOCKSIZE>>>(d_out, N);

In the median_filter_periodic_boundary kernel, texture fetches are operated, while in the square kernel, the global memory locations the texture is bound to are modified.
Here is the code:
#include <stdio.h>

#include "TimingGPU.cuh"
#include "Utilities.cuh"

texture<float, 1, cudaReadModeElementType> signal_texture;

#define BLOCKSIZE 32

/*************************************************/
/* KERNEL FUNCTION FOR MEDIAN FILTER CALCULATION */
/*************************************************/
__global__ void median_filter_periodic_boundary(float * __restrict__ d_out, const unsigned int N){

    int tid = threadIdx.x + blockIdx.x * blockDim.x;

    if (tid < N) {

        float signal_center = tex1D(signal_texture, (float)(tid + 0.5 - 0) / (float)N);
        float signal_before = tex1D(signal_texture, (float)(tid + 0.5 - 1) / (float)N);
        float signal_after  = tex1D(signal_texture, (float)(tid + 0.5 + 1) / (float)N);

        d_out[tid] = (signal_center + signal_before + signal_after) / 3.f;

    }
}

    /*************************************************/
    /* KERNEL FUNCTION FOR MEDIAN FILTER CALCULATION */
    /*************************************************/
__global__ void square(float * __restrict__ d_vec, const size_t pitch, const unsigned int N){

    unsigned int tid = threadIdx.x + blockIdx.x * blockDim.x;

    if (tid < N) d_vec[tid] = 2.f * tid;

}

/********/
/* MAIN */
/********/
int main() {

    const int N = 10;

    // --- Input/output host array declaration and initialization
    float *h_vec = (float *)malloc(N * sizeof(float));
    for (int i = 0; i < N; i++) h_vec[i] = (float)i;

    // --- Input/output host and device array vectors
    size_t pitch;
    float *d_vec;   gpuErrchk(cudaMallocPitch(&d_vec, &pitch, N * sizeof(float), 1));
    printf("pitch = %i\n", pitch);
    float *d_out;   gpuErrchk(cudaMalloc(&d_out, N * sizeof(float)));
    gpuErrchk(cudaMemcpy(d_vec, h_vec, N * sizeof(float), cudaMemcpyHostToDevice));

    // --- CUDA texture memory binding and properties definition
    cudaChannelFormatDesc channelDesc = cudaCreateChannelDesc<float>();
    //Alternatively
    //cudaChannelFormatDesc channelDesc = cudaCreateChannelDesc(32, 0, 0, 0, cudaChannelFormatKindFloat);
    size_t texture_offset = 0;
    gpuErrchk(cudaBindTexture2D(&texture_offset, signal_texture, d_vec, channelDesc, N, 1, pitch));
    signal_texture.normalized = true;
    signal_texture.addressMode[0] = cudaAddressModeWrap;

    // --- Median filter kernel execution
    median_filter_periodic_boundary<<<iDivUp(N, BLOCKSIZE), BLOCKSIZE>>>(d_out, N);
    gpuErrchk(cudaPeekAtLastError());
    gpuErrchk(cudaDeviceSynchronize());

    gpuErrchk(cudaMemcpy(h_vec, d_out, N * sizeof(float), cudaMemcpyDeviceToHost));
    printf("\n\nFirst filtering\n");
    for (int i=0; i<N; i++) printf("h_vec[%i] = %f\n", i, h_vec[i]);

    // --- Square kernel execution
    square<<<iDivUp(N, BLOCKSIZE), BLOCKSIZE>>>(d_vec, pitch, N);
    gpuErrchk(cudaPeekAtLastError());
    gpuErrchk(cudaDeviceSynchronize());

    gpuErrchk(cudaMemcpy(h_vec, d_vec, N * sizeof(float), cudaMemcpyDeviceToHost));
    printf("\n\nSquaring\n");
    for (int i=0; i<N; i++) printf("h_vec[%i] = %f\n", i, h_vec[i]);

    // --- Median filter kernel execution
    median_filter_periodic_boundary<<<iDivUp(N, BLOCKSIZE), BLOCKSIZE>>>(d_out, N);
    gpuErrchk(cudaPeekAtLastError());
    gpuErrchk(cudaDeviceSynchronize());

    printf("\n\nSecond filtering\n");
    gpuErrchk(cudaMemcpy(h_vec, d_out, N * sizeof(float), cudaMemcpyDeviceToHost));
    for (int i=0; i<N; i++) printf("h_vec[%i] = %f\n", i, h_vec[i]);

    printf("Test finished\n");

    return 0;
}

Please, note the following:

*

*I'm NOT binding the texture to a cudaArray, since cudaArrays cannot be modified from within kernels;

*I'm NOT binding the texture to a cudaMalloced array, since textures bound to cudaMalloced arrays can only be fetched by tex1Dfetch and tex1Dfetch does not the cudaAddressModeWrap addressing mode guaranteeing the periodic extension of the signal outside its boundaries;

*I'm binding the texture to a cudaMallocPitched array, since this makes it possible fetching the texture by tex1D, which allows the cudaAddressModeWrap addressing mode;

*I'm using normalized coordinates, because only those enable the cudaAddressModeWrap addressing mode.

I needed points #2, #3 and #4, since I extracted this example from a code I was writing.

A: CUDA Textures are read only. Texture reads are cached. So performance gain is probabilistic.
CUDA Toolkit 3.1 onwards also have writeable textures known as Surfaces, but they are available only for devices with Compute Capability >=2.0. Surfaces are just like textures but the advantage is that they can also be written by the kernel.
Surfaces can only be bound to cudaArray created with flag cudaArraySurfaceLoadStore.

A: I would reccomend declaring your memory as pitched linear memory and bind the with texture. I have not experiment with the new bindless texture yet. Anyone tried it?
Texture mem as mentioned is read-only through cache. Treat it as a read-only memory.
Thus, it is important to note that within the Kernel itself, you do not write to the memory binded to the texture as it may not be updated to the texture cache.

A: I came across this question, and with a bit of search I found this question and this answer to it useful.
Basically texture memory is global memory. Texture memory refers to the special caching mechanism that can be associated with global memory reads. So kernel can manipulate global memory bounded to the texture. But as it shows in provided link there's no instruction such as tex1D(ref, x) = 12.0.

