text:
The permanent International Criminal Court (ICC) was created in 1998,[2] but for it to grow into a credible global justice institution capable of enforcing international criminal law (ICL) and manifesting international criminal justice (ICJ), ratification of the Rome Statute needs to approach a universal international commitment. Aspirations for the court to act as a deterrent and ensure an end to impunity cannot even be seriously argued for unless both widespread ratification and active cooperation are achieved. Without these foundations the formal aims are not available for evaluation beyond the terms of politicized process initiation and selective prosecution.[3]
This article examines the reasons for reluctance to ratify the Rome Statute in specific politico-cultural contexts. The discussion begins at the general level by looking at issues that determine the initiation of ICC procedures: the activation of an investigation and thereafter prosecution at the ICC level and its politicized nature because of the United Nations (UN) Security Council's (UNSC) sectarian influence. The paper then sets forth how the UN and Member States themselves have firewalled exceptions for those involved in peacekeeping operations, UN-sanctioned or otherwise, from effective ICC accountability. The analysis then takes its regional/cultural (rather than hegemonic/political) location in the Asia-Pacific region where there is marked resistance to ratification. This enables a general sketching of resistance variables in specific contextual conditions, which might be countered by those who advance the essential nexus between universal ratification and achieving the deterrent aims of the ICC.
In "un-signing"[4] the United States (US) from the ICC's Rome Statute, former President George W. Bush referred to "a bunch of fellas over there who want to try our boys."[5] Against the fantasy of the US's military personnel being indicted before the ICC, the US Senate passed the American Service-Members Protection Act[6] in part as a reassertion of autonomy and sovereignty in the face of the ICC's jurisdiction. Since then the American position has moved from hostility to selective co-operation.
It could be convincingly argued that world powers with wide international exposure, entanglements and presence at many levels that might cut across the ICC's mandate would be wary of a politicized international court.[7] And there can be little doubt that the refusal of the US, China, India and Russia to accept the ICC's jurisdiction has had a heavy negative influence on less powerful states already uncertain of the extending impact of international law and its institutions.
It is recognized even by its detractors that today the ICC has an urgent role to play in rescuing citizens who are being brutalized by their own governments.[8] Further, religious and cultural diasporas across regions such as Asia are at risk that their critical cultural essence and legal traditions may be sidelined through an international court and its legal process developing without their influence.
I have argued that it is critical for criminal justice paradigms other than those in civil or common law systems—particularly the hybrid traditions across Asia and the Pacific—to engage with the ICC so that otherwise absent procedural influences on the development of ICL and process can authenticate the aim of a holistic global criminal law.[9] With greater and more representative procedural integration comes increased legitimacy and diminished potential for hegemonic capture. The Coalition for the ICC[10] and its Asian branch[11] declare that it is only through the widest ratification[12] of the Rome Statute that an independent court will be ensured and the end to impunity prevails.[13]
The analysis to follow does not propose either the negative influence of reluctant and self-interested global superpowers or national and regional ambivalence as the reason for why Asia and the Pacific are so poorly represented among the ICC Member States. The explanations are much more localized and specific, ranging from incapacities to enact empowering legislation to profound political misgivings that go back to pre-independence and through colonial foundations. This paper suggests that for any successful policy to be sustained ensuring a wider regional inclusion in the ICC mission, it first must confront and address the specific national motivations to decline, and then by drawing out common themes of reluctance that span the region, meet these reservations with legitimacy rather than promise.[14] Having achieved this understanding it is then possible to craft arguments in favor of ratification that will make inclusion in the ICC more relevant for the region and more beneficial for the development of holistic and inclusive ICJ and jurisprudence. The push for ratification from the ICC and the Coalition must not appear to be another phase of western colonization but as an opportunity for Asian and Pacific traditions to reach their appropriate level of recognition in a new global justice ordering.
2. VIEW FROM THE TOP—WHY SIGN UP?
In his recent delivery of the Wallace Wurth Memorial Lecture,[15] the President of the ICC Judge Sang-Hyun Song quite consciously laid out the pitch for joining the Member States. In the audience there were representatives of Asian and Pacific governments that have yet to ratify the Rome Statute and many aspects of the argument were addressed to them.
The President's case was as follows:
The preventive influence of the ICC is a most attractive capacity for justice and peacemaking.
In particular, deterrence, timely intervention, the independence of preliminary investigation, contributing to medium term stabilization and longer term equitable development,[16] victim empowerment through participating in trial justice in their own right, and victim assistance to recognize non-retributive victim needs,[17] each advance this preventive capacity.
The role of the court in norm setting embodies its greatest potential influence for peacemaking. In this role the court recognizes the distance between international treaties and local norms that needs to be bridged.
Complementarity[18] supports the peace and justice efforts of civil society emerging from post-conflict struggles by conceding to the nation state the right and the primary duty to investigate and prosecute crimes that are within the jurisdiction of the ICC. Complementarity also links into the deterrent function by facilitating the local prosecution of such crimes with the capacity building consequences that this offers, thereby carrying through the expressive function of the ICC when the international legal norms of the Rome Statute are translated into domestic norms of that state.
Even with the domestic justice systems of states carrying out the investigation and prosecution of crimes within the purview of the ICC, the ICC provides a safety net ensuring accountability of states in terms of their criminal justice capacity and service delivery.
The ICC recognizes the need for state co-operation to give the ICC the power to arrest, the ability to collect evidence and to encourage witness testimony.
In addition, there is a need to achieve universality so that the majority of mankind presently outside the Rome Statute's protection will not remain outside the protection of the ICC.
In his closing remarks, the President reiterated his realistic understanding that the on-the-ground potentials and the stakeholder legitimacy of ICJ are critical to its success. For this reason how the potential and legitimacy of global justice institutions and processes are viewed in different cultural and political settings and histories may explain the erratic take-up of ICC membership. As such, a bottom-up analysis of resistance to ratification is necessary if the ICC is to construct a more effective and convincing push for universal ratification.
However, the forces waged against the nature and jurisdiction of the ICC cannot be presumed to be equally, consistently or universally opposed to the intervention of ICJ for the maintenance of global ordering. A brief consideration of the UNSC's powers as they relate to international criminal justice (referring matters to the ICC, authorizing peacekeeping missions, and controlling the ad hoc International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and Rwanda (ICTR)), taken together with the ongoing cases relating to Darfur, Sudan, reveals just how complex can be the contradictory tensions between the appearance of non-engagement projected through non-ratification, and the national or hegemonic self-interest behind the activation of international crime control on a case-by-case basis for invoking the process otherwise reviled. In introducing these considerations it is also important to understand what motivates international criminal prosecutions, and alternatively what brands them and the justice process they initiate politicized and partial.
3. INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL JUSTICE PROSECUTION TRIGGERS
ICL operates in a complex reality of international relations. Decisions to prosecute provide a telling example of how ICL (and its rules and procedures) manifests itself as part of international relations power balancing.[19] For example, the trigger for initiating prosecution before the ICC occurs via a referral by the UNSC, or from a State Party, as provided for in the Rome Statute, representing a countermeasure to the Prosecutor's otherwise independent exercise discretion.[20] The UNSC can also request that the Prosecutor not commence an investigation or prosecution for a period of 12 months (a delaying or prohibition tactic which can be renewed).[21] As such the UNSC is politically connected with the ICC through its initiation and sponsorship power, by referring matters for investigation and prosecution,[22] and deferring the investigation or prosecution of a matter for a set or ongoing period.[23] This powerful dominion exercised by the UNSC Members and exacerbated through the self-interest behind the veto power, potentially has the consequence of investing in the permanent members of the UNSC—in particular the US and China—the power to control referrals (through a resolution referring a case to the ICC, vetoing any such resolutions against their interests, or should an investigation or prosecution be initiated by any means, deferring the commencement or process at their pleasure).[24]
The inextricable link between the ICC and the UNSC identifies the inevitable nexus between the formal operations of ICJ and sectarian global political hegemony.[25] The power of referral or deferral emanating from the UNSC in particular justifies suspicion about the extent of prosecutorial independence to evaluate and determine these referrals.[26] Such reservations have grounding in the political expedience of UNSC power constellations, demonstrated by the UNSC's resolve to make peacekeepers in the former Yugoslavia immune from ICC prosecution.[27] UNSC resolutions excluding the ICC's jurisdiction over peacekeepers from non-party states in Bosnia and Herzegovina[28] were made in response to the US threatening to veto the renewal of the UNSC's mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina if the resolution was not made.[29] Similar UNSC resolutions provided immunity to peacekeepers in the conflict in Liberia, deployed to secure the country for humanitarian assistance and prepare for future UN forces with stabilization duties.[30] So evidenced, the UNSC potentially holds the power to determine whose actions are included or excluded from accountability before the ICC, through authorizing those operating with immunity for UN intervention purposes.[31]
The influence of the UNSC is even more pronounced over the ad hoc tribunals, established as a subsidiary of the UNSC, which can disband them at any time. Ultimately, the UNSC's determination of the scope of a tribunal's investigation and prosecution mandate and its capacity to define its temporal jurisdiction and terminate its hearings (for the ICTY and ICTR, in respect of new cases, as of 2012) mean that the very exercise of ICJ is hegemonically dependent.[32]
4. NON-RATIFICATION BUT STANDING AND UTILITY?
The UNSC adopted a similar resolution as that indemnifying troops in the former Yugoslavia conflict, covering non-Sudanese officials in the operations in Darfur (originally authorized by the UNSC and the African Union). The resolution provided that those personnel would be (if at all) subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of their home state, and thus protected from ICC prosecution.[33] In practice, however, the reality of politically selective prosecution and specific offence and proof limitations governing the ICC's jurisdiction at large, might make these UNSC resolutions less than necessary. That being so, the resolutions still represent attempts to circumscribe the jurisdiction of international courts and tribunals in a manner that suggests primary motivation by the hegemonic politics of international relations, specifically, the conditions and negotiation strategies adopted by Member States including the US for their contributions to humanitarian aid and peacekeeping, as they seek to protect their personnel from prosecution by the ICC. In the future, this feature of security trade-off at the UNSC level either may not be quite as blatant or intractable, as the UN moves away from its military intervention model for peacekeeping in preference for broader-based justice resolutions.[34]
The question of standing for accused persons in the international criminal tribunals and permanent court is also dependent on the way in which they become identified and produced as part of the investigation and prosecution process. In domestic criminal justice, the institutionalization of complex policing arrangements means that a suspect goes through a standardized and detailed process of investigation before being arrested and charged. However, at the international level, the pathway of suspect identification and processing is less formalized and predictable because of difficulties with policing (heavily reliant as it is on nation states and mutual assistance) and with countervailing tensions associated with jurisdictional autonomy that militate against cooperation. Accused persons can be offered up by a Member State to the ICC, identified by a UNSC referral, or the independent prosecutor can issue an arrest warrant that requires the accused to be presented for the investigation and trial process. Yet, as certain recent celebrated instances indicate, if accused persons can use their political status or their domestic and regional authority to resist the process of indictment at the national and international levels, then the production of that accused before an international tribunal or court is much more complicated and deeply problematic.[35]
