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The Junior High (1960-2000) Chapter 3
Posted byskyking119 December 15, 2012 Posted inEducational Articles
Chapter 3- School Politics
There were five Principals between the years 1960 and 1998 at Cucamonga Junior High School. Two will not be mentioned because they short term replacements. The first principal lasted ten years, the second principal lasted seven years, and the last principal 17 years. All three retired after serving as Principal of Cucamonga Junior High School. The first principal, Mr. Worley, was "old school," meaning he was from the "old style" of running a building. Everything was by the book and formal rules were the way to go for him. Originally, he was an Assistant Principal at another building. He had transferred from the oldest junior high in the district to this new building in 1960. By the time he became Principal he was already in his late 60's. He brought with him his buddies from the other Junior High to serve as Department chairman with a relatively new faculty. Cucamonga Junior High School opened with 90% new teachers hired from NYC or just out of college in 1960.
The first year at Cucamonga Junior High was very difficult because the building was still unfinished. Many of the classrooms were not finished as of opening day on September 5,1960. Five years later, in 1965, an extension to the main building was build to house the ever-increasing number of students. A pool was supposed to be built in the inner courtyard of the building extension, but the community voted it down in a bond proposal. The population doubled every year with students transferring from New York City schools to the High Mountain school district where parents believed they could get a good education for their children, instead of teacher strikes, and gang violence.
By 1970 the first Principal, Mr. Worley was gone due to gang fights, and bad publicity created in the community. The school board pushed him out thinking he was too old in his late 60's to take control of a junior high. He was forced to retire.
In the fall of 1970, the second Principal, Mr. Tom Balls was hired. He was a Physical education teacher previously, and also an assistant principal until he was fired in a school district somewhere in Vermont. When he applied for the Cucamonga Junior High School job, he had been working in a shoe factory in Vermont for two years. The school board wanted a puppet they could control, and he was just the man. Tom Balls was a man in his forties with no leadership ability at all. He simply did not know how to please the Teachers Union, and get his own way at the same time. He fought the Teachers Union at every turn, and lost. He did not appreciate the power of informal structure at a school, and thought that he could control everything by formal rules. He did not have any friends on the faculty, and few of the teachers had any respect for him. During Tom Balls' "seven year tenure" at Cucamonga Junior High School, all hell broke loose with the loss of control of the students, and a lack of overall school discipline, drug problems, internal politics, threatened teacher strikes, and other administration problems.
The fact that the Teachers Union almost went out on strike three times in the early 1970's showed that there was a big gap between the administration needs, and the teacher's needs. Threatened teacher strikes were bad for business, bad for the parents, bad for the students, and bad for the atmosphere in the school system. Everything began to break down when Principal Tom Balls applied foolish formal rules. After each contract renewal with the teachers, the benefits in health insurance begin to shrink. The cost of living far exceeded the amount of pay the teachers were getting. All of these problems transferred back to the Principal, and the staff attitude at the time. Many teachers stood up against the Principal, and refused to do what he asked. He tried to fire them, but the Teachers Union protected them, and he lost all the battles. The Tom Balls also had a poor relationship with the President of the PTA. The PTA lost a lot of members because of his lack of support to PTA sponsored events. To gain the respect of the student body, and the faculty, Tom Balls arranged a Judo and Karate demonstration in which he demonstrated Judo and Karate with some of the teachers and students. Basically, he made a fool of himself. Many teachers who were not sure about the new Principal were now convinced that he was a fool.
At the Halloween party the Tom Balls was seen trying to impress some of the new female teachers, even though he was married. He hung around one young teacher the whole night, and she tried to get rid of him. All of the teachers noticed his behavior and that became fodder for more gossip around the school.
At the Christmas party for the teachers Tom Balls got drunk, and made a fool of himself calling another teacher names. No one forgot that embarrassing and immature occasion at the Teacher Christmas/Hanukah party. After two years as Principal, Tom Balls has lost all credibility with the teachers. He often had to take attendance at faculty meeting because more and more teachers simply did not come to the meetings anymore. He also tried to use the security guards as his spies around the building. That put the security guards in a bad position with the teachers, who never trusted them to begin with. Eventually, with the tensions of no teacher contracts for three years, pending strike threats, no salary increases; the Union reps took over the school on an informal basis. They called the shots on whether teachers were going to attend after school sports events or volunteer for extra assignments. It was a "work to rule," slow down, and the word "professionalism" went into the garbage can. The board said the teachers should volunteer to do more with no pay, and they called that "professionalism." They insisted on faculty meetings going beyond two hours on a school day after hours, or coming into "back to School night" to volunteer their time to meet with parents without additional pay
When teachers "worked to rule," all the extra free services are thrown out the window. It is amazing how much free extra stuff teachers do, like paying for classroom supplies out of their own pockets, or buying a pizza for a class that did well on a test, or taking a student home who had missed the bus, or cleaning up when a mess was made in a classroom, and the list goes on and on.
Finally, after seven years of total decline Tom Balls retired to Florida never to be seen again.
The third principal, Mr. Mat Baldeen, came to Cucamonga Junior High in 1977, after seven years of decline in the reputation of the school. He came from a New York City school in Brooklyn where he was a social studies teacher who joined the ranks of administrators as an assistant Principal. Coming to Cucamonga Junior High School would be the biggest challenge of his life. Mat Baldeen was an overweight bald Jewish guy with a great sense of humor. When he first arrived he was shunned by many of the teachers because of the bad experiences they had with the previous Principal. He had his work cut out for him.
Enrollment dropped 50 students a year beginning in 1977, and continued into the 1990's to an all time low of 440 students. The faculty dropped from 120 teachers over 30 years to only 48 teachers with a lot of part-time teachers. Five threatened teacher strikes had occurred over the 30 years. It was a bad time for education in High Mountain school district.
The first thing Mat Baldeen did was make changes formally, and informally. Old bad habits and rules were dropped. The "sign-in procedure" for teachers became more relaxed than before. Teachers were treated with more respect than before. The security staff changed and their attitudes change as well as their job functions. They were no longer used as spies for the Principal. The organization of the front office changed, and the swing gate was removed, and the general appearance of the main office became more inviting. Faculty meetings changed with Teacher Union pre-meetings having less and less to complain about. Some older teachers were forced to retire and many new teachers were hired to replace them.
A Principal's cabinet was formed for the first time in the history of the school. It consisted of one person from every department, and one security guard and one custodian, as well as one parent representative. The security guards, custodians and parents had never been asked before to participate in any committee or governing group in the school. It was a brilliant stroke of genius to help improve the communication within the building. It was also a first recognizing that the custodians, security guards and secretarial staff were considered on the same level of respect as the teachers and administrators.
The duty of the Principal's Cabinet was to make new and positive policies for the school, and seek out new ways of improving the school learning environment and community image. Teachers offered to volunteer their lunchtime to supervise a "Lunch time detention room," for students that misbehaved during the lunch periods. That was another precedent with teachers volunteering. The one catch in an agreement between the teachers and the Principal was they would volunteer so long as the Principal never made it mandatory. A few years later Tom Baldeen broke his word, and tried to mandate teachers to supervise the "lunch room detention room," since volunteers has begun to disappear. The Union fought this mandate, and won, and that was the end of the "lunch room detention room."
The Principal's Cabinet worked very well for a few years. Teachers and staff felt they had a say in things for the first time in many years. The school applied for the New York State outstanding school award in 1986, and won the recognition in a ceremony at Albany in the spring of 1987. It was a major positive step forward for Cucamonga Junior High School.
With every Principal comes politics both formal and informal. The Teacher Union has a certain degree of power in representing teachers in conferences with the Principal, and demanding changes that the teachers wanted. Every Principal handled Union reps differently, and for each of the three Principals of Cucamonga Junior high the politics differed. With the first "old school" Principal he ignored the union reps as best he could. He seldom kept them informed, and tried to fire teachers without proper documentation. The second Principal, Tom Balls lost all control of the faculty, and the Union reps were basically running the school with informal control. Whatever the Union wanted the teachers Union got at that time.
When the Tom Balls wanted teachers to sign in before 9:05 at the beginning of the day, the Teachers Union said there were legitimate exceptions, and signing in at 9:05 exactly could not be required. To prove the point, all the teachers were asked by the Union reps to line up outside the school, except those on bus duty, and wait until 9:05, and then enter the building, and sign in on the attendance sheet. The whole process took 30 minutes and many teachers were late to homeroom so the student attendance that day was very inaccurate. Tom Balls gave in on the "sign in issue at 9:05," and the Teachers Union won that battle.
During the monthly faculty meetings the Teachers Union got an hour to meet with the teachers before the Principal could come in and run the meeting. More was done during the Union portion of the meeting than the Principal's portion of the meeting. Coaches were always excused from faculty meetings since they were out on the fields coaching at the time of the meetings or in the gyms. Much of the plotting and informal undermining of the administration took place during the Union faculty meetings.
Politics always came into place when things went wrong. Whenever there was a problem the principal would try to create a rule after the fact. When teachers were told they could not close their doors, they put a matchbook in the doorway. When the Tom Balls began peeking in the small door window at teachers in their classes, the teachers put up artwork of paper to block the window view.
One longhaired teacher had a real toilet in his classroom, and all the windows were painted in psychedelic motifs, peace signs, flowers, stain glass designs, and skulls. No one was ever forced to take down their classroom artwork no matter how weird, except on "back to school night," when the parents came in to hear about the school and their children's progress. Then the posters were taken down, the toilet hidden in a closet, and the window artwork cover over with paper classwork. It was a big game to the teachers and administrators to hide the real class environment from the parents.
There were very few black teachers in the 1960's and 1970's in Cucamonga Junior high, mostly because it was too expensive to live in Mountain High community. At the time there were mostly all Jewish teachers on the faculty, and very few black teachers. Out of 120 white teachers in the early 1970's, only four were black. White administrators were afraid of black teachers, and black power, which was the popular theme in the 1970's. Rather than ask for problems the white administrators did not hire black teachers.
There were two male black science teachers, and two black Females teachers in English, and one black female Music teacher at the time in the 1960's and 1970's. In the 1960's and 1970's it was impossible to fire a black teacher or the NAACP would be at the building in a heartbeat. White administrators were afraid to fire poorly performing black teachers for fear of being called a 'bigot," and getting fired after community outrage ran it's course.
Poorly performing white teachers had a different standard, and could be easily harassed, and constantly evaluated in order to create a file of information to support the administrators firing a teacher at the end of the year. One harassed teacher was a business teacher in his early 60's, whom the principal, Mr. Baldeen, did not like. The Mr. Baldeen thought the teacher's teaching was out of style and since he was already in his sixties he wanted to force him to retire. He sent in the two assistant principals on three occasions in just one month to evaluate the teacher (that was technically illegal by Union standards). The poor man was so stressed that he had a heart attack in the classroom, and died. No administrators were brought to bear for causing his heart attack, but the teachers all knew the real story. It was a sad time in Cucamonga Junior High School history.
Politics were in play when it came to getting tenure or salary promotions. Being appointed to the position of department chairman was all about politics and staying in favor with the Principal. Department chairpersons were the sub- managers that helped the Principal run the school and were therefore considered administrators. They had to be loyal to the Principal or the supervision structure would fall apart. Department chairman were picked for their loyalty that meant they were always "brown nosing the Principal." It was called "kissing ass," by all the teachers. If you didn't want to "kiss ass, " then you will never got promoted to a department chairperson position. It was a plain fact of the game of teaching and administration.
There were two rulebooks in education at High Mount School District. First there was the administrator's rulebook pertaining to other administrators, and what they could get away with. The second book was the teachers' rulebook, which was completely different and had to be formally written down in a large handbook. The teachers had more rules, formal, and informal than the administrators. Administrators could "do no wrong," was the political thought at the time? The teachers were "always wrong" in the administrator's book as in:
Teachers were wrong when a student complained a teacher was
mistreating or abusing them in class.
Teachers were wrong when a student made up a story about a teacher,
to get even for low grades.
Teachers were wrong when a teacher was accused of abusing a
Student without any evidence to the contrary.
Just being accused of a case of misconduct with a student meant you were guilty before being charged. Teachers had to be on their guard both for students who made up stories, and administrators that made up stories.
When the Assistant Principal in charge of class scheduling was assigning teachers to classes she always held grudges, and favored her friends. She could give a teacher a "killer schedule" with three classes in a row, and a late lunch. She could make sure that a teacher did not get the last period of the day off, so they could not leave early for coaching at the High School, for instance. The Teachers Union did not allow four periods in a row to be taught, however, a teacher could sign away his/her rights, and teach four in a row to get out of school earlier than other teachers. Many a new science teacher faded a few months into the fall from having multi-ability classes such as:
A below level science class first period,
An on level science class second period,
An Earth Science regents class third period,
Science lab the third period.
Each of these tracts required a separate preparation, and a separate lesson plan to be written each day each week. Some new teachers spent the entire weekend each week writing their lesson plans to keep up with the stress of preparing separate level lessons.
Politics and favoritism went hand in hand at Cucamonga Junior High School. Those who "kissed ass" got easy duty assignments, such as hall duty where they sat, and worked on their paper work or bus duty before school. The worse assignments were lunch duty where food fights occurred, and physical fights between students were a weekly happening. Teachers attempting to break up fights usually got injured themselves.
One day a teacher walked into the teacher cafeteria after café duty with peaches sliding down his tie after a student food fight. It was a sight to see, as the peaches continued to slide down his tie onto his white shirt. He even had some peaches in his hair. All of the teachers could not help but laugh. The poor teacher was totally embarrassed.
If you wanted to be removed from lunch duty you had to work had doing a poor job. Teachers always came late to lunch duty and left early. Everyone tried to
Do the worse job possible, without being cited at the same time. Reading the New York Times, was always a technique that pissed off the assistant principal. Sitting down while on duty was another 'NO, NO." Eating on duty in the lunchroom or drinking coffee was also not allowed. You just had to come late, and leave early to make the assistant principal think you were the teacher from hell in the lunchroom. Usually it took a year to convince the Assistant Principal that did the lunch duty assignments that there was no way they wanted you in the lunchroom because you did everything wrong. It was after all a typical game teachers and administrators played during the course of a school day.
Bus duties were assigned every six weeks before school, and after school to assist the administrators in controlling the students getting on or off the busses and in preventing fights or accidents. Every six weeks a teacher could be assured that they would get bus duty on top of their daily duty period. If you did not show up you got a bad memo in your file. A stack of bad memos could lead to a poor evaluation at the end of the year. This was how the administrators kept teachers in line with the threat of being fired.
There was the story of the potential Olympic girl skater who never came to Physical Education classes and passed. Politics often came into play when the girl's parents were friends of the Superintendent. While at a social party with the Superintendent one night, the girl's parents asked him to allow their daughter to miss the first period of school everyday, and to be excused from Physical Education classes to attend skating lessons. They told the Superintendent that she was an Olympic hopeful and attending skating lessons every morning from 5:00 am to 9:30 was critical to her success.
The Superintendent agreed to help out his friends, and also requested the Principal to give the girl an automatic passing Physical Education grade. The Principal then told the Physical Education Department chairperson to tell the teacher assigned to the girl, to put down a passing grade, even though the girl never showed up for class. This was a violation of the district attendance, State Education Policy, and district grading laws. The Superintendent demanded that the schoolteachers cooperate, and that was that. All of the Physical Education teachers refused to give the girl a grade, and left her name with no grade on the grading sheets. The Principal had to add the grade, since he could not force the teachers to fill in the grade because they told the Union rep of the violation. This is an example of everyday politics flowing downhill as they always do in schools.
Politics came into play depending upon whether the parent who came into school to complain, was a community activator, a lawyer, and white at the same time. Poor parents from Haiti got treated differently than parents who were professionals and white. Indian, and Chinese parents were also treated poorly unless they were community leaders with some power. What was called "smoking pot" for one student, was called "misuse of medicines" for another student by the administrators when it involved a black student and a white student, respectively. When teachers caught a student smoking marijuana, or using it or selling it, the principal usually called in the parents for a conference. When the white parents came in for the meeting they brought a lawyer and they threatened to sue the Principal, the teachers, and the district. They usually bluffed the Principal out of his position of "no drugs in school" and got a lenient sentence for their child. When it was a black student or a Haitian student caught smoking pot then the parents who were usually poor came into the meeting with no lawyer and their son or daughter was deemed guilty automatically.
When Nurses turned in a student for drinking or smoking in school, they would not sign a statement to that effect because they were afraid of being sued. Administrators often drove students home, so as not to make it a "federal case." Many drug abuse cases of white children were covered up when it involved wealthy parents. Black students and other minorities were turned over to the Police. It was an unequal system of justice from the beginning.
Politics could make or break a school, and in the case of Cucamonga Junior high, and with poor management, the reputation of the school went rapidly down hill during the 1960's and 1970's. During the 1970's, a School student news reporter wanted to publish a story on gang fights in school, but Principal Tom Balls blocked the article from being written by telling the advisor he would be fired if the article were published. The student writer went instead to the local newspaper outside the school, and got his story published. The story about gang fights in the school was something the community and the Superintendent were unaware of at the time. When the Superintendent saw the article he was most upset and notified the Principal Tom Balls to come to his office immediately. Mr. Ball's future from that point on with the district and the Superintendent was tedious.
Unfortunately, community people reading these stories actually believed the stories and gossip. It was a sad thing when many good teachers in the High Mountain school district were afraid to work at Cucamonga Junior high because of its poor reputation in the community.
Despite the attempts by the administration to control the politics at Cucamonga Junior High School, nothing ever worked. All the teachers at Cucamonga Junior High School were branded as militant and radical by the administration. The teachers were the "soldiers in the cold trenches," and the administrations were "the captains in the warm headquarters." Teaching can be a very isolated career once those doors are closed; the teacher is in a world of their own. Administrators used to be teachers, but for some reason they forgot what it is like teaching in a classroom and showed the teachers no sympathy.
A Jewish Community
High Mountain school district had a population of 70% Jewish students in the 1960' through the 1980's many of the teachers were also Jewish. Teaching seemed to be a career that many Jewish college students seemed to prefer, if they were not pursuing a career as a Doctor, Dentist or other high paying professional position. Teaching was considered a profession, but it was last on the list of Professionals because of the low pay scale. There were many kinds of Jewish teachers, some were liberal, and never made a big deal of their religion to students or colleagues. Others were Orthodox Jewish teachers who often wore a little Jewish hat called a yamaka to make a statement that they were orthodox Jews.
The Jewish teachers made it a point to use "Yiddish Jewish expressions," with one another to exclude the non-Jewish teachers from understanding what they were saying. This was their way of being cool "Jewish wise." The Jewish teachers also made it a point to take off for all Jewish holidays large, and small, even if they were not on the school calendar. For small holidays they took personal days. Non-Jewish teachers were Christians, or Muslims mostly were called "goyams." At teacher parties the Jewish teachers made it a point to demand that the food be Kosher even if they did not practice eating kosher diets at home. The Jewish teachers who preferred Hanukah tolerated Christmas. There wasn't any real tension between the Jewish teachers and the Christian teachers at work, but in private many Christian teachers resented the hypocrite attitude by many of the phony Jewish teachers. At funerals for Jewish teachers all the teachers show up to show their respects. Often some Christian teachers offered to participate in the 12 men reading prayers. During shiva when the survivors of the deceased Jewish teacher sat grieving for a week they welcomed Christian and Jewish teachers alike to visit and have small snacks and tea and talk about the deceased person. It was a good idea for togetherness.
Eventually the Jewish teacher's children would at some time turn age 12 and would have a bar mitzvah or bot-mitzvah for boy or girl respectively, in the coming of age ceremony. Jewish Teachers would invite almost all of the faculty friends and family that they could afford. Thousands of dollars were spent on these religious occasions and the parties were lavish and overbearing. These religious social events bonded the Christian and Jewish teachers more on a personal basis and a professional one too over time.
As previously stated, Cucamonga Junior High School was "a cast of characters" from different religious backgrounds that blended together over time. For better or worse they merged into one cohesive faculty over a period of 40 years of the life of Cucamonga Junior High School. Some teachers stood out as the best, and were always fondly remembered by their students. Other teachers their students easily forgot. Some teachers were leaders who weren't afraid to give "their all" for the school, faculty, and students. Some teachers actually taught effectively, and other teachers just got by. The system was never perfect, and politics always played a part. The cliché' was often said. "That if you play ball, and do not make waves, you could survive a career as a teacher."
The Junior High (1960-2000)


