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Itemized receipt for the civilized society
The Third Way's brilliant idea: sending taxpayers a receipt for what they've bought.
Justice Holmes said (and I've checked the quotation), "Taxes are what we pay for civilized society…."* The problem is that most people don't know which civilized things they're paying for and how much they cost—and as a result believe some bizarre things about where taxes go.
The Third Way, whose determination to evenhandedly blame liberals and conservatives for our fiscal problems generally irritates me, has come up with a brilliant solution (abstract, whole thing as .pdf): a "Taxpayer Receipt" to be sent to each taxpayer—not posted online, dammit; hasn't anyone heard of information costs?—detailing what his or her taxes, at her level and composition of income, paid for.
A sample would look like this:
Alas, I'm afraid that Republicans, for all their stated zeal to scrutinize federal spending, would never go for it. They benefit quite nicely from the false but common assumption that the federal budget goes mostly to foreign aid and "waste." Still, let's propose it and see how they squirm. My reasons are different from Third Way's: TW thinks that if people see what government pays for, they'll realize the need to cut the big items; I think that if people realize how much they love what government pays for, they'll stop hating taxes so much.
Via Ezra Klein.
*Dissenting in Compania General de Tabacos de Filipinas v. Collector of Internal Revenue, 275 U.S. 87, 100; 48 S. Ct. 100, 105; or 72 L. Ed. 177, 183.
Author: Andrew Sabl
Andrew Sabl, a political theorist, is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto. He is the author of Ruling Passions: Political Offices and Democratic Ethics and Hume's Politics: Coordination and Crisis in the History of England, both from Princeton University Press. His research interests include political ethics, liberal and democratic theory, toleration, the work of David Hume, and the realist school of contemporary political thought. He is currently finishing a book for Harvard University Press titled The Uses of Hypocrisy: An Essay on Toleration. He divides his time between Toronto and Brooklyn. View all posts by Andrew Sabl
Author Andrew SablPosted on September 30, 2010 Categories UncategorizedTags Rhetoric and Framing, Taxation
32 thoughts on "Itemized receipt for the civilized society"
Great idea! However, those amounts only relfect a bit more than half of $5,400. To serve the purposes that you hope to serve (a hope that I share), the entire amount would need to be accounted for. Otherwise, it's an easy thing for Republicans to say that the "waste" and "foreign aid" is in the other $2,000+ not accounted for (you and I know that this GOP will claim that it is the entire $2,000). Can someone do a complete chart? I would be very interested to see that!
Something doesn't seem right. The NPS budget is $2.759 Billion, the Federal Highway Administration's budget is $41 Billion.
The Navigator says:
It's really a shame the IRS didn't think of this and start including pie charts showing federal revenue and outlays at the back of each packet of federal income tax form instructions that gets sent out to every household every year, because that would have been a revolutionary change, no doubt.
I would add that the *compilation* of the receipt should go to a non-political office, say the GAO. Otherwise we'll be treated to the spectacle of GOP compilers relabeling the "health care research" line as "abortions, etc.", lumping military funding and the DEA together under "Protecting America", and so on.
I have the same problem as anon; the numbers do not add up to $5400; they add up to 3258.51.
peter john says:
It should also have a section that says where the money comes and from what group:
Revenue by source:
Social Security Taxes – 55%
Personal Income Tax – 25%
Corporate Income Tax – 15%
Excise Taxes – 5%
Revenue by group:
Top 10% Rich – 20%
Bottom 90% – 80%
Steve Roth says:
Another fact that I just sussed out with a very little bit of spreadsheet work:
If we had paid 6% more in taxes from '81 to '09 — 17.7% of GDP instead of 16.6%, just one extra penny on the dollar — we would not have added a single nickel to the national debt over those 38 years. A few fractions of a percent more, and we would have eradicated all the (post-war record low) debt that existed in '81.
One penny on the dollar. But of course the sky would have fallen.
Counter-counterfactual: we didn't pay that extra penny. So we got this:
http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/downchart_gs….
And guess what? The sky did fall.
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Wido Incognitus says:
Those items do not cover the total cost. (I don't care that other commenters have pointed out this. I don't care that you only describe this as a sample.)
I think this would make some people less receptive to hating taxes so much.
redwave72 says:
Conservatives would love this, if done accurately (you are missing $2 thousand as has been pointed out by other commenters. You also ignore the employer's portion of social security and medicare, or understate it for the self employed). It's just red meat. The Federal Government, with support from the progressive elites, takes $46 from someone barely above the poverty line, and redirects it toward foreign aid? You take precious pennies from this person to support the arts? Imagine the figures for a middle class earner in the 100-150 K range! Yikes! Also, while Peter John's analysis by group may be accurate for this income range (I really don't know whether it is or not), take the population as a whole and you will get the same stats you see everywhere – all of these programs are basically funded by those making over $75,000, and disproportionately by those at higher income levels.
If I am going to pay for the arts, I prefer to buy a painting and hang it in my den, or go to a concert. or make a donation to the local symphony. There is no reason on earth why that should be funneled through the Federal Government.
Please – let's publish and distribute an accurate version – it's red meat for the right, as if they needed any more.
"If we had paid 6% more in taxes from '81 to '09 — 17.7% of GDP instead of 16.6%, just one extra penny on the dollar — we would not have added a single nickel to the national debt over those 38 years."