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Norwalk, CT – February 5, 2010 – The Aviation Industry CBT (Computer-Based Training) Committee (AICC) has certified version 5 of the Questionmark™ Perception™ assessment management system as compliant with AGR-010 (The AICC Guideline for Web Based Computer Managed Instruction Systems).
Perception was the first assessment software system to achieve the AICC standard and has now been certified for the fifth time. This makes Questionmark the first product vendor to have gone through five consecutive two-year certification cycles. The new award reaffirms Perception's longstanding ability to link seamlessly with enterprise management systems that are also compliant with the AICC guideline and demonstrates Questionmark's commitment to support open standards.
Questionmark Perception version 5 makes it simpler to deliver a single assessment to many different types of devices and manage the combined results all together. Questionmark auto-senses each device and delivers assessments to it in the right format, automatically. A single assessment can be delivered to desktops, laptops, smart phones and other mobile devices — or embedded within wikis, blogs or Web pages. The new system also provides streamlined management of multilingual assessments and, in addition to providing built-in accessibility tools, is easy to use with assistive technologies. Enhanced scalability and security, as well multilingual participant interfaces and streamlined management of multilingual assessments, are among other recent improvements.
About the AICC AICC exists to provide and promote information, guidelines, and standards that result in the cost-effective implementation of computer-based training (CBT) for the aviation industry and the worldwide training community. Founded in 1988, the AICC is made up of a wide variety of industry experts from airframe and engine manufacturers, component suppliers, airlines, regulatory agencies, researchers, training content developers, training software developers, and whole-solution providers. For membership and additional information visit: www.aicc.org.


I wrote feature articles for LoganSquarist.com, a hyper-local online news outlet that uses social media to socialize the Logan Square neighborhood in Chicago. I covered Health & Wellness, Arts, and other area news, events and announcements.
I wrote health content for digital health coaching programs, which combine advanced technology and behavioral science to emulate a live health coach. I consulted with physicians, dietitians, and behavioral scientists to create meaningful, individually tailored content.


text:
Programmable Thermostats for a Smarter Home
A completely new design from Ecobee (which may disturb Nest)
Lombard co-founded Ecobee, a Canadian company that made the world's first Wi-Fi-connected thermostat years back, spent the past three years watching the world fawn over its competitor Nest's futuristic design. Today (September 16th, 2014) the company is unveiling its answer to Nest, the Ecobee 3. It's a jet-black square with rounded edges that looks like nothing else the company has made before, especially its predecessor: a white box with a touchscreen that Ecobee sold patterned Gelaskin stickers for, basically to hide the thing.
The Ecobee 3's weather display
By comparison, the Ecobee 3 is something the company wants you to stop and look at each time you walk by it in your house. When it's not showing you the temperature inside your house, it doubles as a weather station, giving you the upcoming forecast. And just like Nest, Ecobee is pitching it as something that does all the scheduling for you, saving time and money in the process.
The 3 is the result of a two-year collaboration with Lunar Design, a boutique design group headquartered in San Francisco that has designed everything from Apple's first notebook computer to ice cream scoops. The two companies took all the features from Ecobee's existing model and have constructed a new user interface that looks and functions the same whether you're using it on the wall-mounted thermostat or on your phone. That's not a new idea in the world of apps (or even thermostats), but has resulted in software and hardware that feels like one in the same.
The new thermostat uses a capacitive touchscreen, with colored pixels that pop out from a black background as you approach it. Where Nest and Honeywell's Lyric zig with color, Ecobee zagged with dark contrast. Ecobee has also strayed from the idea of a rotating, circular dial, choosing instead a virtual knob that can be maneuvered up or down a track to change the temperature. The same screen then fades to show you things like the local weather forecast, and will let you create and adjust programming schedules. If you're on a tablet or connecting to your thermostat in your browser, you can see this interface and just about every other feature on one screen so you don't have to dig through menus.
The new design replaces Ecobee's previous model, the Smart Thermostat. Ecobee still plans to sell its less expensive, $179 Smart Si thermostat, which it introduced two years ago as its entry-level model.
Beyond the redesign, the Ecobee 3's big new feature is that it integrates tiny companion sensors that you can put in every room of your house. Each one tracks temperature and motion, so that the system can adjust for what room you're in, instead of simply sensing where the thermostat is installed. One of these sensors is built right into the unit, and you get another in the box that's powered by batteries, and can be placed on any flat surface, or mounted onto walls. The system works with up to 32 sensors, in case you have a house like Bill Gates. Lombard says this sort of automatic, targeted adjustment is the top thing people have asked for over the years, and results in a better reading of the temperature where people are versus where they drilled something into the wall.
"For a lot of people, that's like their thermostat in their dining room," Lombard says. That would be fine if people spent most of their time there, but in reality, they don't. "Being able to put a sensor into a room that you actually use, and your ability to detect whether people are home or not and turn back your temperature goes up significantly." That kind of setup is also easier than requiring everyone in your family to run apps on their phones that are tracking where they are, just to help the system out, Lombard argues.
The new model also promises an installation that consumers can do themselves. Where previous iterations relied heavily on professional HVAC installers, Lombard says the company wanted this to be something ordinary people could take out of the box and get up and running in 45 minutes or less. "We tried to go through every step, and determine every time where someone might have gotten confused," Lombard says (this is a big change. If you can read the reviews of the previous Ecobee Thermostat, you will see that the consumers were really happy about the functionality and the flexibility, but the installation was a headache).
THE GOAL IS FOR PEOPLE TO INSTALL IT ON THEIR OWN
To aid in that, Ecobee made two changes to keep people from getting tripped up: one is detecting your wiring and automatically configuring its software settings accordingly; the other is including power extender hardware, so that it can be plugged into the furnace in homes where the existing wiring doesn't deliver enough juice. The company used to charge for this part as a $25 add-on, but Lombard says that it was worth adding out of the box for people who didn't have the ideal wiring setup.
As for how all this will save on bills, Lombard says it's all about scheduling, and touts Ecobee's technology as the best at doing this. Citing figures from the US Environmental Protection Agency, he says that 80 percent of programmable thermostats go unprogrammed (!!!). By comparison, he says, the Ecobee 3 comes with a preprogrammed schedule that it adjusts based on information it gathers from its occupancy sensors and your local weather forecast. The company also gets pricing from local utility companies, and will alert people when they can make adjustments to save money. Together, these things add up to what Ecobee estimates will be a 23 percent annual savings over typical programmable thermostats.
Let's wait, see and test the real product.
The Latest Programmable Thermostat / Smart Thermostat Reviews
How to use a programmable thermostat? (tips from real life)
The Best Thermostat Configurations for Summer (and Winter)
Couple Tips (and Tricks) for Nest Smart Thermostat
Google, T3007ES, Nest Learning Thermostat, 3rd Gen, Smart Thermostat, Stainless Steel, Works With Alexa
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I would like to ask how to write a side story and develop some side charters that will be loved by the readers? I would like to develop some sort of strong feelings of the readers towards side characters too.
Response: Let's assume that in your main plot has a particular story goal or problem as well as a theme. One way to use a side story or subplot is to present a different look at the same theme or to explore the problem from a different angle. By giving the reader a chance to see the issues from different perspectives you can give a more complete exploration. For instance, if your theme is selfishness vs. generosity, you can use subplots to explore different situations where either selfishness or generosity lead to good or bad outcomes. Or if you were exploring an issue such as war, you could use subplots to tell the stories of various people involved in or affected in different ways by a war, giving a very well rounded view of it.
As for making characters the reader will love, that partly comes from creating characters the reader can empathize with because they can see themselves in the character. The character has some of the same emotions, frailties, doubts, that the reader shares - even if they wouldn't admit them to others. Readers love characters they find endearing - well intentioned characters with limitations. They also love characters who have some of the same desires most of us have and the strengths we all wish we had (often in addition to the weaknesses we know we have).
You can also provoke emotions by creating characters the reader recognizes as like people they have encountered. Maybe none of us has met someone exactly like Ebeneezer Scrooge, but most of us have encountered selfish people. Maybe we haven't met a teacher exactly like Dolores Umbridge, but we certainly have seen manipulative or controlling people.
Of course, it helps to know your audience. If you're writing for children, bear in mind that children tend to empathize with characters their own age and admire characters a little older.
According to Dramatica theory, women tend to empathize more with characters of either gender who are running out of options to solve their problem, while men tend to empathize more with male characters who are running out of time to solve their problem.
And how to find a way how to connect the the side charter to the main hero. I have some side characters in mind but their connection to my main two chacaters is distant, so it gets hard for me to develope some stry aroud them.
Well, how your various plotlines connect is just something you'll have to make up on your own. But that's part of the fun.