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Kacy Hill Announces She's Left Kanye West's G.O.O.D. Music
It's been rumored for a while, but now it's confirmed. Kacy Hill took to Twitter today to announce that she's officially left Kanye West's G.O.O.D. Music.
"I left GOOD btw," the singer said in a since-deleted tweet. "No bad feelings + I'm thankful for everything but it's what I needed to do for this new music." Kacy released two projects on the label – the first was her Bloo EP in 2015, and the second was her debut album Like a Woman in 2017.
As well as her label situation, she also revealed that her new album is finished.
Just finished my album pic.twitter.com/jLvVOYQsEu
— KACY HILL (@kacyhill) May 22, 2019
Drake Writes On Kanye West's 'Yikes' & Wasn't Accredited
Twitter Removes Kanye West's Tweet Containing Links To 'Ye'
Desiigner Calls Kanye West "Crazy" While Claiming He…
Drake Was Honoured As A Co-Writer On Kanye West's 'Yikes'
Kanye West Speaks About Drake & Pusha T Beef 'I've…
Kanye West's
Beast Coast (Pro Era, Flatbush Zombies & The Underachievers) – Snow in the Stadium
Little Brother Officially Announce Reunion

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


"An oligarch is a rich person who will not be invited to have dinner with the prime minister."
Prime Minister Boyko Borisov defining the meaning of "oligarch"
"Quality of life means something different from prosperity as seen by a grocery store owner."
"We categorically oppose the abolition of the monument in front of the NDK."
"The key judiciary appointments are dictated by those with political power."
"We have new information, but I cannot share it with you."
"If Bulgaria were a soverign and democratic state, it would probably be fascist."


New tools to give due value to an antique masterpiece: the entire work by Ferdinando Ongania on the Basilica of San Marco in Venice has been digitised so that it can be promoted worldwide for maximum availability. Facsimiles of the artwork collection have also been made.
The masterpiece is now available in the Digital Library of a dedicated website and in an app for smartphones and tablets that makes the visit more engaging for users thanks to Augmented Reality.
The website includes many sections detailing specific aspects of the artwork, and the Digital Library where all the plates and original texts can be viewed for free.
The Digital Library is also being connected to an eCommerce platform for those who would like to buy individual plates' reprints.
The app for tablets and smartphones makes the visit to the Basilica more engaging thanks to additional content that can be consulted through Augmented Reality that catches the real view and overlays it the relevant virtual information level.
An exclusive, limited facsimile edition was also realised of all the documents, graphics, photographs pertaining to the collection.


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Supreme Court Rules President's 2012 Appointments to NLRB Unconstitutional, Invalidates Key Pro-Union NLRB Decision, and Establishes Precedent for Reversals of Other NLRB Decisions and Appointments
By: Patrick W. McGovern
In a unanimous decision issued June 26, 2014, the Supreme Court ruled that President Obama's three so-called recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board in January 2012 were unconstitutional and invalidated the order entered by the improperly appointed Board panel. National Labor Relations Board v. Noel Canning. When the appointments were made, the Senate was in pro forma sessions, meeting every three days and transacting some Senate business. The Senate met on January 3 and January 6, 2012. The President made the NLRB appointments on January 4. The Court's 5-Justice majority agreed that any recess shorter than 10 days "is presumptively too short" for the President to exercise his appointment power.
The Court affirmed the 2013 D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals' decision invalidating the Board's 2012 decision but used distinctly different constitutional rationale to arrive at the same conclusion. While the Court of Appeals' decision set aside the President's appointments on the basis that a valid recess appointment must be an intersession appointment, the Supreme Court held that the Constitution's Recess Appointments Clause permits both intersession and intra-session appointments. At issue for the Supreme Court was the length of the Senate's intra-session recess in January 2012. The Court held that "three days is too short a time to bring a recess within the scope of the Clause," so the President lacked authority to make these appointments under the Recess Appointment Clause. The Court declined to offer any bright-line test to determine when the Senate is actually in session versus recess and refused to second-guess the Senate's motives for avoiding a lengthy recess, in the interests of avoiding "judicial interference with the Legislative Branch." The Court commented simply, "The Senate is in session when it says it is provided that, under its own rules it retains the capacity to transact Senate business."
The possible implications of the Court's decision are far reaching. Numerous pending court challenges to other decisions by the same Board panelists will likely be disposed of unfavorably to the NLRB. Some estimates of Board precedents that may ultimately be affected by the decision reach 100 cases. In addition, this decision rekindles the debate as to what other Board actions must be revisited, such as personnel appointments and decisions made by regional directors who were not appointed by a properly constituted NLRB.
If you have any questions or for more information about the Supreme Court's ruling and its impact on your company's labor relations strategy, please contact Patrick W. McGovern, Esq., pmcgovern@genovaburns.com or any member of our Labor Law Practice Group.
Tag: NLRB
Patrick W. McGovern