The reasoning behind a UNSC referral can also be revealing when reflected against national interest and international relations alignments. Despite its rejection of the jurisdiction of the ICC over its citizens, the US pushed through the UNSC a referral to the ICC for the prosecution of the President of Sudan. As a result, the ICC has sought the indictment of Sudan's President Omar Bashir since 2005 for his involvement in alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Darfur region.[36] However, in July 2008 the African Union, in a meeting of heads of African states, resolved to call for the ICC to suspend its action and instead permit an African-led investigation. Since then, numerous African States—Chad, Kenya, Djibouti, and Malawi—have refused to comply with their ICC Member State obligations such as arrest requests for Bashir when he was present in their country. The ICC judges have reported these countries to the UNSC and the ICC Assembly of State Parties, but no action has since been taken.[37] Most recently in December 2011, the ICC reminded Malawi of the International Court of Justice Arrest Warrant Case that confirmed that the principle in international law providing immunity for former or sitting Heads of State does not apply to prevent criminal prosecution by an international court regardless of whether the alleged offending state is a Member State to the ICC.[38]
5. NATIONAL V. GLOBAL INTERESTS — STORIES OF POLITICAL EXPEDIENCY
As indicated above, when an offence within the subject matter jurisdiction of the ICC is committed in a territory or by a State Party, that State Party can refer the accused for prosecution by the ICC,[39] or the Prosecutor may initiate her own investigation of that crime which may commence, provided the Pre-Trial Chamber grants authorization.[40] In addition, the UNSC can refer the matters to the ICC,[41] and non-state parties can accept the jurisdiction of the ICC on a case-by-case basis.[42] One of the foundational concerns held by those states that have resisted the ICC jurisdiction is that the independent Prosecutor may use her discretion to charge military personnel who have been involved in UN peacekeeping missions or in a military intervention designed to secure the regional and international interests.
Obviously, the US has a large exposure in these areas. As well as not being a State Party to the Rome Statute, under the Bush Administration the US also struck a raft of bi-lateral agreements requiring that signatory states promise not to surrender US citizens or employees to the ICC, and thereby restricting the ICC jurisdiction and indemnifying US military forces.[43] The US sought these agreements to avail itself of the exemption from jurisdiction, set out in the Rome Statute at Article 98(2), which provides that the ICC "may not proceed with a request for surrender which would require the requested State to act inconsistently with its obligations under international agreements pursuant to which the consent of a sending State is required to surrender a person of that State to the Court, unless the Court can first obtain the cooperation of the sending State for the giving of consent for the surrender."[44] These agreements were fortified by the US's offer of military assistance and other forms of financial aid, and conversely the US's threatened withdrawal of military aid from recipient states that refused to sign non-surrender agreements.[45]
More particularly, the UNSC also expressed its concern about the protection of states involved in UN peacekeeping operations. Crucial to this concern about autonomy and the protection of military personnel was the fear that the independent Prosecutor would proceed against powerful states without recognition of the UN's political interests in military intervention.
In the ways discussed above, the dominant world powers treat ICJ as secondary to their own national interests, and this is not only witnessed in the autonomy arguments of those states that refuse to accept ICC jurisdiction.[46] Consequentially, pressure transfers onto international organizations and the non-governmental organization (NGO) community to genuinely contribute to ICJ beyond the limitations of domestic and regional considerations.[47] This has already been particularly the case with the ICC Prosecutor's constant and sometimes controversial reliance on NGO field intelligence and intervention to critically facilitate the identification of witnesses and the supply of testimony.[48] From the foundation of the ICC at the Rome Conference, "the relationship between the ICC and NGOs has probably been closer, more consistent, and more vital to the ICC than have analogous relations between NGOs and any other international organization," with all the problems this can entail.[49]
Justifications for the conclusion that ICJ is politically expedient in its inception, activation and renunciation include:
That commonly purported justifications, such as the end to impunity, disguise less altruistic motivations. This duplicity is demonstrated by the intensely selective nature of prosecutions determined by and on behalf of ICJ. Such selectivity was evident from the early days of ICJ in its present epoch. In the Tokyo war crimes trials for instance, Emperor Hirohito, known to be the inspiration behind terrible crimes, was not charged, as it was feared to do so would delay the cessation of war in the Pacific.[50]
The circumspection surrounding purported altruistic motivations as to why states would create national and international prosecution institutions that might end up turning against them. The US, for instance, has withheld its formal involvement in the ICC in part out of concern that the ICC acts on the mandate and interests of the UNSC, and due to the contrary application of the UNSC veto powers by contesting superpowers,[51] US interests may not always accord with ICC indictments. The strange flipside of this concern is that as a permanent member of the UNSC itself, the US can also apply the veto at least to protect its interests against indictment. Despite such partiality in reservations, one might say that many of those nation states that support the ICC do so as they believe that the ICC will never be turned against the interests of the powerful.
The temptation lies to extrapolate from the political nature of the ICC and the associated reservations of superpowers, and formulate some similar reasoning as to why nation states in the Asia/Pacific region are reluctant to accede to the court's jurisdiction. I suggest below that there are more interesting and convincing historical, cultural, anthropological and social conditions that might provide a more persuasive explanation.
6. REASONS FOR NON-RATIFICATION IN THE REGION — STATE SENSITIVITIES AND REGIONAL RELUCTANCE
Throughout Asia and the Pacific the contemporary face of criminal justice is etched by:
European colonial traditions;
indigenous and migratory cultural influences;
the pressures of subsistence and trade economies;
the clash of home-grown and introduced religions;
the obligations of tribal loyalty and filial piety; and
the relentless advance of modernization and materialism.[52]
The impact of these forces has been neither even nor consistent. What remains constant is the dislocation between the institutions of state-based criminal justice and the processes of traditional dispute resolution and decision-making. Endeavor to overlay this with the "one-size-fits-all" package of global justice and it is not difficult to see how the fissures of resistance would open wide.[53]
In identifying the reasons for resistance to the ratification of ICJ mechanisms—local to the global—across Asia and the Pacific, there is a risk in both over emphasizing cultural and political differences while at the same time seeking universal themes at the expense of real jurisdictional peculiarities. A way around this is to suggest a taxonomy of reluctance that recognizes critical influences over modern criminal justice in the region. In putting together this skeleton, it is necessary to reflect in passing, even if only for the purposes of summary, on the disconnect between formalized justice processes (as exhibited in the ICC) and indigenous or embedded manners of resolving conflict in the cultures of this region. Such dissonance in the way justice is determined, adjudicated and resolved might even be enough to suggest why some states and cultures are disinterested in the global alternative especially when it is so foreign to the experience of their people.
6.1. Relevance?
Particularly in the Pacific there are perceived many greater global crises than those revealed through the crimes in the ICC jurisdiction, which small nation states would prioritize against their limited capacity for international engagement. Small Pacific Island states have identified global warming and rising sea levels as the main issue for social "justice" that they consider requiring urgent action by institutions of the international community. Political leaders and their people in the Pacific are perplexed that the environmental degradation that threatens the displacement of nations and cultures is not seen as a "crime against humanity" or that such displacement, through no fault of island inhabitants, does not qualify as cultural "genocide."[54]
In a region where "aid dependency" features to support many fragile economies and political regimes, relations beyond the nation state are fostered by bilateralism rather than multilateralism. Internationalism is not necessarily complementary with the economic interactions that benefit the North World in terms of trade and resources and obligate the South World through debt slavery and aid reliance.
Another relevant issue, particularly as it relates to small Pacific Island States and to under resourced or emerging Asian jurisdictions, is limited legislative capacity. Many administrations have very restricted legislative services that—when it comes to UN convention ratification—need to be rationed against state priorities for international engagement.
ICC ratification advocates need to substantiate a global criminal justice system that helps rather than burdens these small states with their concerns.
6.2. Global Reach
The "dead hand" of differential superpower influence (economically and diplomatically) in the region is commonly represented by international organizations and agencies in the pursuit of modernization as socio-economic development.[55] Due to the nature of this development policy, cultures of dependency have replaced colonial administration and obligation, advancing the culturally destructive impacts of aid allocation, trade exploitation, and exchange capitalism in subsistence economies. Rather than socio-economic development promoting inclusion within the positive dimensions of globalization across the region, colonial histories of bilateralism pervade foreign and commercial relations within and outside Asia and the Pacific. Particularly when nation states are weak or disaggregated, bilateral dependencies and obligations can stand in the way of ICJ whereby powerful North World states can bargain to require the endorsement of their own autonomy and national interest in return for economic or military favors.
What makes the absence of global reach a particular problem in the Asia-Pacific region is a significant number of micro political units, or macro states with enormous domestic challenges (e.g. food sustainability, cultural cohesion, environmental depletions), coupled with a distinct absence of regional political or economic solidarity that might argue for global inclusion, or at least collectively counter the risk from North World exploitation. Particularly when it comes to the commercial depletion of natural resources, the region has suffered the negative impact of globalization while at the same time being largely excluded from its material benefits. In such a situation there is little popular taste for internationalism, or any prevailing and genuine faith in international justice paradigms.
This reluctance is compounded by an inadequate understanding of how the ICC operates, and more specifically the principle of complementarity. Even when a state has ratified the Rome Statute, its national courts will still have the jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute the crimes that are within the purview of the ICC. It is only if its own domestic justice mechanisms are unable or unwilling to perform such functions will the ICC step in to initiate its own investigations and processes.[56] Therefore, the ICC still has to communicate with that state and make a determination on a case-by-case basis notwithstanding ratification. ICC membership will also not derogate from the autonomy of functioning national legal systems in that citizens have no standing to bring cases directly to the ICC.[57]
Ramification advocates, therefore, should endeavor to clarify the practical circumscription of ICC jurisdiction, or have the circumstances necessary for the activation of its jurisdiction more clearly defined. Such specification would have the effect of mollifying the misconception on the part of suspicious states that membership in the ICC would add another set of external obligations over which they have no administrative as well as political influence.
6.3. Post-Colonial Hangover
It would be fair to say that, as with most post-colonial regions, in recently independent states in Asia and the Pacific region there is reflected a residual fear of "westernization." Tensions are obvious between the resilience of strong indigenous cultures, and the demands of cash economies. The spread of religious fundamentalism across the region has also tended to vilify western culture.