It seems as if Jack and Meg were captivated by my fair hometown.
PS I'd be willing to bet no other music blog used the phrase "Transit Tom" to describe the jam session that happened on a Winnipeg Transit Bus.
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text:
Foreign News Finds Niche on the Net
Both newspapers and TV networks are venturing into cyberspace to report on global issues
By Dirk Smillie Special to The Christian Science Monitor
International stories on the nightly newscasts dropped precipitously over the past decade, as the major US television networks closed foreign news bureaus and cut the number of their overseas correspondents.
But now these same networks are renewing their commitment to international news - in cyberspace.
Web sites operated by the networks are becoming rich repositories of breaking stories and international reports that never make it on the evening news.
If foreign news is finding its niche on the net, it may be because the medium matches the message. By definition, the Internet is international. Its vast communications grid allows massive amounts of data to be conveyed to multiple users at minimal cost. And unlike most mediums, cyberspace offers journalists a bottomless "news hole" and a growing global audience estimated to be 30 million to 50 million people.
This year, international news in cyberspace is poised for even more growth. Redesigns of network Web sites are under way at ABC, CBS, CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC. Some sites will offer more personalized news; others, bolder graphics. The one feature they'll all share is a major expansion of international news.
In March, CNN Interactive will more than triple its foreign coverage as it expands its "World" news section into five subsections covering Europe, Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Latin America, and the Middle East. As part of its redesign of its Web site in June, MSNBC will launch a series of culturally customized news pages aimed at citizens in countries such as Germany, France, and Japan. Web surfers clicking on MSNBC's site from Munich, for example, will get national news in German and international news from a European perspective.
"There's a real thirst on the Internet for international news, something you don't see among television audiences," says Andy Beers, executive producer for news at MSNBC On the Internet.
Scott Ehrlich, director of Fox News Internet, agrees, noting that foreign news on Fox's Internet site is one of its most popular features. "The appetite for international news is definitely there, especially among recent immigrants and those who are strongly attached to their ethnic heritage."
Efforts to expand the international news beat are driven largely by network news executives who believe in filling a niche they see left abandoned by newspapers and network newscasts.
Reuters, one of the first international news providers on the Web, draws an average of 3.5 million "hits" a day from Internet users logging on to the 35 Web sites and on-line services that subscribe to Reuters' wire services, says Wendy Zajack, Reuters' manager of media relations. "News on a Web site keeps bringing people back to it," says Ms. Zajack.
At CNN Interactive, the "World" section for international news is one of the top three destinations for the CNN site, says Scott Woelfel, vice president and editor in chief of CNN Interactive. Drawing on CNN's 30 news bureaus around the world, the network's Web site offers between 50 to 100 pages of new content daily, and the site's content is divided equally between domestic and international news. About 30 percent of those who visit the site come from outside the US, says Mr. Woelfel.
Whether an international story breaks from the United States or abroad, the audience for foreign news in cyberspace remains US-centric. Last December, MSNBC held a live, one-hour chat session with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to discuss the Middle East peace accords. The chat drew about 3,000 visitors: 75 percent from the US, 10 percent from the Middle East, 10 percent from Europe, and 5 percent from Asia. Research shows that those who draw their news from the Web fit the profile of typical cyberspace users: overwhelmingly male and college-educated, between 25 and 45 years old, married, and making more than $50,000 per year.
For now, the economic model for news on the Web emphasizes prestige, not profits. None of the networks' Web sites are reported to be making any money.
In competing for international news audiences, the networks' Web sites face more than just competition among themselves. Besides global news giants like the Associated Press, Dow Jones, Reuters, and the BBC, virtually every nation with Web access delivers international news in cyberspace.
The Web is rapidly becoming a media melting pot of globally available information, where one can locate more than 50 Italian on-line newspapers and magazines just a click away from Iraq's four-language "Kurdistan Web." In addition, hundreds of government information ministries and on-line parliamentary publications feed their own brand of news to the Web daily. More than 1,000 daily newspapers outside the US are on-line, with more launching every day.
The Christian Science Monitor itself has a site that has recently seen dramatic growth in its audience. The Monitor, which won the 1996 Pulitzer Prize for international reporting, now draws nearly 30,000 visitors a week to its Web site.
Stories that resonate across national boundaries often involve celebrities, political scandals, or the health of heads of state. When the verdict was announced in the O.J. Simpson civil trial, the decision appeared among top stories on newspaper Web sites around the world.
As the bandwidth of international news flow continues to broaden, new technologies will also play a role in how news is delivered on the Web. Merrill Brown, editor in chief of MSNBC On the Internet, says that his site's emphasis on international news will also be an opportunity to "reinvent our own storytelling techniques."
In the future, says Mr. Brown, "We're going to illustrate stories with multimedia - photos, video, audio clips - which is going to be very alluring to people who may be turned off by the generally straightforward nature of international coverage."
New ways to report the news are what make the medium of cyberspace so exciting, says Ronni Bennett, managing editor of CBS News on the Web.
"It's like being in television in 1947," says Ms. Bennett. "Anyone who's working on the Web these days is literally inventing it. We're making it up as we go along."
NETWORKS' WEB SITES
Planned dates of major Web-site redesigns are given in parentheses.
CBS News On the Web (fall)
http://www.cbsnews.com
CNN Interactive (summer)
Fox News Internet (March)
MSNBC On the Internet (June)
http://www.msnbc.com
ABC News Online is scheduled to launch in April.
MSNBC.com joint venture dissolved, Microsoft and NBC go separate ways
Not just sexy Kim Jong-un: 5 times the Onion has fooled foreign media
Is America's media divide destroying democracy?