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Lessons about Sydney
1. Ask the taxi driver at the airport BEFORE he drives anywhere if he knows the SUBURB you want to go to, if he doesn't, leave him there.
2. If you forget rule 1, then make sure you have some idea where you are going and when you know he has it wrong demand he stop, turn off the meter and give him directions until you get there. Refuse to pay more.
3. Don't go to the cafe on Curl Curl beach, it is mediocre and overpriced (try being told you can't buy a sandwich to eat in because "these are for our takeaway customers, what else would I sell them", although Curl Curl is a nice beach. You're far better off going to Dee Why or Manly.
4. Try not to be so drunk that your boyfriend is helping you walk along the beach at 6am whilst the rest of us are having a walk or jog - it's really quite sad.
5. Look at the price for business class airtickets, not just economy. The economy ticket for my flight was over $100 MORE than business class. Then you don't need to look at me in envy when while you're all in a snaking queue to checkin at 3 counters, I walk straight up to a free counter, get fastrack security and immigration, and get fed properly. e.g. it can be cheaper to fly LAN from Auckland to Sydney in business class than flying economy class on Air NZ or Qantas, depending on time/day.
Now I'm off to NZ to see family/friends for Christmas, sitting in the Air NZ lounge at Sydney on the most gorgeous Saturday morning, wondering why the hell any of us from this part of the world would want to be in London this time of year (other than if I keep doing it for a few years I could afford to get a place in Manly).
Blog lite
Well it's been a very busy week and I'm flying down under tomorrow - spending a week in Sydney to visit my other half who is there at the present, and then to NZ for Christmas, then Hong Kong for New Years, before shooting back to the mother country. So it will be blog lite for me for the coming weeks. I hope you all, wherever you may be and whoever you may be with (or without) that you take time to enjoy yourselves and have fun over the holiday season.
Visitor from Pakistan
Well from Mardan, North-West Frontier, Pakistan.
Yes you. IP address 203.135.44.133 at 1.48.08pm on 1 December.
Look for your criminal interests elsewhere, I guess Paknet limited doesn't care much about that. Leave those kids alone ok?
I'm no prude, but I don't tolerate violence ok, just because the value of life is cheap where you come from, especially that of women, and especially young girl, doesn't mean you'll find it here.
Two barely democracies
So Chavez lost his referendum, fortunately. It took 51% of the population to ensure that 100% retained some freedoms. However he has gloated according to the Daily Telegraph ""From this moment on, let's be calm," ... "There is no dictatorship here.""
One could argue the result is conveniently close, but with only 56% turnout it does show Chavez doesn't run a Stalinist state. It also shows that a significant minority is uninterested in his "revolution", which is both good and bad. As the Telegraph also outlines, the Venezuelan economic success is likely to be shortlived, with inflation at 20%, plenty of shortages and declining oil production - this experiment with socialism may fail sooner rather than later, and hopefully will see little blood spilt as a result.
Around 63% of the vote for United Russia. The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and Council of Europe have said ""The State Duma election ... was not fair and failed to meet many OSCE and Council of Europe commitments and standards for democratic elections,".
In second place came the Communists at 12%, the fascist Liberal Democratic party and the socialist Fair Russia party (barely to the right of the communists) also seem to have crossed the 7% threshold.
So Russians vote for the corporatist bully, and some pine for the Stalinists or support other fascists. That's what a long tradition of being governed by strongmen has done, and is the legacy of 70 years of brutal Marxism-Leninism. You know, the type that George Galloway and Chris Trotter both miss.
Rail nationalisation?
So Dr Cullen is thinking about buying the entire railway business of Toll NZ, as there is disenchantment with the "network nationalisation" model that the Greens were cheerleading some years ago.
Let's recall what has happened in the last seven or eight years:
In 2000/2001 Tranz Rail brought on board a new chief executive, Michael Beard, to try to arrest an ongoing decline in profits, share price and a mounting legacy of infrastructure and rolling stock that would need hefty investment. In short, the company was not making a return on capital that was worth investing further in it - what that means is simple, the average investor was better off putting money in bank deposits than in Tranz Rail. Michael Beard announced a new focus on freight businesses by commodity, and that a whole raft of lines looked like they should be closed, with much publicity surrounding the Napier to Gisborne line - an expensive to run line, with barely enough freight to keep a train a day going. He also announced Tranz Rail would sell off its passenger businesses.
Government leaped, various Ministers declared this plan was unacceptable and negotiations began on saving various parts of the network/system with subsidies. Auckland local authorities sought to spend $120 million of ratepayers' money to buy the entire Auckland metropolitan rail network to meet aspirations for a massive upgrade of commuter rail services. Central government did it instead, spending $81 million to buy back the Auckland rail network, despite Treasury valuations at the time, of it being worth no more than a quarter of that. Meanwhile Tranz Scenic was sold, and Tranz Rail agreed to not close any lines while it continued negotiations with government on rail policy.
Tranz Rail's shareholders were keen to bail out, and a deal was struck whereby Toll Holdings would buy the company, in exchange for the government taking over the rest of the railway network for $1. The government would own and maintain the rail network, while Toll would have a monopoly on rail freight services as long as it maintained a minimal level of service on each line. Toll was meant to pay adequate track access charges to keep the network maintained, while the government agreed to put $200 million taxpayers' money into the network.
The railway network has been transferred to Ontrack - a Crown company - which is meant to negotiate track access charges with Toll Rail. These negotiations have failed, and an independent arbitrator has decided on charges that Toll claim are unacceptable.
So. What now?
Simple. The government should, at the very least, call Toll's bluff. It should insist on Toll either paying the track access charges or buying the network off it. Arguably the government should ask for what it has put into it, minus track access charges, but let's face it - it's a dud investment. Something socialists are good at finding. Either Toll will pay up and make a profit, or buy the network and do so, or buy it and run much of it into the ground, or sell up the business to a coalition of rail freight users (you know, the ones who claim it is "so essential", but wont pay enough to pay the cost of running it).
The clear answer is this - the government is not best placed to know whether the rail network is economically efficient or not. However, some think it is.
Idiot Savant for one, is cheerleading this, based on a number of strawmen:
Rail services are vital infrastructure: Wrong, countries can exist and thrive without railways. About the only section that can be seen as "vital" is the Wellington commuter rail network, and even then only because the alternative (expensive road widening) is not as cheap as keeping the rail network. Rail services have never made a good return on capital for decades, road transport, by contrast, has been privately run for a long time, and the road network generates a substantial surplus from road user charges that is reinvested in that network. Rail cannot even generate enough revenue to maintain what its got. I don't doubt that some of the rail network could be sustained, but clearly less that what there is.
the key problem of private ownership - the tendency of private owners to cut back on maintenance spending and run down the infrastructure: Actually this reflects an economic fact, it was not profitable to maintain the infrastructure to do more. For example, when you can only sustain one freight train a day on a segment of around 40km (Rotorua), and a high level of maintenance makes that unprofitable then what should be done? Should non-customers pay for something they don't use? By the way, have you noticed how run down truck fleets and bus fleets are, not? Most long haul trucks in New Zealand are an average of around seven years old, and most major bus companies don't keep buses beyond 15-20 years. There is not a long haul locomotive on New Zealand tracks that is younger than 20 (or a diesel younger than 28) (and yes I know they have a longer service life, but engine technology has moved on a lot since the 1970s!).
(renationalisation will) allow us to have a properly planned rail network and services again: I wonder when he last thought this happened? In 1990 and 1993 it collectively had NZ$1.3 billion (in 1993 values!) wiped, this happened before in 1982 when around NZ$100 million in debt was wiped (it collected this debt while it had a statutory monopoly on long haul freight). Is this the proper planning that saw investment in new goods sheds that were shut a few years later, or the manufacture of its own rivets at several times the cost of buying them off the shelf?
However he makes one correct point "we're effectively subsidising them, and paying for their profits, by maintaining the infrastructure they depend on to run". Indeed, but the answer to that isn't to pay for the business, after all if YOU were Toll Holdings, wouldn't you ask a good bit of money for the business if the government wanted to buy you out? Labour might threaten to pass legislation to force nationalisation, but wouldn't that look a bit Robert Mugabe or Hugo Chavez - and in election year too.
So, I'm expecting this to drag on. Toll Holdings knows though that its best deal is almost certainly under a Labour government rather than a National one, so it will want to strike a deal - Labour also knows it wants to be the government that "saved rail" for whatever reason. In addition, the Greens will demand it as one of their "faith based initiatives". So you might find another wad of taxpayers' money being thrown into the rail network to prop it up a bit more, otherwise I dare all those who want the government to force New Zealand taxpayers to save rail to do something...
save rail yourself. Get like minded people to come together and offer Toll Holdings a price. You might need to get the rail freight customers like Fonterra, Solid Energy and the like to join you, but make the effort. If you're not so inclined, then buy a train ticket on one of the few long distance passenger services left - at least you can say you've used it, since your taxes have paid for the lines!
Labels: New Zealand politics, New Zealand transport
Freedom from the pre-modern Islamists
Gillian Gibbons' has received a Presidential pardon in Sudan, which is a tremendous relief - but for it to come to this is an indictment on the Sudanese legal system. She has also said she wants to go back to teaching in Sudan and "I have great respect for the Islamic religion and would not knowingly offend anyone and I am sorry if I caused any distress". Her choice of course, although whilst still in Sudan and having had her freedom achieved by Muslim peers means, at the very least, she is hardly going to say anything else while she is still there. She has nothing to apologise for, and her respect for Islam is misplaced. Of course it may be unlikely she has been shown the extend of local calls for her execution!
Neverthelessm what this shows is what happens in an Islamist state. It has a legal system that besides having laws against blasphemy (don't forget blasphemy is still a crime in NZ, and the last English prosecution for it was 1977, although it would be fair to say as a law its time is nearly up), doesn't even apply actus reus or mens rea to the crime. At worst she was negligent, she not only had no intent, she didn't DO anything.
Pity the Sudanese we never hear of who ever get accused of such a "crime". With mobs of thugs who regard execution as a legitimate punishment for blasphemy, something not seen in England since the 18th century, locals who inadvertently let children do something like - name a teddy bear - wont have the British Government or British Muslim peers on their side. The state of Sudan is just another instrument of initiated violence, and has the blood of hundreds of thousands on its hands because of Darfur.
Sudan needs to go through the renaissance, throw off the shackles of Islamist violence and have a state that protects citizens from each other, not turn on them because some offend others.