To particularize this post-colonial resentment, the relatively recent memory of the colonial excesses exacted through the mechanisms of criminal justice, resonate throughout the independence histories of the region. State-sponsored criminal justice institutions and processes have come to represent, and perpetuate through elitist post-colonial administrations, the discriminatory dominion of the powerful over the populous rather than any system of universal justice.
In Asia and the Pacific ancient routes of migration meant that indigenous cultures were exposed to a constant transition of colonization. Add to this the unique treasures of trade that attracted the West to the East and it is not hard to understand why, when the bonds of colonial rule are released, there is no eagerness to compromise hard-fought-for autonomy in return for a notion of westernized justice that could represent just another layer of imperial influence.
Because Asian cultures in particular have been suspicious about, and therefore misunderstanding of internationalization or polarity that is interpreted as westernization, transitional or developing Asian economies have adapted western administration and commercial organization to suit their own priorities. Despite the language of constitutional legality, in many Asian political and social frameworks individualized rights that are said to underpin principled western criminal justice models may not be valued above communitarian cohesion. Pacific Island tribalism has similar priorities.
Pacific Island states usually retain the trappings of Westminster parliamentary government. However, as these frameworks are so often ill suited to social organizations with intricate bonds of obligation and clan duty, traditional ties of community cohesion have become perverted through corruption and exploitation.[58] Corrupt political elites have a vested interest in distancing any intrusive institutions of international governance and accountability, such as ICJ claims to be.[59]
If the institutions of ICJ and the international governance mechanisms that sponsor them are viewed by the small Asia Pacific States in particular as the representatives of global political and economic hegemony, then they will be avoided as such. For post-colonial states in Africa and in South America that might share the same reservations, those torn by internal military and political struggle or ravaged by secessionist movements may be willing even to engage hegemonic dominion in the hope of political preferment or conflict resolution through the criminalization of their enemies.
It is only through communication and consultations with Member States that organic developments of ICJ occur through its institutions, and as the ICC is to some extent subordinated to the interests of powerful states such as the permanent members of the UN, it also needs to be open to influences from small or less hegemonic states and their procedural traditions.[60] The ICC can take the UN's intimated transition towards broader-based justice paradigms as a cue to situate ICJ in the most culturally inclusive (rather than politically selective) processes of justice delivery. The new inclusivity approach complements the need for developments in substantive ICL and procedure that recognize collective liability, criminal organizations, and the resultant responsibilities of offender communities to communities of victims.[61]
6.4. Normative Identity
The terms "Asian values" or the "Pacific way" are commonly employed when explaining the determination of political autonomy and regional engagement across the region. In a governance sense, this attempt to link the conceptualization of nationhood with fundamental traditions is more than cultural relativity. For instance, if one examines the development of hybrid criminal justice traditions in Asia and the Pacific, these are explained at least in part by different notions of justice and of citizen responsibility than those that may prevail in North World or westernized justice paradigms, which are the predominant models for ICJ. Again, normative distinction as an explanation for reluctance to engage with ICJ might be countered by the many examples in Africa and South America where nation states equally jealous of their post-colonial sovereignty and autonomy have signed up to the Rome Statute. What else influences the Asian and Pacific normative exceptionalism?
Digging deeper into normative identity at a nation state level presents the danger in generalizing normative enunciation across such a culturally and developmentally diverse region. Recognizing this, and looking at the constitution of those states in the region that remain outside the ICC, post-colonial cultural and political stability is not uncommon. The embedding of an independent political identity within long established cultural foundations, even in the more volatile post-colonial states in Asia and the Pacific, is regularly endorsed through strong centralist or paternalist political frameworks that celebrate sovereignty. The relatively weak regional political and economic alliances in Asia and the Pacific are a further evidence of resilient and prevailing nation state autonomy.
To meet such concerns, the ICC can do more to demonstrate how ratification of the Rome Statute underscores and not subverts nation state autonomy by paying attention to the aspects and peculiarities of the until-now unrepresented justice paradigms. Engagement with the ICC is an opportunity for Asian and Pacific Island states to assert their normative identity by influencing the development of a global criminal jurisprudence.
In the case of China, the Confucian and communist ascription to social order above the individual, as recognized in their system of criminal law (imperial and modern), has provided fertile soil from which communitarian resolution practices such as victim participation in both mediation and the trial process, and victims' right to compensation, have grown.[62] Therefore, entry of China into the ICC debate, bringing with it collective and communitarian rights consideration, holds enormous potential for collective crime prevention and aggregated social order to assume a greater place in ICJ.
6.5. Constitutional Legality
Another frame of reference that might explain the reluctance to engage with ICJ across the region is constitutional legality. Asian and Pacific Island states recurrently demonstrate dismal human rights records by UN standards, despite the proliferation of sophisticated constitutions with human rights charters and leadership codes that appear "rights focused." This paradox might be explained by both the problematic application of Westminster parliamentarianism, and the underdeveloped or corrupted stages of representative democracy. Another explanation, in states such as China, is a disconnect between the discourse of constitutionalism and the perseverance of administrative traditions that rely on non-accountable and expansive individualized discretion.
The heavy emphasis on humanitarian rights principles that underpins the formal institutions of ICJ does not sit well with political frameworks that do not respect rights protection in practice, and instead rely on cultural and political informalities (such as clan loyalties), which frustrate accountability for rights violations. Again, what might distinguish any such regional reluctance based on the rights dilemma from other regions where states have signed the Rome Statute while also devaluing rights and political accountability, is the marked absence of any Asian regional rights superstructure, combined with recent history of political regimes that operated (and some continue to operate) systematic rights repression.
It is anticipated that the intervention of the ICC will be both more likely and more attractive for states when their domestic criminal justice capacity—and more particularly the place of the trial process within constitutional legality—is fragile, strained or compromised and dependent. Interestingly, despite the varied levels of economic development and political competence, nation states across the Pacific and Asia (perhaps as a consequence of colonial control policies) often exhibit relatively well-resourced, centralized and resilient criminal juridical institutions and traditions. It may provide some comfort for states reluctant to concede to international jurisdiction that the state's formal justice processes possess the capacity to manage their own affairs for crimes within the ICC's jurisdiction.
6.6. Executive Discretion
Aligned with the final observation above, many nation states in Asia and the Pacific region have suffered under recent dictatorships or military governance, and a history of coups. Centralist governance frameworks in China, India, Pakistan and Indonesia have meant that the majority of the world's population has been administered with a tight hand of centralist government.
In such regimes a residually powerful security sector in the military and police proliferates. Governance through fear of the consequences of opposition or dissent for the individual citizen has meant that a healthy adversarialism is scarce in civil society. Freedom of expression, independent media, and alternative political organization are restricted. Communities become compliant. In such governance environments, administrative discretion is centralized, pervasive, and largely not responsible to the people but to the powerful. Therefore practices of impunity are tolerated because the leadership of such states are often themselves perpetrators of serious crimes, whether through action or omission. The invitation to participate in a justice process that has the potential to require international accountability above the interests of the nation state is, not surprisingly, unlikely to be attractive for governments dedicated to the denial of domestic accountability obligations.
6.7. Civil Society
Throughout the Asia Pacific region, the immaturity of civil society as a political force has meant that grassroots support for ICJ is difficult to muster.[63] Tribalism, caste and cultural hierarchies have tended to mechanically stratify civil society and prevent organic movements of victims that would pressure for ICJ engagement. In this political environment, NGOs have been frequently restricted, and the fracture of oppositional political movements has made the growth of domestic agitation for ICJ difficult.
A unique feature of civil society in the region has been its complacency. This is not always a consequence of fear through repression. In the case of Singapore, for instance, authoritarian governance has been imposed and maintained through materialist and economic advancement. Society in such circumstances complies with government as it perceives in non-compliance a risk to socio-economic benefit. In addition, although the wealth gap in Singapore is one of the starkest world-wide, the doctrine of meritocracy transposes responsibility for wealth creation onto the individual within society, dispossessing the state of any duty to redress the balance and to become the obvious focus for the dissent of the disadvantaged.
The complex webs of obligation and patronage are another characteristic of compliant civil society. Stimulated by commodity and cash economy development models, these relationships may also foster corruption that in turn controls civil society through the giving and receiving of advantage.
Common to both centralist and paternalist states in the region is the manner in which they effectively exclude civil society from participatory governance or fail to activate inclusion beyond the obligations that the state identifies.[64] These obligations are designed to complement core cultural beliefs that necessitate compliance and that, when required, enforce conservative adherence to the established order.
Ratification advocates should work through civil society in oppressive state regimes to exploit the accountability and governance potential of ICJ, embodied in institutions such as the ICC.[65] Such a push can also come from academia and the media, which play a role in cultivating the potential of civil society activism.
In endeavoring to understand the relatively low accession rate to ICC Member State standing across the Asia Pacific region, this paper has located a range of explanations in social and cultural contexts, rather than essentially focusing on political determinations. The hypothesis is that the social conditions resistant to engagement with ICJ, prevailing in the nations states across the region, can be identified, distinguished and, if possible, addressed by the forces promoting ICC membership. However some of these conditions, such as relevance and capacity, require much more developmental and political adjustment than mere promotion of the values of ICJ can attain. Such adjustment would be necessary within states, and from the formal institutions of ICJ as well, if engagement in the region is to be made more viable and more attractive.
The development of nation state receptivity to the benefits of global governance that institutions like the ICC can and should offer, holds out an associated challenge for public international law. Due to the determination to individualize international criminal liability, the fundamental bonds (and essential purposes) of public international law can be envisaged beyond state-to-state relationships. The individualization of liability through international criminal prosecution also goes beyond the individualized rights paradigms of international humanitarian law. Developments in ICL and ICJ (as modes of global governance) have increased the utility of public international law to address many of the "big issue" divergent concerns of states in the Asia Pacific region that are multi-polar and not only bilateral. International law can be reinvigorated for these states as a medium for individualizing and aggregating responsibility, and seeking out redress where responsibility has too long been denied by the hegemonic interests behind the limited interpretation of public international law and its potential outreach. Membership in international justice alliances can now be argued to bring with it the more inclusive benefits of global governance.
Mark Findlay is Professor of Law, Singapore Management University and Professor of Criminal Justice, University of Sydney.