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One-punch attack by 'coward' outside pub left 56-year-old unconscious on the pavement
Lewis Waugh attacked the man after being headbutted by him in the pub earlier
Samuel Jones
Lewis Waugh from Stockton who appeared at Teesside Crown Court accused of GBH. (Image: Teesside Live)
A jaw fractured in three places, a damaged eye socket and lost teeth were some of the shocking injuries sustained by a man knocked unconscious in a one-punch assault outside a Stockton pub.
The sickening "coward's attack" by Lewis Waugh on a man in his 50s left the victim needing an operation to put a plate and screws in his broken jaw.
But the 21-year-old avoided jail after a judge ruled justice could be served in the form of a community order.
Teesside Crown Court heard on Wednesday how Waugh had been out at pub on March 3 this year when he was headbutted in the toilets by the victim, prosecutor Harry Hadfield said.
Waugh responded by punching the 56-year-old before he was thrown out.
The victim was also ordered to leave the venue around 10 minutes later when the attack unfolded.
Mr Hadfield explained: "The defendant approaches from the left and punches him to the head."
The man was knocked unconscious, as he "fell to the pavement and banged his head."
The punch was witnessed by a doorman at the venue.
Mr Hadfield added: "He heard the defendant shout words to the effect that he was going to kill the complainant."
The bouncer said in his view it was a "coward's attack."
The man spent two days in hospital where he was treated for three fractures to his jaw, damage to his eye socket, two lost teeth and a black eye.
The original fight centred around a dispute regarding the victim's son. Mr Hadfield explained: "His son used to go out with a girl and it seems the defendant may have gone out with that girl."
Gary Wood, defending, told the court how Waugh had pleaded guilty to the charge of inflicting grievous bodily harm at an early stage in court proceeedings.
Mr Wood said that the attack wasn't a case of his client waiting for the victim.
"He was waiting for his friends so they could move on and go somewhere else," he said.
"It was at that stage that the complainant was also removed from the establishment by the door staff."
He added: "He was shocked that he fell to the floor and hadn't intended to cause the injuries that he caused."
The court was also told how Waugh intends to apologise for his actions.
Judge Peter Armstrong said that the victim had effectively been "blindsided" and "unable to roll with the punch."
But he said that the fact that the man had headbutted Waugh lowered his culpability, along with the fact that he had previously been a man of good character.
He said: "The justice in this case can be met by imposition of a community order with requirements attached."
Tears in packed public gallery as victims watch fraud pair get sent to jail
Waugh, of Darlington Road, Stockton, was given a 12 month community order, ordered to complete 100 hours unpaid work and to attend 20 rehabilitation activity requirement days.
The court also heard how the victim who was said to have headbutted Waugh was not prosecuted after the defendant made no complaint against him.
Courts'If I had a wing full of people like Wayne...': Prison reference helps cut burglar's jail termWayne Cuthbert, 38, vowed to 'try' to lead an honest life as he was jailed for his eighth home burglary, along with a dash from police in A&E


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People and community
Emergency planning and community safety
Surrey Police and Crime Panel
Complaints about the Police and Crime Commissioner
The Police and Crime Panel has a responsibility to informally resolve non-criminal complaints about the conduct of the Police and Crime Commissioner and Deputy Police and Crime Commissioner, as well as criminal complaints or conduct matters that are referred back to it by the Independent Police Complaints Commission.
If you have a complaint relating to the conduct of the Police and Crime Commissioner or his Deputy, you should in the first instance contact:
Address: The Chief Executive, Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner, PO Box 412, Guildford, Surrey GU3 1BR
Email: SurreyPCC@Surrey.police.uk
The Panel has agreed that all complaints will initially be dealt with by the Chief Executive of the PCC's Office. With the exception of when the complaint is already being dealt with through criminal proceedings, the Chief Executive will be responsible for receiving, logging and forwarding complaints to the most appropriate body.
The Panel can only consider complaints in relation to the Commissioner and his Deputy. For non-criminal complaints that fall outside of this remit, the Chief Executive will forwarded the matter on to the most appropriate body.
When it receives a complaint, the Panel will arrange for a meeting of its Complaints Sub-committee, normally within four weeks. The Panel will write to both the complainant and the person complained about, setting out timescales and providing details of the informal resolution procedure. The Panel will also invite both sides to submit comments in support of their case.
At its meeting, the Complaints Sub-committee will consider the information submitted and determine the most suitable course of action to assist with the informal resolution of the complaint.
Writing a letter of explanation to the complainant
Requesting that the PCC or one of his or her staff write a letter of explanation to the complainant
Suggesting a change in policy
Requesting that the person complained about issue an apology
With the exception of inviting comments from both the complainant and the person complained about, and inviting the latter to attend its meeting to answer questions, neither the Panel nor the Complaints Sub-committee is authorised to conduct an investigation.
Once a decision has been made, the Complaints Sub-Committee will notify those involved usually within 5 working days of the meeting. The Panel will be provided with an update on all complaints dealt with by the Complaints Sub-committee on a quarterly basis.
Complaints about the Police and Crime Panel
Any complaints about the Police and Crime Panel should be referred to the Local Government Ombudsman.
Refreshed Surrey Police & Crime Panel Complaints Protocol-13 July 2017
The Police and Crime Panel met on Thursday 13 July 2017 and agreed the adoption of a new Complaints Protocol which can be accessed below. A complaint handling flowchart which sets out the Panels complaint handling process is also available to download.
Complaints Protocol 2017 (PDF)
Complaint handling flowchart (PDF)
Updated: 17 Jul 2017


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Home > Resources > Articles > HCL and Google partner on new cloud business
HCL and Google partner on new cloud business
HCL technologies and Google Cloud have announced the launch of a cloud business unit to support enterprise cloud adoption.This is a dedicated business group within HCL that will be supported by engineering and business teams from Google Cloud.HCL, an Indian-based IT and consultation company that spun out of the R and D division of HCL Enterprises in 1991, said it currently has more than 1,300 professionals trained on the Google Cloud Platform (GCP) and plans to expand this capacity to more than 5,000 specialists in the near future. Enterprise customers will receive support in areas like containerisation, hybrid and multi-cloud, the companies claimed.Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian said: "The cloud is at the heart of innovation and digital transformation for enterprises and that it unlocks new opportunities for them to tackle their most important challenges.Through our partnership with HCL, we can help organizations deploy Google Cloud broadly and at scale, and move their most critical, data-intensive workloads to GCP.
Appirio is a global services company that helps customers create next-generation Worker & Customer Experiences using the latest cloud technologies. Our free-thinking consultants deliver unmatched customer value by creating actionable strategies that deliver results quickly and help organizations adapt to a new experience-driven era. We do this by harnessing the power of one of the world's largest crowdsourcing communities and thousands of pre-built solution accelerators.
2022 the 7th International Conference on Big Data Analytics


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Kia ora Mark Cartwright
Mark Cartwright is buzzing with excitement about his new role as Head of College: Engineering, Construction & Living Sciences.
Mark, who takes up the position on Monday, 21 June, describes the job as "amazing" and a "natural, albeit significant step" on his career pathway.
"I am moving from a highly rewarding position as General Manager for Workforce Central Dunedin, where I have been responsible for establishing the job and skills hub linked to the New Dunedin Hospital with a small team."
Mark has extensive experience within work-based learning environments, including leading team culture transformation, developing and sustaining an engaged workforce, planning, implementing regional strategy and operational oversight.
Mark is also a strong advocate of diversity within the sector. During his time working at BCITO, he championed the "Women in Trades" programme, his team contributing to the Southern region having the highest participation levels of females in construction-related trades nationally.
Like many within the sector, Mark is committed to ongoing professional development. He has just completed an Executive Master of Business Administration through Massey.
"I am a collaborative leader. I like to engage with stakeholders and customers and am genuinely results-focused.
"I am looking forward to having my abilities challenged as I attempt to help Otago Polytechnic in its continual efforts to improve as an organization."
Mark will be welcomed to Otago Polytechnic with a mihi on Monday, 21 June, at 9am