Of course, it's easy to throw stones when Western liberal democracies still have, largely nascent, laws against blasphemy. These should go, forthwith, there is NO excuse. A handful from the religious dark ages will come out and preach censorship, but they should be ignored.
By the way, the US Supreme Court decided in 1952 that "It is not the business of government in our nation to suppress real or imagined attacks upon a particular religious doctrine, whether they appear in publications, speeches or motion pictures" overturning the New York state blasphemy law. New Zealand and those European countries with such laws could do worst than to follow this example.
Labels: Criminal law, Islam
Have I got news for you
Damned thing wont post but there is buckets of this show on youtube.
Start with Boris Johnson hosting here from two years ago, this is absolutely magic. The man IS the best chance Londoners have of unseating Red Ken Livingstone - frankly, if as Mayor of London he spends more time hosting this show, I think we'll all be winners!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBxkrBaK8vk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LaLbBmrS8dw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGKiGz4-Dy0
Is there political satire in NZ on TV yet? Can you imagine any MPs participating?
Labels: Comedy
Russia's barely democracy
It has been clear in the years since Vladimir Putin became President, that Russia is slipping back to authoritarianism. It isn't quite the totalitarian terror of Marxism-Leninism, but something halfway - whereby there is some free speech, there is some private sphere but you daren't think about seriously threatening the incumbents.
Putin has been variously sabre rattling, being friendly with bullies to the east and south, and been trying to flex Russia's muscles, largely fueled by the high prices of oil and gas. Many Russians have benefited from this, from the wealthy to a growing middle class.
However, Russia has moved from the substantial freedom of the late 1980s and most of the 1990s, to controlled speech and media. In the last parliamentary elections in 2003, the party of Putin- United Russia - gained a plurality with around 37.6% of the vote. With 70 seats out of the 450 largely held by independents loyal to Putin, United Russia commanded a clear majority.
This time, the entire system has moved to proportional representation - because, you see, it clears out lots of small parties. The threshold for entering the Duma will be 7%, given only 4 parties crossed that in 2003, you can see what's going on. In 2003, the two main opposition parties to United Russia were the Communists and the Liberal Democratic Party - the latter being a fascist nationalist party (remember Vladimir Zhirinovsky?). The most promising ones (by any measure of support for Western values) - Yabloko and Union of Right Forces - only won 4 and 3 seats respectively last time.
So this time the contest looks like a foregone conclusion. State TV is overwhelmingly biased in favour of Putin and United Russia, and Gary Kasparov - who led a coalition of parties of left and right against Putin - is now in prison for leading an illegal march. Because, of course, he would have been allowed had he applied for permission! United Russia refuses to participate in TV debates with other parties
The Daily Telegraph reports "there are widespread stories of intimidation and planned ballot rigging. University professors, factory bosses and teachers claim to have been forced to vote for or join the party or face dismissal. Students claim to have been threatened with expulsion if they do not do the same. Regional governors not trusted to secure a sufficient share of the vote for United Russia have been removed."
Although it also reports that even in a free and fair election, United Russia may still win. However, it is aiming for more than that. It wants 70% of the vote, so it can change the Constitution, allowing Putin to remain President, although he is at the top of the United Russia party list so he could become Premier as well.
So should we fear Russia? Probably not. For now, almost all of its economy is based on fossil fuels - when prices slide back down, then there is little else left. Technology, services and manufacturing remain at a low level. It could well be the mine for China, but it is an expensive mine to operate given the climate, territory and infrastructure. Secondly, its population is in steady decline, falling at around 0.5% per annum. 15 years ago it had the 8th largest economy in the world, now it is 11th. Its rusty armed forces cannot project far, although it still has nuclear capabilities these probably have a serviceable life of about another 10 years at best - realistically speaking Russia will be confined to defending its borders within a generation. So no, it is unlikely to be a threat over the longer term, but this is sad
Meanwhile, pity Russians who had their taste of freedom and largely don't want it anymore. Unfortunately, the whole country is generations behind western Europe in having relatively low corruption, transparent politics and bureaucracy - the best hope to change that remains the examples on its borders. Sadly, with the exceptions of Finland, Poland and the Baltic States none are much of an example, and plenty are the opposite (Belarus, Kazakhstan).
So on Sunday hope that enough Russians will vote in enough number to ensure the gerrymandering doesn't give United Russia an overwhelming majority. While you're at it, buy a lotto ticket - you might have better odds.
Labels: Dictatorships, International relations, Russia
Chavez threatens to not sell oil to the USA
Go on you Marxist thug.
Given CNN reports "United States is Venezuela's biggest oil customer and one of the few countries that can refine its low-quality crude. Venezuela accounts for up to 15 percent of U.S. crude imports". I think it's fine for a socialist to say he's not going to sell to his biggest customer, especially since his product is hardly that well sought after.
He's looking to remove term limits and put the Central Bank under his control, as well as reduce working weeks (given that the work ethic there isn't high according to some reports that wont help). Nice little recipe for more authoritarianism, and more wasting of money following a grand vision for "the people".
Keep watching political science students and economic students - learn how a country can be wrecked by socialism, and pity the average Venezuelan, the welfare state that has been built is unsustainable.
Labels: communists, International relations, Trade, Venezuela
Trotter vs Minto
Chris Trotter is a funny political beast, he is firmly on the left and most of the time I find him quite despicable. After all I recently pulled to bits his bizarre Marxist view of democratic politics being "them" vs "us", the "moneyed" vs the "workers". I remember many years ago a bizarre column of his claiming that when Air NZ introduced business class on domestic flights (which has been gone now for 6 years but will be back in a different form from next year) it was a sign of a change in New Zealand - the class in front was "them" while "us" sat in the back. Sheer nonsense of course as mostly "them" were politicians. He has said that "we pay a toll for our comfortable lives" in that other people's kids get abused. He sung praises for Wolfgang Rosenberg, a supporter of Stalinist East Germany.
However this time he is on the side of freedom, or at least against those who were advocating fomenting violent revolution. His open letter to John Minto in the Sunday Star Times some weeks ago spoke volumes, he nailed his colours to the mast of liberal democracy. His closing statement made a fundamental point:
"Because in the course of the past month, John, I have heard you make many accusations, seen you point many fingers and hurl many fistfuls of abuse. But I have not heard one word from you about the right of a democratic society, such as ours, to be protected from people who think it's OK to run around the bush with semi-automatics and Molotov cocktails. People who think it's OK to train young Maori men to be bodyguards for the Americans in Baghdad. People who think it's OK to reach a level of preparation for organised political violence so alarming that New Zealand's most liberal police commissioner, ever, felt he had no choice but to launch "Operation Eight". Because it's NOT OK, John. Political violence in a functioning democracy is NEVER OK. And I want to hear you say it. "
See that? Political violence in a functioning democracy is never ok. So does John Minto reply yes or no? No, of course not. This self proclaimed champion of human rights, who blames the West for how Robert Mugabe (no doubt one of his pinups) is treating Zimbabwe, who also blames everyone but the perpetrators for torturing their own kids, likes political violence. Indeed he is an apologist for violence committed by anyone he sees as a victim - nice chap.
Minto's response starts by claiming, so innocuously that "groups involved in working for social change saw the long shadow of the state loom over them". Oh "working for social change", which in his world doesn't include libertarians, Christian conservatives or the Business Roundtable, no it is code for socialist Marxist groups. Minto only supports those wanting statist collectivist solutions. He trots out again the excuse that evidence was leaked, of course all of the evidence is now publicly available thanks to the internet - and it IS damning. So he ignores it, he prefers to attack the anti-terror legislation - he doesn't even respond to Trotter's comment. He doesn't condemn the ideas expressed by those accused - because Minto, like too many in the so called "peace" movement have no interest in peace, or non-violence. You see "peace" means surrender.
Minto, rightly, would argue that peace under apartheid was impossible, so it was legitimate to fight to overthrow it. However, he would also argue the same about any other conflict, according to the side he supports. He wouldn't support Palestinians ceasing hostilities in the West Bank and Gaza unconditionally - though he would support them waging war against Israel and overrunning it. He wouldn't support the USA destroying an Iranian nuclear weapon's facility, but he would support the USA abolishing its own while Iran does nothing.
Minto is a revolutionary, he cares little for rule of law under liberal democracy. Indeed, his sympathy for Robert Mugabe tells you much about where he comes from - he opposes capitalism, Western liberal democracy (unless it doesn't mean his side wins and gets what he wants) and supports political violence. If the evidence found by the Police proved to be substantial, Minto would say acts of terrorism committed by those with such views were "justified" or "understandable". He's no friend of freedom, he is a sympathiser of thuggery and brutality as long as it is for Marxists. His well known anti-apartheid views were correct, but he was, again, supporting Marxists against a brutal regime - he doesn't criticise the ANC now despite its rampant corruption and intolerance for criticism. However, it is clear what side he is on - the peace he argues for is AFTER the revolution.
Labels: New Zealand politics, Terrorism
A jump to the left
So Stephen Franks is seeking to be the National candidate for Wellington Central.
He always was a rather conservative ACT MP, not warm towards civil unions or legalisation of prostitution. He has a good legal mind, but does this say more about Stephen Franks or ACT? I am sure ACT will be sad to lose him, but if National seeks someone to talk about the Treaty of Waitangi he would be a good man for that role - he's certainly head and shoulders above many of the National caucus.
Labels: ACT
I don't believe in property rights so...
I can steal. Phillida Bunkle, a sad case of a dejected socialist or just a common thief?
Thieving socialist! One could feel sorry for her, but honestly I don't. She entered public life in order to be a bully, in order to raise taxes, to regulate people and their businesses - while she produced nothing. Remember you paid for her salaries and travel for several years, thanks to the retards who voted Alliance in 1996 and 1999. The Dom Post got this wrong, saying she was elected in 1999 - how much effort is there to do some basic internet research Kay Blundell? Bunkle was number 8 on the Alliance list and got in with such brainiacs as Liz Gordon, Alamein Kopu and Frank Grover. Yes, just over 10% of voters ticked these supreme underperformers (picking Alamein was, of course, part of the "got to have Maori candidates" political correctness of the Alliance, forgetting of course, that as the Alliance was largely driven by hatred of success, good people would be unlikely to be attracted to it).
I love Oswald Bastable's comment that "as a former Alliance MP, Bunkum genuinely did not understand that it is wrong to take other peoples property"
She still has a website as if she were an MP here. She was Minister of Consumer Affairs - adding to her contempt for producers or sellers. Of course her first claim to fame was co-authoring the famous/infamous article "An Unfortunate Experiment" in Metro which saw the Cartwright Inquiry undertaken. Itself controversial, but that is another story.
Labels: Criminal law, New Zealand politics