text:
require "test_helper"

class UserTest < ActiveSupport::TestCase
  setup do
    @user = build(:user)
  end

  test "saves successfully with valid attributes" do
    assert @user.save!
  end

  test "authenticate returns user when correct password given" do
    @user.save
    assert_equal @user, @user.authenticate("secret")
  end

  test "authenticate returns false when incorrect password given" do
    @user.save
    assert_equal false, @user.authenticate("wrong-secret")
  end

  test "is invalid with malformed email" do
    user = build(:user, email: "wrong-email")
    assert user.invalid?
    assert user.errors[:email].present?
  end

  test "is invalid with duplicate uppercased email" do
    create(:user, email: "john@doe.com")
    @user.email = "John@Doe.com"
    assert @user.invalid?
    assert @user.errors[:email].present?
  end

  test "is invalid without name" do
    user = build(:user, name: nil)
    assert user.invalid?
    assert user.errors[:name].present?
  end

  test "is invalid without password" do
    user = build(:user, password: nil)
    assert user.invalid?
    assert user.errors[:password].present?
  end

  test "is invalid with non-matching password confirmation" do
    @user.password_confirmation = "wrong-secret"
    assert @user.invalid?
    assert @user.errors[:password_confirmation].present?
  end
end

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Q: How to prove that $\mathbb{Z} \sim E^*$ where $E^*$ is the set of positive even integers Prove that $\mathbb{Z} \sim E^*$ where $E^*$ is the set of positive even integers. Intuitevely I know this to be true, but cannot construct a proof.
Could someone show a proof?

A: In interpret your $\sim$ as "there is a bijection between them".
Instead of giving a bijection directly, as both set are countable, I think it is much more intuitive to consider the following two bijections (I take $0\in\mathbb N$ to be given):
$$f:\mathbb N\to E^*, f(n)=2(n+1)$$
and
$$g:\mathbb N\to\mathbb Z, f(n)=\begin{cases}(n-1)/2&n\text{ odd}\\-n/2&n\text{ even}\end{cases}$$
You can verify for both cases easily (by induction) that they are bijections. We then just take $g^{-1}\circ f$ as the desired bijection between $\mathbb Z$ and $E^*$.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


No. 1 seed Wildcats seeking second national title in three years.
San Antonio — The Final Four experience is all new for Michigan's roster.
That's far from the case down the hall.
For Villanova, preparing to play in a national-championship game isn't exactly old hat, as seven players on the current roster were part of the Wildcats' title-winning team in 2016 — with three of them playing key roles in the overtime victory over North Carolina.
Guard Jalen Brunson started and played 22 minutes that night in Houston, scoring four points, while Mikal Bridges had two points in 15 minutes. The big game came from then-redshirt freshman Phil Booth, who scored 20 in 25 minutes.
But that experience, so far, is coming in second place to this season's run to the championship game which culminates at 9:20 tonight at the Alamodome.
All three are expected to have a big say in whether the Wildcats can win it all for the second time in three seasons, as are guard Donte DiVincenzo, who was redshirting in 2016, and forward Eric Paschall, who sat out after transferring from Fordham.
For Paschall, who was 10-for-11 and scored 24 against Kansas on Saturday, it's the chance to take part in what he only got to watch two seasons ago.
And while the roster has changed to some extent, the lessons learned from the last championship have stuck with the group going for another title.
While Michigan will have its hands full trying to stop Brunson, Villanova feels like it will have an equally hard time finding the right matchup for Wolverines big man Moritz Wagner, who had 24 points and 15 rebounds in the victory over Loyola-Chicago on Saturday.
Villanova blew apart any myth that it's hard to shoot in a big stadium like the Alamodome when it went 18-for-40 from 3-point range against Kansas.
The Wildcats, who had 13 triples at halftime, set the record for most 3-pointers made in a Final Four game and have now made the most threes in an NCAA Tournament with 66. They also have made 454 3-pointers this season, the most ever by a Division I team.
The line opened with Villanova as a 6½-point favorite.
... Michigan and Villanova have met three times before, with Villanova winning twice — including over top-seed Michigan in the 1985 NCAA Tournament, en route to the Wildcats' first national championship.