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Harvey Wander
February 1, 2018, 11:36 am 0 Edit
WANDER: Harvey Wander, age 94, of White Oak, died Tuesday, January 30, 2018. He was born January 10, 1924 in Elizabeth, Pa., son of the late Morris and Minnie Mermelstein Wander. A well-known figure in Pittsburgh, he was an entrepreneur and business owner. He managed the first rock and roll club in Pittsburgh. He subsequently established Harvey's House on Federal Street and later formed the Harvey Wander Agency, a bail bond business. He was a member of the Pleasant Hills-Guthrie Lodge #509 F&AM. He was also a member of Scottish Rite where he received his 32nd degree. He was also dedicated and active in the Shrine as well. A sports enthusiast, he coached amateur basketball in White Oak and was a Pittsburgh Steelers season ticket holder for more than 50 years. He is survived by his devoted wife of 71 years, Irene Rudick Wander; son, Jeffrey (Lisa) Wander of Cuyutlan, Mexico; daughter, Elyse Wander of Washington, D.C.; grandchildren, Joshua, Meghan, Layne; and great-grandchildren, Calina, Zoe and Scarlett. Family and friends gathered at Strifflers of White Oak Cremation and Mortuary Services, Inc. Rabbi Paul Tuchman officiated. Burial at Temple Cemetery.


It happens more often than you'd think: Research scientists go digging around the dusty collections of your local natural history museum and find species hitherto unknown to science. Whatever sits on display when you visit — ancient human art, towering dinosaurs, slightly off-putting taxidermy — is just the tip of the iceberg. Countless specimens remain unseen — not just by museum patrons, but often by staff as well.
"There's all this stuff that no one has ever had time to go through," Alexandra Boersma, who studies fossil marine mammals at the Smithsonian, told The Washington Post. So to find new species, all you have to do is wander around the museum's dustiest corridors. Along with her lab's principle investigator Nicholas D. Pyenson, Boersma went hunting for interesting projects.
"Some of it has been sitting there for decades," Boersma said. "No one has gotten around to describing it."
On Tuesday, she and Pyenson introduced their latest find to the scientific community: A 25 million-year-old river dolphin they've dubbed Arktocara yakataga. The species, described for the first time in a study published in PeerJ, sat on the shelf for more than half a century and caught Boersma's eye because of its "beautiful, cute little skull."
While there are three or four species of river dolphin that exist today (one of them may have already gone extinct, but scientists aren't sure whether any individuals remain), one stands apart from the rest: The South Asian river dolphin Platanista is the last remaining member of a separate lineage from the rest of the crew. The other species are similar to one another, but more like an oceanic dolphin than like their fellow river-dweller Platanista.
But as luck would have it, Arktocara yakataga appears to be a close relative of Platanista, a dolphin that swims on its side and uses echolocation to navigate murky rivers without the ability to see. Arktocara yakataga is the oldest member of the Platanistoidea family ever found — it lived right at the time when whales were breaking into the ancestral groups that would evolve into modern whales — which helps prove that Platanista represents the remains of an ancient lineage.
Unfortunately, that ancient lineage is hanging on by a thread. Platanista is poorly understood and tragically endangered. Fishing nets, pollution and habitat disruption have left just a few thousand dolphins swimming in the rivers of Nepal, India, Bangladesh and Pakistan. The researchers hope that this evidence will help conservationists push for greater protection of the Platanista holdouts.
The other intriguing thing about Arktocara yakataga is that it was reportedly found up in Alaska, which would mean the dolphin dwelled in the ancient Arctic.
"It was striking and really kind of bizarre that this huge group of marine dolphins that were up in the Arctic and all over the world has dwindled to this one species that's stuck in freshwater systems in Asia," Boersma said, adding that the whales that live in the Arctic today — belugas and narwhals, for example — are known to have descended from whales that lived farther south during Arktocara yakataga's time.
"It would be interesting to know what whales started out in the Arctic," Boersma said. "It would give us a better sense of how whales first adapted to those new climates, and maybe give us a sense of how well they might adapt in the future, now that climate is changing so rapidly."
Are black holes really all that black? A new study supports Stephen Hawking's theory.


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What can Ohio learn from other state guardianship programs? - Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada
What can Ohio learn from other state guardianship programs?
Katie Ellington
Ohio Center for Investigative Journalism
Nevada addressed guardianship abuse after a fraud case drew national attention.
CLEVELAND, Ohio – Ohio isn't the only state concerned about vulnerable seniors.
Minnesota tackled financial elder abuse in 2012 by establishing a Conservator Account Auditing Program (CAAP).
It created an online system for uploading records of court-appointed conservators and hired a team of auditors to periodically review them. A related initiative is called the Conservator Account Review Program (CARP). According to Minnesota Judicial Branch Audit Manager Jamie Majerus, roughly 4,800 Minnesotans had assets under conservatorship in 2018 that were monitored by the programs. The value of these assets totalled $950 million.
In both programs, professionals supervised by certified fraud examiners oversee wards' finances. CAAP audits all conservator-managed accounts after the first year and all accounts with assets exceeding $10,000 every four years. CARP routinely audits all conservator-managed accounts, regardless of size, and can refer those accounts to CAAP if it spots potential problems.
After the audit, judges get an account review report summarizing the auditor's findings and recommendations. A similar document is provided to the judge before conservatorship hearings.
One expert calls it the model for an auditing system.
Professional guardian April Parks used her court-appointed position to isolate and financially exploit more than 150 people in Las Vegas before she was caught. She got the maximum sentence of 16-40 years in prison after pleading guilty last November.
Nevada's reform efforts since have made it a national example, said Rick Black, director of the Center for Estate Administration Reform.
In 2017, the Nevada Supreme Court created the Permanent Guardianship Commission, made up of judges, advocates and lawyers, to oversee and improve the state's guardianship practices.
Wards must be present at a hearing, if physically able, and must have legal representation. A proposed ward can hire his or her own lawyer, but many are appointed by the court through legal aid centers.
"Now, protected persons and proposed protected persons have trained lawyers fighting for what they want, not what everyone thinks is in their best interest," said Jim Berchtold, who leads the guardianship advocacy program at the Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada.
Berchtold believes that a lawyer independent from the probate system can best serve wards as an impartial advocate. "Even if a protected person is unable to express his or her wishes, the mere presence of an attorney to represent them helps to ensure compliance with the statutes and dissuades financial exploitation and other abuses," he said.
Nevada also created a Guardianship Compliance Office, which supports district probate courts by reviewing cases and performing investigations upon request. It can investigate the health and welfare of a protected person, locate guardians the court has lost contact with and run forensic audits if a judge is concerned about accounting for a ward's assets.
"Before, the court didn't have those resources to dig in and investigate," said Guardianship Compliance Manager Kate McCloskey. "We have one district court that calls our audits 'liquid gold.'"
Nevada's Guardianship Complaince Office also operates a hotline for anyone who has questions about guardianship or needs help reporting guardianship abuse.
Berchtold and McCloskey said Nevada's 2017 Protected Person's Bill of Rights was another major step forward. It includes the right to be educated about guardianships, to participate in developing plans that will affect the ward's future and to remain as independent as possible.
Editor's note: This story is part of a series on guardianship for the Ohio Center for Investigative Journalism. The second installment will examine how Ohio courts and communities are collaborating to provide responsible guardianship in the face of ever-increasing demand.
This series of stories was funded by a grant from the Ohio News Media Foundation.
Legal Aid Center of Sothern Nevada
725 E. Charleston Blvd., Las Vegas, NV 89104
tel (702) 386-1070, fax (702) 366-0569,
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Burna Boy introduces the official music video to his most recent single "Dangote", created by Kel P.
In a 360 degree turn, Burna Boy changes from the fun and great vibes of 'Killin' Dem' to a progressively serious, socially charged account in his new single 'Dangote'.
In his standard way, the afrofusion artiste tends to some of the monetary issues the young in Nigeria face on an everyday premise and how they manage it. Two things set apart this video, coordinated by Clarence Peters, from the others. Initially, we see these accounts told from the viewpoints of the general population living these lives, and we likewise observe the results of their activities.
As Burna Boy sings about the hustle in obvious Fela style, we are taken starting with one story then onto the next and given a feeling of how every last bit of it is connected. The hustle must go on, yet we additionally should know that for each activity there is regularly an equivalent and inverse response. We likewise value the saxophone performances toward the end, paying tribute to Fela.