text:
Katherine Izzo Wiki, Biography, Age, Family, Height, Net Worth, Fast Facts
Katherine Izzo Wiki, Biography
ABC is launching a new season of The Bachelor where 30 women from across the United States will try to win the heart of tech executive Zach Shallcross. Season 27 of the popular dating series will premiere on ABC on Monday, January 23 at 8 p.m. m. ET.
Katherine Izzo, 26, is one of the contestants on season 27 of The Bachelor. She is a registered nurse from Tampa, Florida and loves spending time with her family. Based on ABC's description of her, people often tell her that she looks like actress Julia Roberts.
More on Katherine Izzo, a contestant on season 27 of The Bachelor
Katherine attended the University of Central Florida for her BSN degree, where she was a member of the Zeta Tau Alpha sorority and Knight Thon. After graduating in 2019, she attended Southern University to earn her MSN and FNP degrees.
She also holds an Advanced Cardiac Life Support license and a Health Care Provider Basic Life Support license from the American Heart Association and currently works for the Moffitt Cancer Center in Florida.
Izzo has also worked as a traveling nurse for St. Joseph Hospital, Brandon Regional Hospital, and Massachusetts General Hospital. She describes herself as a "vibrant entrepreneur with a witty sense of humor and a glass-half-full attitude." Katherine's career is very important to her, but right now she hopes to find her perfect match.
According to ABC:
"Katherine's dream man is loyal, trustworthy, a great communicator, and most importantly, her best friend. She's looking for a real man to make her life better, and she's willing to risk everything to find the right man." love".
Izzo often hangs out with her "nieces and nephews" and hopes to start a family of his own soon. She also revealed in her description that she can live on breakfast pastries and that she doesn't like camping.
She has over 6,500 followers on Instagram and is the pet mom to a cat named Sammie. According to her Instagram posts, Katherine loves to hang out at the beach with her friends.
More on The Bachelor season 27
26-year-old tech executive Zach Shallcross was last seen on season 19 of The Bachelorette when he was dating Rachel Recchia. He left the show and ranked third on the season after a failed relationship.
He was announced as the next series lead on the season 19 finale of The Bachelorette, where he met 5 of his potential partners, Bailey, Brianna, Brooklyn, Cat, and Christina. The Bachelor season 27 will be hosted by Jesse Palmer and Zach himself will try to connect with the ladies, as they compete for the longest one-on-one time with Shallcross.
In the end, Zach will most likely get engaged to one of the ladies after spending almost 8 weeks together and connecting on a deeper level.
The description of the show says:
"To find his true love and life partner, a bachelor dates a group of women, over several weeks, who compete in a series of challenges designed to prove his compatibility with him."
ABC will air new episodes on The Bachelor every Monday at 8 p.m. m. ET. Tune in to the show every week to find out if Izzo will be able to impress Zach. Fans can also watch the episodes on the network's website a day after the television premiere.