text:
News & Reviews | Under the shadow of His wing – Musicweb International
Posted: Thursday 10th December 2015
Under the shadow of His wing – Musicweb International
The Vasari Singers have a proud record of commissioning new music. Indeed, for the choir's 25th anniversary, which fell in 2005, they commissioned new pieces from no fewer than ten composers, recording all but one of them on an album entitled Anthems for the 21st Century (review). One of the composers on that occasion was Jonathan Rathbone. Now the Vasari Singers have turned to him again for a new work but this time on a much more ambitious scale.
Under the shadow of His wing, premiered in October 2014, was "conceived as a contemporary re-working of the Vespers service" in the words of Jeremy Backhouse. He also comments that "rather like the traditional Vespers service itself, [Rathbone's score] takes us on a musical journey from darkness to light." The composer says that the piece is "something between an act of worship and a concert." It's written for a cappella chorus but, in fact, the chorus is divided into two and sometimes three separate choirs. In addition a female semi-chorus is used at times. At several points in the score spatial separation of the various choirs is used to heighten the effect of the music. This separation is well conveyed in the recording.
The score is cast in no fewer than sixteen separate movements and it incorporates a number of liturgical texts associated with evening or night time. So, for example, there are settings of the Magnificat and Nunc Dimittis. There are also settings of a number of texts associated with the evening and night Offices of the Christian church, including 'Te lucis ante terminum', 'In pace, in idipsum', 'Glory to Thee, my God, this night' and 'Hail, gladdening light'. The work finishes with 'Abide with me'. A number of thematic motifs are used on a recurring basis to unify the score though I have to confess that I couldn't easily identify these motifs save for those which are based on familiar plainsong.
There's much to admire during the course of the individual movements. I like Rathbone's setting of the Magnificat where excited, quick-moving musical figures are married with slower-moving lines to good effect. Mary's joy at the prospect of being the mother of Jesus is well conveyed. The Nunc Dimittis is also attractive: here Rathbone builds the intensity of the music from a thoughtful opening before relapsing into tranquillity; the process is repeated in the doxology. 'Blessed is the man' is the longest movement and here a lot of use is made of three widely-spaced choirs. This is quite an impressive movement, not least on account of the multi-layered choral textures. It also helps, I think, that there's some impassioned music in this movement. 'Into thy hands' is another multi-layered movement and I can imagine it would especially make an impact in live performance.
I don't think all the music is as successful, however. The seventh movement, 'Close thine eyes' is scored for an octet of singers (two to a part.) Here we're told Rathbone has borrowed a lot from jazz harmonies. There's certainly no hiding place for the singers in this movement – and the eight members of the choir acquit themselves well. However, I'm afraid I didn't warm to the harmonic language at all; it doesn't seem to gel with the words. The following movement, 'Christe qui lux es et dies' is another one in which spatial effects are employed. Three groups of singers are involved but on this occasion the spatial effects seemed to militate against the music – and since these effects work well elsewhere I don't think the singers can be to blame here. In this movement I found the words almost indistinguishable. The effect is that of a halo of sound but the result, while atmospheric, is diffuse. Perhaps this is one reason why I felt that this movement is too long for its material. Later in the work comes 'Care-charming sleep', a setting of a poem by John Fletcher (1579-1625). This is written for the female semi chorus of just four voices. It's well sung but I'm afraid I found my attention wandering. The work concludes with a setting of 'Abide with me'. The familiar tune is used and Rathbone's arrangement starts hauntingly with just an octet of voices. However, as the setting unfolds I found some of the key changes and harmonies unconvincing. Others may take a different view but I didn't think this last movement worked. I rather wish Rathbone had ended with his fourteenth movement, 'Hail, gladdening light'. This is a good, strong piece containing music with a genuinely strong profile. Indeed, it's described in the notes as "in effect, a triumphant conclusion to the piece." So why not end with it?
So, musically I think Under the shadow of His wing is something of a mixed bag. Jonathan Rathbone tells us that the music "is intended to be soothing and reassuring – the reassurance comes from imitating styles of the past [such as plainchant], mixed with more modern yet carefully handled harmonic ideas." I'm afraid that one of my foremost reservations about this score comes from the very fact that so much of it is "soothing and reassuring". To be sure, there's a great deal of beautiful-sounding music here but I found myself craving rather more in the way of assertive writing or even nothing more than music ins a quicker tempo. So much of the music is slow-moving that I found my attention wandering. Furthermore, the harmonies are usually warm and comforting to an extent that eventually I came to find some of the music bland. An obvious exemplar – even though the musical styles are poles apart – is Rachmaninov's All-Night Vigil. However, the Russian master includes not only beautiful, prayerful settings in his great work but also outbursts of praise and fervent joy. By comparison, too much of Rathbone's work seems somewhat one-dimensional.
The other significant reservation I have concerns the sheer length of Under the shadow of His wing. I do wonder how many choirs will feel able – or wish – to invest the time and effort to learn a score that lasts for nearly 100 minutes and is all unaccompanied. I suspect that the score will make a stronger impression if experienced in live performance where there's a visual dimension too. Heard simply in an audio recording, however, one becomes conscious that this is a long piece. The composer says that the movements are designed also for separate performance and that's good because there are some interesting individual pieces in here that I can well see having a life of their own. I'm left with the feeling that the score as a whole and some of the individual movements within it would have benefited from editing. It's hard to avoid the feeling that the composer has got carried away a bit. In passing, I notice that on the composer's website Under the shadow of His wing is described as being eighty minutes in length, which in itself would be a substantial length. That entry, it is clear, was written prior to the first performance of the work.
However, I must emphasise that there are some very good individual movements in the score. Each time I've listened to this recording I've listened to the entire work. Clearly anyone buying this recording will want to do the same. However, I suspect that greater rewards may be gained from listening selectively to individual movements. I'm not sure if Under the shadow of His wing has yet been published but I hope that choirs will be able to purchase copies of individual movements; that, I am sure, is how the music is likely to gain the widest currency.
Rathbone's music has been splendidly served here by Jeremy Backhouse and the Vasari Singers. I've never been disappointed by the quality of their singing on disc and they maintain their high standards here with singing that is committed and sensitive. They've been well recorded in what has become their regular recording venue. Engineer Dave Rowell and producer Adrian Peacock have captured the choir faithfully and atmospherically and, as I've said already, have conveyed the spatial effects successfully. The documentation is good, which augurs well for the choir's new label.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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text:
Movie and TV Mistress
Reviews of Movies and TV shows old and new.
WISHMASTER 3: Devil Stone (2001)
Movie and TV Mistress back with the third instalment of WISHMASTER films.
This third film is called WISHMASTER 3: Devil Stone in the UK but is also known as WISHMASTER 3: Beyond The Gates Of Hell. Like the second film it is another straight to DVD release, this film is also rated 15 rather then 18 like the rest of the series, these are signs that it will yet again be bad, but you never know so lets see if this can redeem the franchise.
We have some very sedate opening credits showing Persian statues, pottery and a star shaped puzzle box engulfed in flames. Then we have the nightmare of the female lead called Diana, she has a nightmare about the car crash she survived but which killed her parents, while that's happening she has decided to climb to the roof of her dorm and her boyfriend Greg follows her. Greg thinks she has jumped off the roof and we get a bad attempt at a jump scare when her foot touches his neck.
I predict that Diana will wish that she died in the car crash, meaning everybody will be alive and well at the end of the film.
Diana is a TA in a mythology class, her boyfriend is a student in her class, yeah we all know he wants her for one thing the answers. So she is doing some extra stuff at the museum with the Teacher, nothing kinky even though Jason Connery so wants to. I find Jason's performance in most of his films to be awful and very creepy, no change there then.
While waiting for Jason to arrive Diana checks out the Persian puzzle box, this is all starting to remind me of Hellraiser, but with a magic eye puzzle; what Diana needs is a fatty-boom-batty blunt! And I guarantee she'll be seeing a sailboat, an ocean, and maybe even some of those big-tittied mermaids doing some of that lesbian shit!
She sees the button to open the box, pulls out the ruby and rubs it, this is a first the ruby does not get broken at the start. Jason arrives wants to take her to dinner, but is denied. Diana leaves and he is left alone and wouldn't you know it the Djinn arrives, the Djinn in this film is now played by John Novak in make up, but will also be played by Jason, oh the joy.
I figure the fact the stone was found in a puzzle box could explain the difference of Djinn in this and the fourth film. It's sad that horror monsters aren't played by the same actor, Robert Englund stuck with the franchise to the very end, he was right not to come back for the reboot, but his Freddy was and will always be the best.
Jason knows who the Djinn is and says he doesn't want anything but the Djinn blackmails him into wishing, so he wishes for the two most beautiful girls to want him and be there, Djinn obliges and then Jason is sliced to pieces by the girls and the Djinn takes his face so he can walk around. Meanwhile Diana is hanging with her friend who is telling her that her boyfriend will leave her if she doesn't change and then she gets the vision of Jason's death so goes to investigate.
So far I have to say this film is better then the second film and slightly closer to the first so that's good but the downside is as it is a 15 rated film we only see tits and no real gore.
Diana's friend has sex with boyfriend in public after scaring her boyfriend with a bull head, perhaps that is a set up for later, or maybe I'm expecting too much from this film. Diana knows all about the mythology and what the box and stone are and asks her boyfriend to trust her and tells him everything, but Greg needs to know if she loves him and why she won't get help for her issues and leaves.
Jason is trying to get info about Diana but can't get it so gets the registrar to make a wish, she wishes all the files would go up in flames which ruins his plan to find Diana that way. Diana has a research montage and is late for class. Djinn Jason teaches class telling the class that the Greek gods were Djinn and that the Trojan war was due to the Djinn because Helen of Troy wished to be loved by everybody, what a selfish bitch.
Well wouldn't you know it the College is putting on the play Faust wow isn't that subtle, Jason is tricked in going to a girls room believing he will find Diana but finds Melissa who wants to have sex with Jason, so he leaves and heads to Diana's room where Greg confronts Jason and we get a bad morph job on Jason's face so Greg now believes and runs to find Diana and takes her to church but Jason is there.
We finally get some gross gore and and bad make up effects as a girl becomes thinner, so Diana wishes for her pain to stop and then wishes for the Arc Angel Michael to fight the Djinn, Diana is about to take Michael into her but Greg pushes her out of the way, he and the Djinn fight and Michael barely wins and runs off with Diana. Melissa still wants the professor and wishes for him to break her heart. While Michael and Diana hide in the theatre and he has a go at her for releasing the Djinn.
We get another wish and death, while Diana tries to block the visions from the Djinn, they talk to each other through the visions straight to camera. Diana tries to wield Michael's Flaming sword but gets burnt, so Michael heals her by blowing on her, now that one hell of a blow job. Diana's Friend Katie runs when she sees her boyfriend and then Jason and hides in an animal research lab, phone's Diana and wishes for somewhere to hide and is forced into a cage with rats.
Michael and Jason fight again and Michael cuts off the Djinn's hand but he just grows another, Michael and Diana drive off but Jason jumps on top they continue to fight but then we have a car crash just like the start of the film and she saves Michael before the car explodes. Jason has some dodgy body reforming, which looks like they copied the transformation for Judge Doom into the crazy toon at the end of WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT?