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BONUS MATERIAL: What's Old is New Again updating a bowling alley to art Center (S1E7)
January 14, 2022 Jason Stershic Uncategorized 0 Comments
The county needed theater space and room for a museum. Some creative thinking by a handful of county officials turned an old and abandoned bowling alley into an arts and cultural center. Listen to the stories of performers who got on stage and one person whose life was actually saved by art classes in Johnson County, Kansas.
Transcript of What's Old is New Again updating a bowling alley to art Center (S1E7)
Carol: This is a good government show.
Nancy Wellerstein: It solved a lot of different problems. one, it was becoming an eyesore as the parking lot and everything was kind of deteriorating around it. And to it provided a home for the the Johnson County Museum.
Ed Eilert: It probably would have been torn down and a gas station set foot on the property, which, you know, I suppose that's okay. But I think I think saving and saving the structure, modernizing the structure, redeveloping it turned out very, very well.
David: This is a story about making something old new again. It's about restoring a landmark building. It's about the history of electricity and creating a new arts community. It's about local government seeing an opportunity and creating a new use for an old space.
It's about government working. Welcome to the Good Government Show. I'm David Martin.
Carol: And I'm Carol D'auria. So, David, where are we off to now?
David: We're off to Johnson County, Kansas, and this is a Kansas City suburb called Overland Park.
Carol: So what good is the government doing in Johnson County?
David: Well, they're doing something pretty remarkable, actually.
Carol: Well, to tell you, said the history of electricity, how does that figure in?
David: Well, I'm glad you asked. So first, we have to go back. There was a time when having an electric hair dryer and iron that you plug into a wall and a television was a big deal. And one of these new housing developments they were building, the Kansas City Gas and Electric built a model home. It was a 1954 state of the art house.
Carol: Oh, I can't imagine what this a state of the art house in 1954 look like.
David: Well, to the people of 1954, it was very modern. And even today it's pretty cool that modern extras, electric curtains, you push a button and you curtains open. No gas, no coal, just electricity to run your stove, heat your house and power your house.
The new television is still black and white, but it was hidden behind a painting push a button and the TV was revealed. Pretty modern, exciting stuff. This electric house was actually lived in by two families.
Carol: It reminds me of the Old World's Fair and General Electric had the House of the Future, I guess, for 1954. Pretty advanced stuff, huh?
David: Sure, a lot of it is standard today, and some of it didn't really take off, but no one uses a cast iron to press their clothes anymore. It was pretty amazing, and it was pretty well preserved two families live there.
Carol: So you said the history of electricity? Is there more history?
David: Yes, there is. But we're going to stay in the past, but we're going to just jump forward a little bit to 1959. Someone's living in the electric house, they're using all their modern conveniences. No doubt the envy of their neighbors.
But the area is expanding, and this was the year they built the King Louis bowling alley. But this was no ordinary alley. first, it was a great example of Googie architecture.
Carol: Googie architecture? You're going to have to explain that one to me.
David: You're not familiar? All right. Well, look. Think about the Jetsons, right? Think futuristic design. You've seen Googie architecture. You probably didn't even know it. Think about those original McDonald's with those big buildings and this big golden arches on both, right?
Carol: Oh, okay.
David: See, you are well-versed in Googie architecture. The the main theme building at Los Angeles Airport when you fly into L.A., that kind of building right in the middle. The Welcome to Las Vegas sign. It was space age. It was atomic atomic designs and it was intended to look modern.
Carol: Who knew? So Googie architecture, you learn something every day. So was this just a modern bowling alley with a few space age signs?
David: Oh no, no, no. This was not just a bowling alley. They had in an ice rink. But really, this was the center of community life. If you're a kid or even a teenager, you went to the King Louie in its heyday at hosted parties had school events.
I think they even had the prom there once. They even had a local bowling for dollars TV show there there was a mezzanine where you could sort of check it out and look down on people skating. I mean, really, it was the place to be.
Carol: A cool place.
David: It was a cool place. It was the place to be. But you know, like all things that started to fade, it lost its popularity shopping malls, new, you know, multiplex movie theaters and other new cool venues.
Carol: OK, but you kind of lost me there. We have an electric house and a one time popular bowling alley. What's the connection?
David: All right. So now we leave the 1950s and now we're here in 2016, and here we are in Johnson County, the all electric house that has become a museum piece two families live there. They moved out. Someone decided to preserve it.
They put it in an old school. But that old school building is falling apart. And the King Louis, that's pretty much falling apart. It's been abandoned. It's been gutted. It's probably not long for this world. You know, it's become sort of an eyesore for the community.
So there are two issues here. one, the electric house is getting moldy and they have to move.
Carol: It sounds like somebody wants to take a bulldozer to it.
David: Well, no, because this is history. You can't do that. And the bowling alley with its Googie architecture is now, well, familiar with, you know, now it's just a useless old building. But behind the scenes, people are working. The Johnson County administrators are looking for a place to house the electric house, and everyone agrees that this bowling alley could work. And this this is where Nancy Wellerstein comes into the picture. She's on the County Parks and Recreation Committee and with her colleagues, they come up with the idea of moving the electric house into the bowling alley.
It's a space where you can move a whole house into and they want to refurbish the King Louis.
Carol: So it's like a two, for one thing. Problem solved.
David: Yes, problem solved, but not quite so fast. Not everybody's on board with this plan. This is going to cost money, but this is where Nancy Wellerstein steps in and she really starts to lobby. Not only that, she's also a major supporter of the arts.
I'm including the county's theater in the park program. As you can imagine, you can only perform in the park in the summer, and she's looking to add indoor space, and she seized on it when she had the chance.
Nancy Wellerstein: I had to come up with an I. Here to make it a functional, financially sustainable building and hub for the community. And the first thing that happens in a community when school districts have to cut budgets, they cut the arts.
And there was a need for more arts programing in the community, and so this was the opportunity and it has turned into a hub of activity that I don't think anyone has even imagined that it could be this vibrant.
Carol: So she's right. Or it's do get cut every time, that's always the first thing to go when money is tight. So the county steps in to save the arts.
David: Well, yeah, but there was still a lot more work to do. Ed Eilert is a Johnson County commissioner, and he was the one that Nancy lobbied to get his vote to approve funding to renovate the bowling alley.
Ed Eilert: She came up with the idea that we could have some other community activities at that facility. One of them was we created a black box theater for use by community theater groups and also the Johnson County Parks and Rec has a Theater in the Park Summer production and they could use it for winter productions if they so desired.
Carol: So Nancy won and good government prevailed. I love it. So just what is the bowling alley doing now, though?
David: Well, for starters, now it's called the Johnson County Arts and Heritage Center. There are so many things going on inside. There are two theaters. There's dance space, there's art space, there's art exhibit space. Folks get married there. They have meeting spaces. They have their county parks, offices there. It's just a constantly busy place.
The sponsor of the good government show is Liquid.
So let me introduce you to Tim Bair. He's the producing artistic director of theater in the park and the manager of fine and performing arts for Johnson County Parks and Rec.
Carol: Well, he sounds pretty busy.
David: He is, but he's been waiting for an opportunity like this.
Tim Bair: We were always looking for an opportunity to expand our summer season. Traditionally, we do five big musicals in the summer, which starts generally around the first of June and goes through the first weekend of August, depending on how summer falls, of course.
But we were always really looking for the opportunity to do something beyond our summer season. The difficulty was that we just had no facility to do it, so we were really looking for an inside theater, a space that we could produce theater in something other than the summer.
Carol: So it sounds like this is really coming together.
David: It is, but I'll let Tim explain it more.
Tim Bair: We've created an opportunity for people in our community inside this facility to continue to just fill our black box theater here with theater. So, yeah, we have in a way created a kind of a kind of a theater scene inside this facility.
I think it's really important for Johnson County, Johnson County as it is a great place to live. Honestly, where we are in Kansas and across the border is county, Missouri. There's there's lots of small theater spaces inside Kansas City, Missouri, across the state line down in kind of the urban core of the city.
And there really isn't. There wasn't anything in more the world of suburbia kind of. And that's kind of how it feels here inside Johnson County. So I think it's really great that there's a space now inside a different kind of area, really.
I know that's what this is not inside, but Theater in the Park has a large demographic that attends theater know when we're doing our outside season. But again, because of this, the small nature of our theater here and the spirit of the shows that we can produce inside, I think we're reaching a broader audience just by virtue of that, by what we're able to offer. And the other groups that have found some kind of home here as well are able to do to do theater that that they wouldn't otherwise get to do.
Carol: A home for theater in an old bowling alley. Who would have thunk it? This really is a great story and makes me want to go to Kansas.
David: I'm sorry, Carol, you're not in Kansas.
Carol: You had to do.
David: I had to. I had to. So let me introduce you to Darcy Hingula. She's a songwriter and a performer. She just graduated from high school, and she had a song included in a local production called Songs for a New Now at the theater, at the center.
And actually, she's headed to New York University to study theater, and she hopes to get on Broadway. She works the arts center, and she performs there.
Darcie Hingula: It's a second home for me. I've definitely found a really close bond with the people I work with, but I've also found a close bond with the people I perform with. And so this this place has definitely created a home, a second home for me outside of my family.
David: What it's also done is provide a venue for local people to perform right in their own town.
Darcie Hingula: You know, I've worked here many times that I do definitely get a lot of opportunities to perform than other, you know, again, other towns and other places near us don't have. I feel very grateful that I have all these opportunities to perform.
Carol: So it seems this new arts center really has created a new community center. That's cool.
David: It has, but there's a lot more to this place. And for Diane McLean, the Arts and Heritage Center really saved her son, Daniel's life.
Carol: Those are strong words. Really saved his life.
David: Yeah, it really did. Daniel suffers from a few medical and mental conditions, including being autistic. So after a recent hospital stay, she said her son was basically non-communicative and nearly catatonic. His older sister had gone off and got married.
He was out of high school, but he couldn't have a job. He had taken a few art courses at the local community college, but basically he had nothing to do and pretty much no motivation to do anything. His physical and mental conditions were getting worse. But then he found the arts program at the center.
Diane McLean: He started the program after he had been discharged about six months, and he went from barely being able to talk. And or if he did, it didn't always make sense to being like the spokesperson for this group. And and, you know, this program totally changed his life.
He started the program. After being through a series of hospitalizations, the last one was three months and he was pretty much non-functioning due to catatonia. That's related to autism and he we thought we were totally losing him.
Carol: Wow. This new arts center sounds like it really did change his life.
David: It really did. He shows up now. His overall health improved. He even sells his art, and he shows the theater and he has friends.
Diane McLean: This gave him something to do. Somebody expected him to be there. Somebody appreciated what he did and valued what he did and was able to help support him because it was he. He couldn't do it independently. And so that he has a purpose now, and he feels like he has something to contribute and that he's able to have a job and do what he loves. And it's really rewarding for him. It gives him a huge sense of independence and some hope that he can, you know, become more independent.
Carol: It's amazing how it shows one small project building an arts center, how the whole thing can really affect just one person.
David: It really does, Carol, and this really shows how government really can improve and change a life. And there are many Daniels in this program.
Carol: OK, I really do want to check out this place. It sounds wonderful.
David: Well, I have something for you this fall that, yes, this fall they're staging the Full Monty. Yes. At the Black Box Theater. So how's that for you? Go see a play. The men do the full monty right there in Kansas.
Carol: I could get into that.
David: All right. You go see the play. I'm going to go check out the electric house I'm in.
Carol: Well, this is certainly a good government success story.
David: It is. But I'm going to let these folks sum up what it's like to have a new and vibrant art and heritage center and what it means to them. first, we're going to go back to Nancy.
Nancy Wellerstein: Every day it's just my chest puffs up and I I just have some tremendous pride in what this has become and how it has become a hub for the community and bringing arts into the community that is really was fairly barren for Johnson County. There's there. We don't really all of the arts that you seem to go into the Kansas City, Missouri, area, but this is one of the ones out in the suburbs for the county and for all of the the locals.
David: Tim sees this place as a space for all artists.
Tim Bair: We're providing opportunity for artists in our area to to exhibit their work and to share what they do with the community that lives here and now.
David: That's proven be a success. The politicians can look back on a wise decision.
Ed Eilert: Being in public office over a period of years. There are a lot of decisions you have to make, and you hope that the decisions you make are the right ones for the benefit of the community. And this one turned out very, very well. And I'm sure in my career in public office, there have been some that did not go so well, perhaps. But this one? Yes, I'm very proud of.
Carol: But ultimately, it really comes down to the people, a government helping the people who voted them into office. And when you have a story like Daniel McLean, his mother Diane, it shows how good government can really change a person's life, even if it's just a few art classes.
Diane McLean: Oh my gosh. Without Arts and Heritage Museum and the and the space they've provided for the emerging artists, um, I don't know. I really I don't know what we would have done because he needed engagement. The engagement is what saved his life. The art is what saved his life.
Carol: That's good government inaction renovating an old bowling alley and an ice rink and creating new programs and opportunities for today. Great story. But I want to know how you get those tickets for The Full Monty.
David: Well, we just have to go to the Johnson County Art and Heritage Center, and you can see a fun musical. You can see the men going the full Monty, but you also see a great example of good government at work.
So thanks for listening. I'm David Martin.
Carol: And I'm Carol D'auria, and this is the good government show.
David: The Good Government Show is a Valley Park Production, Jason Stershic is our editor and producer. Associate producers are Jade Ludlow and Mackenzie Martin, the executive producers of The Good Government Show are Jim Ludlow, David Martin and David Snyder. Join us again right here for another episode of The Good Government Show.