Beschreibung: We are discussing various advanced programming paradigms illustrated by a number of real programming languages such as e.g. Haskell, Prolog, Java, C++ and others.
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SCART denotes a coupling device and a connector audio and video consumer mainly used in Europe.
It allows a simplified connection of devices that operate audio and video analog using a 21-pin connector.
There are three types of connectors: the socket on devices, male/male cord and the extension cord.
We meet more often than the SCART connectors on equipment marketed in Europe.
Mandatory on televisions since 1980, SCART is no longer since late 2014.
- 0 v means \no signal\, or internal signal (example: current operation of the TV).
- + 12 v means: selection of the auxiliary audio/video input and 4/3 format.
- 1 v to 3 V (nominal 1 V peak) RGB only.
It can be used to embed the RGB signal within another video signal: Teletext and subtitling.
Video bandwidth admitted on fast switching amounts to 6 MHz.
The use of this Jack has interest for the screens that can be satisfied with a low definition (approximately 800 × 600).
For more high-definition screens, it is useful to connect all products without a HDMI (for example an analog VCR, VHS type).
Beyond three meters, an extension cord can effectively convey low and multiple analog signals it operates without that disturbances arise.
Without specific treatment (video amplifier, audio filter) so non-compliance of the original standard, the longer bonds are inadvisable.


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text:
Q: how to use different columns as prob in sample function i have a data frame with different variables. i have merged three columns of probabilities to my data frame. my question is how can i use these columns as probabilities in sample function so that for prob argument take each column as probability. for example for y= 1 take ncol (a) , for y=1 take ncol(b) and so on my codes are:
    a    b    c    y
1  0.090 0.12 0.10 1
2  0.015 0.13 0.09 1
3  0.034 0.20 0.34 1
4  0.440 0.44 0.70 1
5  0.090 0.12 0.10 2
6  0.015 0.13 0.09 2

mydata$mig<- sample( 1:3, size = 7, replace = TRUE, prob= ????)

any help would be appreciated

A: Using apply function per rows:
df <- read.table(header = TRUE, text="a    b    c    y
1  0.090 0.12 0.10 1
2  0.015 0.13 0.09 1
3  0.034 0.20 0.34 1
4  0.440 0.44 0.70 1
5  0.090 0.12 0.10 2
6  0.015 0.13 0.09 2")
set.seed(12344)
samples1<- apply(X = df[,-4], MARGIN = 1, # MARGIN = 1 indicates you are applying FUN per rows
             FUN = function(x) sample( 1:3,
                                 size = 7,
                                 replace= TRUE ,
                                 prob = x))
#You obtain six columns from samples with prob parameter in df's rows
samples1
     1 2 3 4 5 6
[1,] 2 3 3 1 3 2
[2,] 1 2 3 3 2 2
[3,] 2 3 3 3 1 3
[4,] 2 3 3 1 3 2
[5,] 2 2 3 2 3 2
[6,] 1 3 2 3 2 3
[7,] 3 3 3 2 1 2

Update:
Given your comment on my answer, I update and propose a new solution using data.table. I leave the previous version for reference if there will be anyone interested.
library(data.table)
setDT(df)
set.seed(78787)
#Column V1 has your 7 samples per group y, with probs taken at random from a,b,c
df[, sample(1:.N,
            size = 7,
            replace = TRUE,
            prob = unlist(.SD)),
   by = y,
   .SDcols = sample(names(df)[-ncol(df)], 1)]

    y V1
 1: 1  4
 2: 1  3
 3: 1  4
 4: 1  3
 5: 1  4
 6: 1  4
 7: 1  4
 8: 2  2
 9: 2  1
10: 2  1
11: 2  1
12: 2  2
13: 2  1
14: 2  1

A: While the "normal" indexing of 2d matrices and frames is the [i,j] method, one can also provide a 2-column matrix to i alone to programmatically combine the rows and columns. We can use this to create a matrix whose first column is merely counting the rows (1:6 here), and the second column is taken directly from your y column:
cbind(seq_len(nrow(mydata)), mydata$y)
#      [,1] [,2]
# [1,]    1    1
# [2,]    2    1
# [3,]    3    1
# [4,]    4    1
# [5,]    5    2
# [6,]    6    2
mydata[cbind(seq_len(nrow(mydata)), mydata$y)]
# [1] 0.090 0.015 0.034 0.440 0.120 0.130

Note that in this case, your sample-ing code is not going to work:

*

*true --> TRUE

*the length of derived probabilities is not the same length as your 1:3

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Londonistan: Migrants Expect More!
October 31, 2015 sheikyermami	21 Comments
From Eritrea to Londonistan: Refugee's 3,500 mile journey MAPPED but he expected 'MORE from UK'
AN illegal immigrant given a taxpayer-funded home after sneaking into the UK in a deadly 3,500 mile journey said he expected Britain "to be better" than it is.
The migrant crisis has seen coach loads of asylum seekers shipped in the Longford near Heathrow
The Eritrean fled persecution in his war-ravaged country, survived nearly drowning at sea, faced kidnap by ISIS, starvation and dehydration and made it to Britain by hanging on to the outside of a Eurostar train.
But he has turned his nose up at the UK and its goodwill by telling Express.co.uk he expected MORE from the country putting a roof over his head at the expense of the taxpayer.
Kabul has a railway station since 2011!
Now they're lining up to leave the country, to invade Europe. That's right: It's a bloody invasion.
You think these Muslims are going to Europe to be …. good Germans, Brits, etc. ?
Immigration jihad, or hijrah, is the migration or journey of Muhammad and his followers from Mecca to Yathrib, later renamed by him to Medina, in the year 622 CE. It was after the hijrah that Muhammad for the first time became not just a preacher of religious ideas, but a political and military leader. That was what occasioned his new "revelations" exhorting his followers to commit violence against unbelievers. Significantly, the Islamic calendar counts the hijrah, not Muhammad's birth or the occasion of his first "revelation," as the beginning of Islam, implying that Islam is not fully itself without a political and military component. (Pamela Geller)
After every act of terror, dhimmified politclowns throw money at mosqueteers who promptly go into proselytising mode:
Australia celebrates National Mosque Open Day as it hopes to "'break down barriers of misconception" about Islam.
Australian mosques open doors to locals to 'demystify' Islam
Muslim worshippers pray, during the holy month of Ramadan, in the Gallipoli Mosque located in the western Sydney suburb of Auburn, Australia, July 10, 2015. Picture taken July 10, 2015. Reuters/David Gray
According to ScottMorrison, there's "no comfort" for terrorism and violence in any of the mosques he visited. He, however, admitted that the recent radical attack on NSW police employee Curtis Chang might have encouraged anti-Muslim sentiments. …
More muslim murder and mayhem might have encouraged anti-muslim sentiments at International Business Times, By Sounak Mukhopadhyay, thanks to Mullah, pbuh
Australian mosques have opened doors to the public as Islamic leaders in the country hope to reduce misunderstandings about their religion. Fourteen mosques around Australia have invited locals in so that they may learn more about Islam.
According to Lebanese Muslim Association President Samier Dandan, extremist organisations like the Islamic State have maligned Islam's reputation, and any "ignorance" among the public about the religion should be addressed.
"There's never been a time more so than now that … any particular Islamic organisation needs to open up its doors to embrace all the different concerns and issues that currently do exist," AAP quoted Dandan as saying outside Lakemba mosque on Saturday. "The only way to try and break down those misconceptions or that level of ignorance is through a dialogue."
Labor leader Bill Shorten and Treasurer Scott Morrison visited the mosque in Sydney's west on Saturday.
According to Morrison, there's "no comfort" for terrorism and violence in any of the mosques he visited. He, however, admitted that the recent radical attack on NSW police employee Curtis Chang might have encouraged anti-Muslim sentiments.
LMA spokesman Zachary Rea believes non-Muslim Australians should also visit their local mosques and engage with religious leaders of Islam to aid the process of "demystifying the mosque." Rea asked people to take their shoes off before going inside mosques. They can, however, leave their socks on or take those off.
"We ask people to come with an open mind and essentially enjoy the day and take advantage of it," HuffingtonPost Australia quoted Rea as saying. "It's about trying to promote cohesion within the community and society at large."
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21 thoughts on "Londonistan: Migrants Expect More!"
Don Laird says:
MY REVIEW OF GLENFIDDICH 18 YR OLD SCOTCH WHISKY
(A little off topic but what the hell…………)
Seriously?, you really want to know how this scotch tastes?
I'll tell ya!
Its bloody great!
I won't go on with a bunch of self-absorbed, arrogant and pretentious garbage like "it pairs with this" or "it pairs with that" or it has "subtle notes of this and that", or smells like a whore's drawers, quite simply, its just a goddamned good single malt scotch whisky.
In fact, its a great phucking whisky if you can afford it, and I can!!!!! And more than that, it stimulates the creative senses and inflames the genitals and makes you want to rob banks and put the top down and go for drives in the countryside with law enforcement and gunfire!!!!
It's best enjoyed in the company of real men.
Like you and a bunch of yer friends gathered on a glacier, surrounded by wolves or on the top of some really big goddamned mountain you climbed just for the hell of it in the midst of a blinding godamned blizzard, and there you are, just a bunch of cold crazed bastards, pouring each other a few shots to celebrate your manliness all while you sing Viking war songs.
Or with that same group of real men, not flimsy flamboyant downtown fudgepackers, but really really real men with beards and scars and tattoos, some of whom really have robbed banks and plotted coup d'etat's and stuff and done prison time, and some of the others have killed bears and mountain lions and shit, and there you are just you and the men, sitting around a campfire or a living-room filled with books and leather furniture and paintings of naked pouting big bosomed women and stuff and talking about war and global conquest and trapping wolverines or that spectacular woman who's vagina you set on fire with the friction of your massive, manly, magnificent, mesmerizing man-meat and how, after you set her vagina aflame, you used those flames to spark up your Cohiba Robusto Fino Cameroon….and then sat back and watched her as she, still mesmerized, cooked you up a blood soaked filet Mignon all the while, clad in her skimpy panties, she kept refilling your scotch glass whilst she vacuumed the house, did the dishes, made you a samich for later and then she wrote a poem dedicated to your magnificent, manly, massive man-meat. And then you cracked open another bottle of this gift from the Gods, grabbed this naughty maid and, until the sun came up, banged her until she was cross-eyed, limping and speaking Swahili !!!!
Oh yeah………..so where was I?
Oh right, Glennfiddich 18 year old??…..its a bloody good scotch, a little pricey, but worth it if you can afford it…..and best of all, Metrosexual Mangina's hate it.
All the bovine scatology aside, I've had a few bottles of this stuff and its bloody good!!!
Go buy a quart of it now!!!!
I'll expect a full report later.
Don Laird,
Hater of Manginas, Metrosexuals, Fudgepackers and Muslims
Here's a couple of good songs to drink whisky to.
Don Laird
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N527oBKIPMc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfySK7CLEEg
Torked says:
Let's see. On boat for 5 hours. How Horrible. Illegal. Paid "A lot of Money". Free Housing. 3 meals a day delivered. Stretch Limo.
But no free cable TV. Internet, walking about money, or 14 year old British girl.
What a truly terrible life he is forced to endure at our hands.
Sorry……..the last one's a classic, from Canada and the 80's…….a time of wild-eyed, disease free, guilt free sex and self indulgence…
Behold, Kim Mitchell and the incomparable……"All We Are"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLsCZo4xLdY
Dude, there are hundreds of websites where you can give your opinion about whiskey, and ask people to watch your fave music video. Try to stay on topic here. Or drink a little less of that whiskey before you post. Nobody cares.
@Torked
Good idea, and while you're on the subject of topics and speaking for everyone, perhaps you could post a comment with a little more substance and depth than your usual comments, forgive me Torked, but objectively; the equivalent of casual flatulence.
Torked, I suppose you can take pride of authorship in this fine example of piercing, substantial, intellectual editorial commentary………you should, its yours.
………."Mud Sh- Sh- Shark. Involving a band known as The Vanilla Fudge"……..(Torked, comment on "Susie Knows Islam")
So Torked, until you consistently provide blog comments the literary "on topic" equivalent of lets say, Oriana Fallacis' "Sermon To The West", perhaps you can spread the arrogance and condescension a little less thickly on your particular brand of toast.
Before I go Torked, try, just try writing an essay of lets say, 7000 words. Something reasonably coherent, something of critical insight and analysis relating to the threat we face at the hands of the Muslim and its Islam. Then Torked, publish it to the internet in your real name, in full view of law enforcement and your Muslim enemies, taking full responsibility for your actions and writings, not quivering and hiding behind a cute little username all while young men and women, far better than you or I, are slaughtered on our streets.
I suspect you'll take the Avenue of Or Not………..
On the other hand Torked the next time you encounter satire or a video link that displeases you to such depths do what most children learn to do at a very early age……say 1 or 2 years old……..ignore it.
Food for thought n'est pas Torked?
@Torked……….
Here, for your convenience, is Oriana Fallaci's "Sermon To The West"
Written by the author of "The Rage and The Pride" and "The Force of Reason".
With respect Torked, I strongly suggest you read both. Ms. Fallaci is dead now, but her words resonate like thunder.
SERMON TO THE WEST
I don't hide. I never have. I stay at home because I like to stay at home, and at home I work. I have not appeared in public for at least ten years. No interviews, no TV.
Why am I here, then? Because, since September 11, we are at war. Because the front line of that war is here, in America. Because when I was a war correspondent, I liked to be on the front line. And this time, in this war, I do not feel as a war correspondent. I feel as a soldier. The duty of a soldier is to fight. And to fight this war, I deploy a personal weapon. It is not a gun. It's a small book, The Rage and The Pride.
My soldier weapon is the weapon of truth. The truth that begins with the truth I maintain in these pages:
"From Afghanistan to Sudan, from Palestine to Pakistan, from Malaysia to Iran, from Egypt to Iraq, from Algeria to Senegal, from Syria to Kenya, from Libya to Chad, from Lebanon to Morocco, from Indonesia to Yemen, from Saudi Arabia to Somalia, the hate for the West swells like a fire fed by the wind. And the followers of Islamic fundamentalism multiply like a protozoa of a cell which splits to become two cells then four then eight then sixteen then thirty-two to infinity. Those who are not aware of it only have to look at the images that the TV brings us every day. The multitudes that impregnate the streets of Islamabad, the squares of Nairobi, the mosques of Tehran. The ferocious faces, the threatening fists. The fires that burn the American flag and the photos of Bush."
"The clash between us and them is not a military clash. Oh, no. It is a cultural one, a religious one. And our military victories do not solve the offensive of Islamic terrorism. On the contrary, they encourage it. They exacerbate it, they multiply it. The worst is still to come."
President Bush has said, "We refuse to live in fear."
Beautiful sentence, very beautiful. I loved it! But inexact, Mr. President, because the West does live in fear. People are afraid to speak against the Islamic world. Afraid to offend, and to be punished for offending, the sons of Allah. You can insult the Christians, the Buddhists, the Hindus, the Jews. You can slander the Catholics, you can spit on the Madonna and Jesus Christ. But, woe betide the citizen who pronounces a word against the Islamic religion.
My small book is not tender with Islam. In certain passages, it is even ferocious. But it is much more ferocious with us: with us Italians, us Europeans, us Americans.
I call my book a sermon—addressed to the Italians, to the Europeans, the Westerners. And along with the rage, this sermon unchains the pride for their culture, my culture. That culture that in spite of its mistakes, its faults, even monstrosities, has given so much to the world. It has moved us from the tents of the deserts and the huts of the woods to the dignity of civilization. It has given us the concept of beauty, of morals, of freedom, of equality. It has made the unique conquest in the social field, in the realm of science. It has wiped out diseases.
It has invented all the tools that make life easier and more intelligent, those tools that our enemy can also use, for instance, to kill us. It has brought us to the moon and to
Mars, and this cannot be said of the other culture. A culture, which has produced and produces only religion, which in every sense imprisons women inside the burkah or the chador, which is never accompanied by a drop of freedom, a drop of democracy, which subjugates its people under theocratical, oppressive regimes.
Socrates and Aristotle and Heraclitus were not mullahs. Jesus Christ, neither. Leonardo da Vinci and Michaelangelo, and Galileo, and Copernicus, and Newton and Pasteur and Einstein, the same.
My book is also a j'accuse. To accuse us of cowardice, hypocrisy, laziness, moral misery, and of all that comes with that. The stupidity of the unbearable fad of political correctness, for instance. The paucity of our schools, our universities, our young people, people who often don't even know the story of their country, the names Jefferson, Franklin, Robespierre, Napoleon, Garibaldi. And no understanding that freedom cannot exist without discipline, self-discipline.
I accuse ourselves also of another crime: the loss of passion. Haven't you understood what drives our enemies? What permits them to fight this war against us? The passion!
They have passion! They have so much passion that they can die for it!
Their leaders, too, of course. I met Khomeini. I discussed with him for more than six hours in calm, and I tell you that that man was a man of passion. I never met bin Laden. But I have well observed his eyes. I have well listened to his voice. And I tell you that that man is a man of passion. We have lost passion.
Well, I have not. I boil with passion. I, too, am ready to die for passion. But around me, I see no passion. Even those who hate me and attack me and insult me do this without passion. They are mollusks, not men and women. And a civilization, a culture, cannot survive without passion, cannot be saved without passion. If the West does not wake up, if we do not refind passion, we are lost.
To quote from my book:
"The problem is that the solution does not depend upon the death of Osama bin Laden. Because the Osama bin Ladens are too many, by now: as cloned as the sheep of our research laboratories…. In fact, the best trained and the more intelligent do not stay in the Muslim countries… They stay in our own countries, in our cities, our universities, our business companies. They have excellent bonds with our churches, our banks, our televisions, our radios, our newspapers, our publishers, our academic organizations, our unions, our political parties…. Worse, they live in the heart of a society that hosts them without questioning their differences, with- out checking their bad intentions, without penalizing their sullen fanaticism."
["I]f we continue to stay inert, they will become always more and more. They will demand always more and more, they will vex and boss us always more and more. 'Til the point of subduing us. Therefore, dealing with them is impossible. Attempting a dialogue, unthinkable. Showing indulgence, suicidal. And he or she who believes the contrary is a fool."
This is what I write about Europe: "Identical [are our] faults, the cowardices, the hypocrisies. Identical the blindness, the deafness, the lack of wisdom, the masochism…. Identical the ignorance and the lack of leadership that favors the Muslim invasion. Identical the fad of the Politically Correct that encourages it. To believe me, you only have to observe the financial club you proudly call European Union. A club that only serves to impose the rhetorical nonsense called common currency…to pay fabulous and undeserved salaries (tax free) to the members of its inept and useless Parliament….
"A club that shelters more than 15 million sons of Allah and God knows how many of their terrorists… A club that fornicates like a whore with the Arab countries and fills its pockets with their filthy petrodollars. The same petrodollars with which the Saudi Uncle Scrooges buy our ancient palaces, our banks, our commercial and industrial firms. A club, moreover, that dares to speak of cultural similarities with the Middle East…. [Y]ou chatterers, you mentally retarded[!] Where the hell is the cultural similarity with the Middle East, you cretins, you silly clowns?!? At Mecca? At Bethlehem, at Gaza, at Damascus, at Beirut?!? At Cairo, at Tripoli, at Nairobi, at Tehran, at Baghdad, at Kabul?!?
"When I was very young, about 17 or so, I longed so much for a united Europe! I came from a war in which the [Europeans] had pitilessly slaughtered each other: remember? The damned Second World War. Plunged up to his neck in the brand-new struggle, my father preached the European Federalism…. He held rallies, he spoke to the crowds, he chanted: 'Europe! Europe! We must make Europe!'"
"But this frustrating and disappointing and insignificant Financial Club…[with] its sons of Allah who want to erase my civilization, this European Union, which chatters of
Cultural-Similarities-with-the-Middle-East and meanwhile ignores my beautiful language, meanwhile sacrifices my national identity, is not the Europe I dreamed of when my father chanted, Europe-Europe. It is not Europe. It is the suicide of Europe."
-Oriana Fallaci
sheikyermami says:
Thanks Don! She was a giant, a goddess among men!
So, do you still want to explain your whiskey review? Been drinking much?
N'est-ce pas?
The Sheik himself made a reference to Frank Zappa. As a fellow musician, I made a return reference. I was having a little fun with the Sheik. The fact that you have no idea about the reference, although it did not involve you, obviously went right over your head.
OK, I watched about 30 seconds of the vid. It really sucked. 🙂
@SYM
RE: ORIANA FALLACI
Oriana Fallaci was a patriot and an author whose works were, in addition to being a literary tour de force, a prophetic clamouring of the darkest times to come.
For that brilliance, for that patriotism, for that love of her country and culture she was vilified, persecuted and publicly mocked.
Now dead, from that vantage point on the other side, Ms. Fallaci I doubt would take no pride in the manifestations of her prophecies but rather a true patriots accusatory finger of condemnation pointed directly at the hearts and souls of her treasonous and blindly stupid detractors.
RIP Ms. Fallaci, you are sorely missed and fondly remembered.
Wither now Italia?……..wither now.
So, you wrote a book? There is absolutely nothing about you or your book on the internet. I'm calling bullshit.
When I read your trollish taunts I was reminded of the musing of Abraham Lincoln as he pondered a soul as dull-witted as you Torked…….he said…..
"Better to be suspected a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt"……..
In the future Torked, I suggest you not arrive at a battle of wits unarmed, it's embarrassing for us both.
Now run along my young one, I'm sure there is an episode of the Simpsons or Dancing with the Stars on one of the 500 channels that will catch your fancy.
Bon nuit.
Well, it is most certainly embarrassing for you. But I digress. DWTS or Simpsons? I do not own a television set. Young one? LOL. I retired when I was 58 years old, which was several years ago. 2 hitches in the U.S. Marines. Yes, while there were no wars going on. 33 years working for a DOD contractor with a Top Secret clearance and an Explosives Handler certification. And yes, I still have all my fingers.
"Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt". Abraham Lincoln, 16th president of U.S.
Don, I dislike you, I know that you commented on Aaron Swartz case on Wired.com. You use the same vocabulary in that article just like in this one. Get a dictionary and look up new words! "Regards"
Pnuemo. No I'm not going to disclose my name to you. You are not worth it.
CC on July 5, 2013 at 10:50 pm said:
Laird is a blow-hard bully. He was a ranker in the army 'till they turfed him. Since then, when he aint drunk he runs around kickin up chit.
here'e another piece of the low-life fascist's "literature". Man this dude is stupid.
Don, I would still like a peek at your book. Please provide the title so that I can purchase a copy. Thank You!
http://vladtepesblog.com/2012/03/28/an-open-letter-to-england-by-don-laird-in-canada/
Sorry, Don. But you are just so easy to troll that it has lost it's fun. You are a fat old alky that was booted from the military. Doing 10 pushups would kill you, and you have never written a book as you claim to have done. Even Gates Of Vienna has called you a fraud. Researching you has found people that call you a Blow Hard Bully and Alcoholic. And you apparently have a problem with the RCMP. They must have busted you for driving drunk, as intoxicated is your usual state. You, Sir, Are a pitiful loser in the game of life. I will not waste any more seconds in discourse with you.