Diana jumps off a building saying that if the waker dies before the last wish he looses, but Jason grabs her arm, Michael throws the sword and she stabs Jason and they both fall the Djinn dies. Michael thanks her and resurrects her she and Greg are back together and she tells him she loves him.
This film was way better then the the second, but that's not hard that was a complicated mess of a film which didn't make sense; this film owes a lot to the teen horror films like SCREAM and I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER. Jason Connery is well cast as the villain and is very good at sleazy and creepy, the only real problem is that the deaths are nothing like what you have come to expect of the WISHMASTER they are very tame and the effects are very poor.
Though the film was closer to the original in plot, if you came in half way though you would probably think it was a typical teen slasher film, it was very dull and dragged, of course not as much as the second, but that movie felt like the Machine in THE PRINCESS BRIDE, I think it took a year from my life. Thankfully there is only one more movie in this franchise left.
Posted by SciFiGeekSarah at Friday, August 26, 2011 No comments: Links to this post
WISHMASTER 2: Evil Never Dies (1999)
Movie and TV Mistress back again with another WISHMASTER film, this time it's WISHMASTER 2: Evil Never Dies (1999)
This film didn't even come out at the cinema it premièred on cable and went to DVD which is now out of print, that bodes well for this sequel doesn't it. At least Andrew Divoff returned to play the Djinn, sadly KNB effects didn't return to do the make up or effects.
The Movie starts very quickly we see Robert England's collection then thieves stealing items, guards try to stop them by shooting and wouldn't you know it they shoot the statue with the Djinn Ruby in it and a Thief takes the ruby, that thief is shot by a guard but it's fine, apparently bullets are attracted to the Djinn and so the ruby was shot and damaged the thief is revealed to be a girl and is burnt by the ruby. Her Boyfriend is shot, she kisses him and runs off leaving the broken ruby behind, the Djinn breaks loose and gets Eric to make a wish, he wishes he had never been born, we get some dodgy morphing effects and bad CGI with the Djinn.
The cops arrive, it is not Robert Englunds house from the first one it looks like a museum or gallery, a cop finds the Djinn who now appears to have horns, the cop tells him to freeze so the Djinn freezes the cop. The other cops arrive and the Djinn has turned into his human form from the first movie. Meanwhile Morgana the girl who got burnt by the ruby is having a bit of a hissy fit and mental breakdown, she seems surprised that her boyfriend was shot asking why...well lets see, you break in and steal stuff in America you are bound to be shot at, tut tut tut.
The Detective is questioning the Djinn and getting no where and the Djinn was unable to get him to make a wish but in the cell he gets a tough guy to wish and of course Morgana is connected to the Djinn and dreams about his victims. We have our first gory death and Morgana goes to church and see a priest played by Paul Johansson (Dan Scott from ONE TREE HILL). Morgana believes the Djinn is the Devil, I can see how she made that mistake he has horns and gives people what they want for their souls, yeah the Djinn and Devil so alike.
The Djinn is now in Prison and calls himself the Wishmaster, how to slip the title in. An inmate who is wrongly imprisoned asks the Djinn to put his lawyer though the pain and suffering he's been through and the lawyer shows up to say he can get him out and all the charges dropped but then is folded in half and rocked back and fourth, in a very comedic way.
Morgana has a nightmare again and does some research on the statue the ruby was in and so time for that history lesson. She is unsure if Eric is dead and here is a plot hole that bugged me from the start, Eric wished he was never born therefore no one should remember him and the Djinn would have no connection to Morgana and the incident may not have happened so this whole movie is a paradox.
Morgana explains everything to the priest who tells her to confess and find piece. She goes in search of the Djinn and goes to the prison to meet him, while another inmate asks the Djinn to get him out of jail, he is Russian and says "you are the devil and will give things for my soul." Morgana speaks with the Djinn but doesn't get any real information. More inmates ask for stuff from him, which pisses off the big guy in the prison, who asks to get wasted and is beaten up by his twin martial arts bodyguards.
Morgana has more back story of the Djinn and talks it all out with the Priest who then offers to meet the Djinn with her and try to help, the priest discovers that the Djinn is not of this world and then we have the required shower scene where the Djinn scares her. The Priest explains the prophecy and then says he now believes in the Devil, I thought if you were a priest you'd believe in the devil as it's in the bible, he believes in god why not the devil till now; The priest wants Morgana and isn't hiding it.
The priest and Morgana have a plan and that's to not make any wishes, Morgana cuts off her little finger and returns the stolen art work as well as confess in church. This movie is boring and the finger thing makes no sense and there is still 40 minutes to go, I wish it would end already, at least the first one was gross and funny there is no real scares or horror in this boring film.
The guard that hates the Djinn wishes he could slow dance with him alone Compton style, he regrets it when he see the Djinn in its real form, yet again we see nothing. The guard is now the Djinn , the Russian prisoner and the Djinn both escape. The Djinn has got as many souls as he can in prison but requires more, apparently 800 souls. Morgana finds the Djinn in the Russian mob club and shoots him, he tells her that she will make her 3 wishes and she runs off scared.
The Russian shoots Morgana thinking he can stop the Djinn but she is uninjured, the Djinn is in Vegas getting more souls and calls Morgana using the Russians voice telling her to fly to Vegas and stop the Djinn. The Priest finds the incantation to put the Djinn back in the ruby, they get closer and make out, there's a priest with principles. The Djinn reforms the ruby as he now has enough souls. Everybody in the Casino is winning and loosing their souls.
Morgana wishes that the Djinn be gone forever and be back in the stone but he can not grant these wishes, The Priest wishes that he go back to his hell and they all end up in the stone and the priest is on a cross, so she has her first wish. They end up back at the Casino and the owner wishes to see it all come to an end, god so do I. We get a bizarre scene with cards and roulette wheels attacking people, frogs and locusts.
Morgana wishes that the guard she shot was alive and takes god into her soul and says the incantation and everybody's soul is expelled, I really hope this is over soon. It ends with what's meant to be the last scare of the Djinn staring at camera inside the stone, Barney the Dinosaur is scarier.
That movie was Awful, Boring and made no sense; as I said earlier it contains a paradox and other plot holes, like why does he now need 800 souls when he didn't in the first and why does she cut off her little finger. I know this film was made for TV but only showing 2 deaths at the start and having the rest take pace off camera made this film unscary and boring, it did not need to be 95 minutes long so much could be cut to make this a better paced film, not a better film though.
I guess it's on to the next WISHMASTER film, maybe it will be better, sadly Andrew Divoff does not return.
Posted by SciFiGeekSarah at Saturday, August 13, 2011 No comments: Links to this post
WISHMASTER (1997)
Movie and TV Mistress back again with another Horror Franchise, this time it's WISHMASTER.
I actually remember seeing this at the cinema, as it came out in May 1998 in the UK. I do know I found it funny more then scary back then, I wonder if I still feel the same way, has this laughable film improved with age?
Directed by Robert Kurtzman, a founding member of KNB effects who have worked on EVIL DEAD films and lots of other horror films including the recent Zombie series THE WALKING DEAD. This was his second time directing, his first being THE DEMOLITIONIST (1995), think ROBCOP with out the robot, it sounds hilarious and I will now be looking for it.
On with this film, which if you don't know is about a Djinn which is a Genie unlike Robin Williams or Jeannie from I DREAM OF JEANNIE. The movie opens with a Gem being cast, the McGuffin of the film. Next we have a long scroll about the history of the Djinn, narrated by Angus Scrimm (The Tall Man from PHANTASM). We hear a man in Persia wishing to be shown all the wonders of the world, a man is made part of a wall and looks just like Han Solo in Carbonite.
OK I'm less then 5 minutes in and I'm already laughing, it kind of reminds me of ARMY OF DARKNESS, the Type face is the same and it seems to have a similar film quality. I do wonder, what was it about the 90's which made movies so self referential We get to see lots of great make up effects which KNB are excellent at. We have a guy with a weird alien like creature popping out of his chest which bites a woman, next we have a man's skeleton escape his skin and attack people and another man turned into a snake. The wizard to the sultan tells him not to make any more wishes and then traps the Djinn in the red ruby which is then encased in a statue for safe keeping.
It's a hell of an opening for a movie and sets the mood for the rest of the film, which to me like HOUSE it is a horror comedy.
We flash forward to present day and Robert Englund (Freddy Kruger) and Ted Raimi (Joxer the Mighty) are at a dock receiving a shipment of the very statue the McGuffin ruby is in and of course a crew guy is drunk and drops the crate with the statue on Ted's head. Ted always dies in horror films in the funniest ways.
The statue is broken and the ruby is exposed and a dock guy takes it to an auction house for appraisal. we are introduced to Alex the heroine of the film, who doesn't want to date a hot guy (Josh) who fancies her. OK so Alex is a gem expert at the Auction house and just happens to have a Genie bottle like that in I DREAM OF JEANNIE in her office, see you can't take this movie seriously. Alex rubs the gem and we get a jump scare of her boss being right beside her, she takes the gem to Josh to check it further.
Ah set up for the finale battle between Alex and the Djinn, she tells a girl basket ball team they need stillness. While Josh uses a laser scan on the Gem and releases the Djinn who kills him by wishing for the pain to cease. Alex feels the pain and death of every victim and is connected to the Djinn. The Djinn creature grows and gets stronger with every wish.
This movie has so many horror actor cameo's Reggie Bannister from the PHANTASM films is a pharmacist and Buck Flower who plaid Red Thomas the Bum in BACK TO THE FUTURE again plays a bum. They argue and The bum wishes for Reggie to die.
Meanwhile Alex is upset and her sister doesn't believe her visions, Shannon thinks Alex is just having nightmares, which is true she is having nightmares about the Djinn. Alex investigates where the Gem came from and meets Robert Englund and gets some history and advise while the Djinn gets a human face and blinds a medical student. Alex meets a folklore professor who explains the plot and how the Djinn works, while we have more silly jump scares just to keep the audience on their toes.
We have a montage of Alex reading about the Djinn's history and more exposition. While the Djinn goes to her boss to find out where Alex lives, and on the Boss's Desk has a classic Genie Lamp like that is Aladdin. More smoking from both Alex and the Djinn, meanwhile the Djinn puts the Gem back together so he can bring more of his kind into the world, bit like the dark overlords in HOWARD THE DUCK, which is funny since the Djinn sounds just like the possessed Dr Jennings.
Alex goes to the professor again but it's very obvious that the Djinn has taken over her body or something, it's very red riding hood. Alex gets a free wish and wishes the Djinn to blow his brains out which he does but he cannot die, she then wishes to know what he is and is then trapped in the Gem being chased by her fears. Alex wishes her second official wish and we have a scream moment with the house phone.
Alex heads to Robert's party where the final battle will take place and is stopped by Tony Todd (Candy Man), she gets in and the Djinn gets Tony to try and escape a water tank and tricks Robert into wishing that his party was like that at the start of the film. Alex promises that she won't wish and runs way but the Djinn makes the soldier statues come to life and attack her and traps her sister in a burning painting. So she wishes that the Dock worker had not been drinking on the job 2 days earlier so everyone including Ted Raimi is safe and sound and Alex asks Josh out on a date.
So that was WISHMASTER it was still as funny as I remember and gross and the make-up effects were just as good as you would expect from KNB. As a Director Robert Kurtzman didn't do a bad job, this film definitely deserved the 18 rating for the Make-up and effects alone, more so then HOUSE. I would not tell you to go out of your way and watch this film, but if you like 90's self referential horror and seeing loads of classic horror actors meet horrific ends in a movie you might enjoy this just for a laugh, plus I'm sure there are some fun drinking games you can have with this film.
Can you guess what comes next?
Posted by SciFiGeekSarah at Monday, August 08, 2011 No comments: Links to this post
SciFiGeekSarah
I am a child of the 80's i grew up on some of the best and worst movies made. I knew when I was 5 and had just seen Back to the Future I wanted to work in movies and I have made it my mission in life to achive this goal.
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text:
Fast bootstraping of development evironment