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9 Sticking Points The House And Senate Have to Work Out In Their Tax Bills
Scott Horsley / NPR
Photo by Chip Somodevilla Getty Images
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. (center), gathered the support he needed on Friday to pass the GOP tax bill in the Senate. Now that legislation must be reconciled with the House version.
House and Senate Republicans have now passed two different versions of a sweeping tax overhaul. Their next step is to iron out differences between the two bills, so the final product can be sent to the president to be signed into law.
Both the House and Senate bills call for deep cuts in the corporate tax rate — from 35 to 20 percent. In the House version, that cut would take effect next year. In the Senate version, the lower rate would begin a year later. The two bills differ in a number of other ways, including their treatment of individual taxes and so-called "pass-through" businesses that are taxed at the individual rate of their owners.
Here are some areas to watch as lawmakers work to harmonize the two versions and produce a single bill:
1. Individual taxes
House: Sets up four tax brackets, with tax rates ranging from 12 to 39.6 percent.
Senate: Seven brackets, ranging from 10 to 38.5 percent.
Both versions offer a larger standard deduction while eliminating personal exemptions. But the individual tax cuts in the Senate bill expire after 2025, while those in the House version are permanent.
2. Pass-through businesses
House: Taxes pass-through businesses at a fixed rate of 25 percent.
Senate: Taxes these businesses at the owners' individual rate, but allows owners to deduct 23 percent of their pass-through income.
3. Child tax credit
House: Boosts the child tax credit from $1,000 per child to $1,600.
Senate: Increase it to $2,000, but the credit would expire after 2025.
Both versions would make the credit available to more middle- and upper-income families. But those on the lower rungs of the income ladder might not see any benefit, because the "refundable" portion of the tax credit — which helps those who pay little or no income tax — is unchanged.
4. Mortgage-interest deduction
House: Taxpayers could only deduct interest on mortgages up to $500,000 — down from the current ceiling of $1 million.
Senate: Leaves the mortgage-interest deduction unchanged.
5. Alternative-Minimum Tax
The Alternative-Minimum Tax, or AMT, is designed to ensure that highly paid workers with a lot of deductions still pay at least a minimum amount of tax.
House: Would do away with the AMT altogether.
Senate: Fewer taxpayers would be subject to the AMT than are today.
(For a deeper explainer of the AMT, here's the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center.)
6. Estate tax
This is a tax on wealthy individuals' estates when they die. Currently, it applies to those whose estates are valued at $5.49 million.
House: Does away with it altogether in 2024.
Senate: Raises the threshold at which the tax is owed, so only the very richest families — with more than $11 million in assets — would be taxed.
Only about 0.2 percent of estates ever face this tax.
7. Obamacare
House: Does not deal with the Affordable Care Act's mandate, the tax penalty for people who don't buy health insurance.
Senate: Eliminates it.
8. Graduate students
House: Treats graduate students' tuition waivers as taxable income.
Senate: Does not address this.
9. Corporate tax
Both the House and Senate bills cut the corporate tax rate to 20 percent — which the White House had identified as a key goal. After the Senate vote, though, President Trump suggested there may be some wiggle room.
"It could be 22 [percent] when it comes out, but it could also be 20," Trump told reporters on Saturday. "We'll see what ultimately comes out."
A somewhat smaller cut in the corporate tax rate could give lawmakers breathing room to make other adjustments, while still staying within Senate rules that say the bill can add no more than $1.5 trillion in federal debt over the next decade.
House Passes Massive Tax Package; Senate To Vote Next
Week Ahead: Trump Might Get His Tax Bill, But That Might Be It Until After 2018
CHART: How The New Version Of The Republican Tax Bill Would Affect You
GOP Releases Final Tax Bill As Rubio, Corker Boost Path To Christmas Passage