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This is Alex Chohan who plays for the U11 Kestrels.
When he's not playing for Mytchett, Alex is a committed student of Lau Gar Kickboxing. He's been training since the tender age of 3 and last month completed his black belt grading.
Alex has demonstrated the core principals of martial arts over the years of self-discipline, commitment, perseverance and integrity.
Currently competing at an international level – we look forward to seeing Alex return with gold from the World Kick Boxing Championships held in Athens this year.


LONDON, Sept 7 (Reuters) - European shares were slightly higher in early trading on Friday as uncertainty over global trade rippled through markets and investors sought refuge in defensive sectors.
The pan-European STOXX 600 was up 0.1 percent by 0724 GMT, while the exporter-heavy German DAX gained 0.2 percent and Britain's' FTSE 100 was flat in percentage terms.
Europe's benchmark was set to end the week with a 2.3 percent loss, its worst weekly performance since the end of March as worries over an escalating trade dispute between the United States and China, as well as weakness in emerging markets, have dented investors' appetite for risk.
Shares in more defensive sectors, such as consumer stocks and telcos, were in demand as markets remained on edge after the deadline for a public comment period for proposed U.S. tariffs on an additional $200 billion worth of Chinese imports passed.
The timing of exactly when the tariffs would go into effect remained uncertain, however.
European autos, which have been particularly sensitive to headlines around tariffs, were flat.
Tech stocks were also flat, though chipmakers such as AMS and Siltronic declined 1.1 percent and 3.7 percent respectively, continuing a decline seen in U.S. peers overnight.
A drop of as much as four percent in International Consolidated Airlines (IAG) shares weighed on the travel and leisure sector, which retreated 0.2 percent.
British Airways, owned by IAG, said that it had suffered a data breach, with financial and personal data stolen from potentially hundreds of thousands of customers who booked online in recent weeks.
Elsewhere, British mid cap Greene King saw its shares surge more than 13 percent after the pub operator reported a jump in beer sales in the first quarter thanks to a boost from the World Cup.