# Targets
- [ ] download .ydev.yml from github repository (get username using git config)
- [ ] Clone active repos from github/bitbucket
- [ ] Install apm/npm/gpm/chocolatey packages
- [ ] Install golang tools
- [ ] Support gemsets for ruby developers
- [ ] Support python package managers
- [ ] Package sets
- [ ] Environment sets

# Commands

`ydev init` - installs tools from default .devrc file

`ydev init other` - installs tools from other.devrc file

# .ydev.yml

This file defines assets to be installed by ydev. Example:

```
# active repositories to clone
active-repos:
# next repos will be cloned into $GOPATH src folder
  $GOPATH: [
    gocheckers
    hypster
  ]
  # next repos will be cloned into $HOME/pets folder
  $HOME/pets: []

# tools to install
tools: git mercurial atom golang

# tools to install with brew
brew: gpm

# npm packages to install
npm: bower gulp karma

# apm packages to install
apm: [
  git-plus go-plus
  script linter
  language-go
]

# gpm packages to install
gpm: []

```


James, 10 year old boy, wants very much to help his mother who has got difficulties with the end of year school concert.
James is full of ideas when it comes to helping his mother, but he can't do everything alone. So he teams up with his Grandma.
Grandma is 92, she has got wobbly legs and bad temper, but she is a witch and she is very crafty.
James and his two best pals, Richard and Maria, have become friends with Grandma and her own friends at the rest home.
And, while James' mother is at the orchestra rehearsal, the Gang meets secretly in Grandmas dark and gloomy bedroom.


text:
Consortium for the Advanced Study of Brain Injury
History Evolution and Timeline
Our Team+
Our Labs+
Laboratory of Cognitive Neuromodulation
Ethics Policy Center
Ethics and Policy Considerations
Division of Systems Neurology and Neuroscience
Rockefeller University Hospital
Our Projects+
Grants & Funders
Glossary+
Select a subpage
The Consortium for the Advanced Study of Brain Injury [CASBI] at Weill Cornell Medical College and The Rockefeller University seeks to understand mechanisms of recovery following severe brain injuries and to develop novel therapeutic interventions and strategies. Through translational research and public policy engagement, CASBI works to affirm the rights of individuals with brain injury and overcome the scientific and societal barriers that can limit their maximal integration into our society.
The Consortium for the Advanced Study of Brain Injury
Neurological disease presents a multitude of unique challenges. Developing new approaches to treatment and addressing their societal consequences requires a research program that is highly multidisciplinary, running the gamut from mathematics and biophysics to experimental neurophysiology, clinical neurology, public policy and medical ethics. The Consortium for the Advanced Study of Brain Injury (CASBI) and its partnerships with Systems Neurology and Neuroscience Division of the Feil Family Brain Mind Institute at Weill Cornell enables a specialized group of basic and clinical neuroscientists to develop novel strategies for the assessment and treatment of neurologic disease and a team of ethicists and social scientists to ensure the broad impact of this work through advances in public policy. CASBI is unique in integrating this range of expertise and resources for the purpose of addressing the unmet needs of patients with non-progressive brain injuries.
By some estimates, 100,000 people in the United States – and as many as 300,000 – may now be surviving in a chronic minimally conscious state (MCS). Among the many types of brain injury that may result in MCS and produce a slow recovery of cognitive function, the greatest number of patients have suffered traumatic brain injury (TBI), which is most commonly caused by automobile accidents. Most recently, these numbers have swelled from the injuries sustained by our wounded warriors coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan. Most TBI victims are otherwise healthy and between the ages of 16 and 24 when injured. In the United States alone, as many as five million people have significant residual functional impairment following TBI. An estimated 90,000 new patients each year may recover from TBI, but do not reach a level of independent living due to cognitive impairments.
Patients with severe brain injuries present particular challenges to the healthcare system. Unfortunately, the complexity of these illnesses has tended to obscure medical understanding of the potential to recover from TBI. Since 2007, Weill Cornell's CASBI initiative has been at the international forefront in the advancement of research in this area. With a strong foundation in place, there is still much to discover.
Contact Us Glossary
Weill Cornell Medicine Consortium for the Advanced Study of Brain Injury 520 East 70th Street New York, NY


text:
Private Schools: Best for the Disadvantaged
Q. Which does the better job of educating low-income and minority children, the public schools or the private schools?
Clearly, and ironically, it's the private schools. Most people think that private schools cost more and that explains why their students and parents feel more satisfied with the educational product they received. But actually, public schools are more expensive, pupil for pupil, than their private counterparts. It's just that the parents of public-school children don't have to pay for the public education out of their own pockets. They are distanced from the tax funding, which is averaging around $9,000 per pupil per year in United States K-12 schools, not counting off-budget spending such as debt service and construction projects.
The obvious advantages that private education yields for kids of all income levels and races is fueling the boom in private school enrollments and the push for school choice programs around the country.
Foundations and donors looking to improve educational outcomes for disadvantaged children might be forced to reject supporting public education because its track record is pretty sorry. The achievement gap between rich and poor, white and black or brown in public schools has been widening, or staying static, for the past 30 or 40 years. Today's white children score an average of 200 points higher on the SAT and on all subjects tested by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP).
Yet in private schools, the achievement gap has been markedly narrowed in recent years. Researcher Jay Greene, senior fellow of the Manhattan Institute, revealed that in studies using NAEP data compiled from all Milwaukee public-school students of all income levels, comparing their scores with those of the low-income participants in Milwaukee's private-school voucher program.
Greene reported that voucher students were more than 1� times as likely to graduate as public-school students. The test-score gap between the two races actually widened in writing and math between fourth grade and 12th grade among public-school students, Greene found. The gaps increased by 15% and 10%, respectively, although the racial gaps got slightly smaller in reading and science in those eight years.
However, Greene noted that relatively high numbers of minority students drop out of public schools every year, leaving a pool of minority students in public schools who are academically better performers than minority students as a whole. So by all rights, the gaps should have been narrowed considerably more.
That's exactly what happened in Milwaukee's private schools. The racial gap in reading, 27 points for fourth-graders in public schools, was reduced by nearly 50%, to a gap of only 14 points dividing the races for seniors. Writing, math and science gaps also were closed, by factors of 18% to 26%.
Homework: See the Citizen's Guide to Education Reform, www.schoolchoices.org
By Susan Darst Williams � www.ShowandTellforParents.com � Private Schools 02 � � 2008
Private Schools < Previous Next >


The Lab is home to the Jazz Lab Recording Studio. This fully state of the art facility is being utilized for educational endeavors and professional audio/video production, mastering and duplication.
Doors open one hour prior to the event - unless noted otherwise.