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Disability Japan Paralympics Tokyo 2020
880 Flame Events to Precede Tokyo Paralympics
Flame festivals and visits will take place in 43 of Japan's 47 prefectures on Aug. 12-16, while the remaining four prefectures--Tokyo, Shizuoka, Chiba and Saitama--where Paralympic Games venues are located, will host similar events and the Paralympic torch relay from Aug. 17, according to a detailed program for Paralympic flame-related events announced by the organizing committee.
From Jiji
TOKYO – Events for the Paralympic flame will be held in some 880 municipalities across Japan ahead of the Aug. 24 opening ceremony of the Tokyo Paralympics, the Tokyo Games organizing committee said Wednesday.
Flame festivals and visits will take place in 43 of Japan's 47 prefectures on Aug. 12-16, while the remaining four prefectures–Tokyo, Shizuoka, Chiba and Saitama–where Paralympic Games venues are located, will host similar events and the Paralympic torch relay from Aug. 17, according to a detailed program for Paralympic flame-related events announced by the organizing committee.
A flame to be created on Aug. 19 in Stoke Mandeville in Britain, the birthplace of the Paralympic Games, will be combined with the flames from Japan's 47 prefectures in a ceremony in Tokyo on Aug. 20. The combined flame will tour around Tokyo until the opening ceremony.
In the western city of Hiroshima, which experienced U.S. atomic bombing during World War II, the Paralympic flame will come from the Peace Flame at Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park.
A flame event will also be held at Tsukui Yamayuri-en, a care home for mentally disabled people in Sagamihara in the eastern prefecture of Kanagawa, where 19 residents were knifed to death by a former worker in 2016.
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