What is your Keto breakfast go to?
Mine is, and has been bacon and eggs for months. I am quite loyal to routine and find that 5 out of 7 days I go for the easy, the reliable, bacon and fried eggs!
I will throw in pancakes or muffins sometimes for good measure, but mostly I stick with quick and easy so I can get on with my day!
Well these special breakfast sandwich buns are super easy!! You just whip it up in the blender, bake and eat! Then stack up a couple fried eggs with cheese and bacon and your set! Try with ham for a twist instead of bacon.
The only special ingredient needed you may not have is maple extract. This gives the buns a breakfast taste that really sets it apart from other "muffin" type sandwich buns.
Get some online. I recommend Frontier brand as it is the best one that doesn't leave an aftertaste!
You will also need wide mouth canning rings as molds. I greased them then set on a parchment lined pan.
Bake until golden, then gently push out from the underside.
Place the ingredients for the buns into a blender and pulse until smooth.
Pour evenly into greased wide mouth canning rings (approximately 2-3 tbsp per lid) that are sitting on a silpat, foil or parchment. This all should be sitting on a flat cookie sheet.
Fill up till 1/4 inch from top.
Bake at 350F for 12-15 minutes or until set. Allow to cool slightly before removing from the rings.
Use in your sandwich of bacon, egg and cheese!
Will keep up to 5 days in fridge.


text:
Jaravee Boonchant player-feature Diversity
Boonchant Hopes to Earn LPGA Status
Angela Stanford honored with Charlie Bartlett Award
Jaravee Boonchant Hopes to Earn LPGA Status After the 2022 Season
Jaravee Boonchant
player-feature
Photo Credit: 2022 Getty Images
Written By: Madison Donley @m_donley4
Madison Donley is a senior journalism student at Northwestern University and a member of the Women's Soccer team. She is currently interning at the LPGA.
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Duke four-time all-American and Epson Tour standout Jaravee Boonchant is ready to earn her LPGA Tour card and follow in Jennifer Kupcho's footsteps. Boonchant challenged Kupcho in the 2019 NCAA Championship as a sophomore and defeated the Wake Forest standout, a perfect culmination to Boonchant's collegiate career. Having her Blue Devil's capture another national title in the process was a bonus.
Now, Boonchant looks at Kupcho's major win at this year's Chevron Championship as a future goal, one she is confident she can attain.
"I wouldn't say she's a rival, but she's always been a very good golfer. I look up to her, and I played with her in college a couple of times. I want to get into the LPGA to play in the same league as her and play against her again," Jaravee said of Kupcho.
The 23-year-old Thai native said winning the 2021 LPGA Thailand Master boosted her confidence after a dry spell in Q-school.
"It was very special. In December of last year, I went through this missed-cut streak of three or four events, so I went back to Thailand. I had some weeks off, and I was able to refocus and work on my game. It was very nice to see that hard work pay off, and it boosted my confidence," she said.
Jaravee began playing golf when she was six years old, when her father introduced her to the game. "He was taking me to the driving range with him and would watch him hitting balls. I felt like I wanted to try out the sport so I could spend more time with him. I started taking lessons and I just kept playing since," she said.
Despite the distance and time change, Boonchant said her family is always cheering her on overseas. "They're not here with me, but they will be texting me and watching my score. Even if it's 2 a.m., my dad will still be awake and watching," she said.
Growing up, Boonchant would routinely miss school on Fridays to compete in weekend junior golf tournaments in Thailand. "We have a Thai Golf Association that I was playing in. If you keep enough ranking, you get to go to international tournaments in Asia, and also some in America," she said.
Boonchant moved to the US when she was a 14-year-old to attend the IMG Academy while her parents stayed back in Thailand. Although she went to a bilingual school, she wasn't fluent in English, making it a challenging transition.
angela-stanford
Angela Stanford honored with Charlie Bartlett Award By The GWAA
news-and-notes
LPGA Tour Statement on the Blue Bay LPGA
Junior Players Shows The Way In Kenya
hsbc-womens-world-championship
World's Top Five and All 2022 Major Winners in Field For 2023 HSBC Women's World Championship


text:
All Issues Culture Economy Education Energy & Environment Governance Health Care Public Safety Spending & Taxes Unions
Women of Great Jobs
Hear from the talented and inspiring women who were the focus of the Great Jobs Project.
How "Green" Is a Wind Turbine?
Wind turbines consume a vast quantity of resources while producing no reliable energy
Working Hard for Minnesota
Center of the American Experiment works hard for all Minnesotans
Clear Energy Alliance: Minnesota Madness
Proposal to increase Minnesota's "green" energy mandate from 25% to 50% would cost $80 billion, raise the cost of electricity by 40%, and accomplish nothing to combat global warming.
Support Mining In Minnesota TV Ad
Expanded mining in Minnesota will add billions to the state's economy, create 8,500 jobs, and won't harm the environment. What are we waiting for?
Support Mining In Minnesota
Great Jobs Project: It's a huge opportunity for people once they know about it
Learn one of the best kept secrets from Co-director of the Great Jobs Project Katherine Kersten. Find out more! http://www.greatjobsmn.com/
Great Jobs Project: It's nice to be able to be your own boss
The path from trade school to small-business owner can be rewarding in many ways. But, How? Find out! http://www.greatjobsmn.com/
Great Jobs Project: "I never knew about a two-year college until I started doing research…"
Electrical Tech Beverly White tells us about her passion for the auto and electrical fields and the possibilities in store for her. Find out more! http://www.greatjobsmn.com/
Great Jobs Project: "We've been brainwashed that you need a four-year degree…"
Mill Turn Machinist Aaron Mumbleau, Apprentice Heath Foster and Training and Development Specialist Beth Metzger dispel the falsehoods surrounding machine manufacturing and open our eyes to the amazing opportunities waiting…
Great Jobs Project: "People don't understand the industry."
Sales Engineer Dan McGee talks about modern American manufacturing and the innovative work that goes into "making us all comfortable." Find out more! http://www.greatjobsmn.com/
Great Jobs Project: "You get a feeling at the end of the day…"
Carpenter Instructor Amanda Phillips and Apprentice John Horbach talk about their work and shine a light on an opportunity too many people don't know about. Find out more! http://www.greatjobsmn.com/
Minnesota Report Card
Minnesota's taxes and regulations are hurting small businesses. Minnesota can do better!
Minnesota's Report Card (4/27/16)
Peter Nelson Testifies at the MN House Job Growth & Energy Affordability Comm.
Peter Nelson testifies before the MN House Job Growth & Energy Affordability Committee on April 18, 2016 (at 1:07)
Twin Cities Business Wealth Migration Webinar
Twin Cities Business Wealth Migration Webinar (3.24.16) features CAE's VP & Senior Policy Fellow Peter Nelson and TCB's Editor Dale Kurscher


text:
English locations
The Lake District is a National Park located in Cumbria in north-west England. Coronation Street episodes have included scenes from the Lake District during the following years: 1969, 1987, 1990, 1993, 2010 and 2014.
Role in Coronation Street Edit
In October 1969, while returning home from a day trip to the Lake District, a coach carrying several residents of the street crashed into a tree after its steering mechanism failed. The driver, Reg Ellis, was killed in the crash, and passenger Ray Langton was left wheelchair-bound for several months.
Alec Hobson moved to the Lake District in April 1982.
In July 1990, teenagers Steve McDonald and Joanne Khan travelled to the Lake District on a motorbike. Upon arrival, Joanne had doubts about Steve's intentions and hitchhiked back to Weatherfield.
Following the death of her husband Derek, Mavis Wilton moved to the village of Cartmel, close to the Lake District, in October 1997 to run a bed-and-breakfast.
In February 2010, Joe McIntyre travelled to the Lake District in an attempt to fake his death and also to evade loan shark Rick Neelan. After sailing on Lake Windermere one night, a strong gust of wind threw Joe overboard. In the strong, cold winds and the ice cold water, hypothermia set in and Joe drowned before he could pull himself back onto the boat.
Retrieved from "https://coronationstreet.fandom.com/wiki/Lake_District?oldid=347631"


and satellites for the meeting.
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