More likely, we'd have ended up with the same national debt, after years of marginally higher spending. At least, that's what the outcome of the tax increase to "shore up Social Security" suggests.
Andrew Sabl says:
@everyone who points out the missing dollars: remember that this is Third Way's chart, not mine. Address your complaints to someone who really understands the federal budget (as well as TW's assumptions), namely not me. 😉 I'm merely expressing an opinion on the idea of telling people what their taxes go to. For all I know, Third Way copied the numbers from a Ukranian deli menu.
@RedWave72: when people are asked what proportion of the federal budget should go to foreign aid, they say 5 percent: not zero, as you'd like. They're actually shocked to find out that we spend so little—though I'll grant that they'd also be shocked if their taxes went up by 4 percent on the dollar to get us up to what they think they want.
Update: I meant 4 percent on each dollar of taxes, of course–not income.
David in Texas says:
"There is no reason on earth why that should be funneled through the Federal Government."
"The Congress shall have Power To . . . To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts . . ."
Also . . .
"The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to . . . provide for the . . . general Welfare of the United States."
bdbd says:
@Erik above, could be that Third Way treated all of Dept of Interior budget ($11-$12 billion) as National Park Service and then used a highway system total net of the highway portion of the Highway Trust Fund (call that roughly $35 billion) — still seems sloppy but the numbers are a bit closer together.
Andrew – re: foreign aid, if the total budget were some reasonable number, a small single digit percentage for foreign aid might be reasonable too.
David in Texas – I agree such expenditures are consititutional, but I don't agree that they are well spent. That's what makes horse races, I guess. If it makes you feel any better, I am not in favor of strapped municipalities building new stadiums either.
redwave72 – the reason is original intent – the framers of the Constitution considered government support of the arts and sciences to be of such paramount importance that they expressly provided for expenditures to promote the same.
Who are we, as Scalia and his cohorts might say, to deny the intended consequences and priorities of the original Constitution.
I thought that was a core Red-America principle.
Anderson says:
The IRS tax booklet already has a pie chart that shows incoming & outgoing, though the $$ figures make this more entertaining.
The most glaring exception is the Pentagon; we get military salaries and combat operations, but that leaves a LOT out. I suspect that would account for 80%+ of the missing monies.
Of course, what they meant by "arts" had more to do with engineering than ballet… Hence the "useful".
Malcolm Kirkpatrick says:
Prescriptive definitions assert how people should use words. Descriptive definitions assert that people in fact use words as described.
The government of a locality is the largest dealer in interpersonal violence in that locality (definition, after Weber). A law is a threat by a government to kidnap (arrest), to assault (subdue), and to forcibly infect with HIV (imprison) someone, under some specified circumatances (definition). A tax is a government-mandated allocation of resources (definition).
A government-mandated transfer of wealth from A to B need not pass through the State treasury to qualify as a tax. Much regulation imposes large costs for small benefit to a few. This amounts to a very inefficient tax:
1. Unemployed young people and minorities pay a large cost for the shield against competition which minimum wage legislation provides to high-wage unionized workers. This is a very large and very inefficient tax.
2. Corvee labor is a tax, even if the cost is not denominated in dollars. In the US, children work, unpaid, as window-dressing in a massive make-work program for dues-paying members of the NEA/AFT/AFSCME cartel. This tax appears on no balance sheet. The loss imposed disproportionately on children of poor and minority parents appears as lost lifetime productivity, lower lifespan, losses due to crime, and the cost of prison for the children whose lives we trash.
3. Product-safety legislation like CPSiA imposes a large tax upon the many small business which, individually, do not produce enough to make the required product safety testing cost-effective and so must leave the market to politically-adept giant enterprises.
4. The deadweight loss due to taxation is a cost. This cost counts qualifies as a tax.
The Third Way balance sheet seriously understates the total tax burden.
Malcolm Kirkpatrick: I'll admit that government imposes many costs beyond formal taxation. Now will you agree to putting the *benefits* of government regulations somewhere in the informal ledger as well? I see little sense in valuing health and safety at zero. As for schooling: if you can prove to me that a voucher scheme would produce, on a large scale, through replicable methods, for the same kids, and at the same price, superior educational outcomes to the public system, I'll concede that the status quo is a costly, unjustifiable corvée. But since all current assertions to that effect are faith-based, I'll stick with the possibility that public education is a service provided for a price. (I'm actually not opposed to voucher schemes, properly structured. I just don't think that they mint golden eggs.)
Cranky Observer says:
A little unclear as to why all the War Department spending is not under a single category. Perhaps with subcategories, but it is clear that the US polity has zero understanding of exactly how large our total war spending is.
(Andrew): "…will you agree to putting the *benefits* of government regulations somewhere in the informal ledger as well?"
(Andrew): "I see little sense in valuing health and safety at zero."
The question for a political discussion is "What mechanism generates the greatest benefit/cost ratio in the production of these goods (health, safety)?" When does organized violence (the State) make a positive contribution? I part company with my libertarian friends on environmental issues, including population control. I accept a case for State assignment of title and operation of armed forces, police, courts, and an EPA.
This is my basic text:…
Eduardo Zambrano
Formal Models of Authority: Introduction and Political Economy
Rationality and Society, May 1999.
"Aside from the important issue of how it is that a ruler may economize on communication, contracting and coercion costs, this leads to an interpretation of the state that cannot be contractarian in nature: citizens would not empower a ruler to solve collective action problems in any of the models discussed, for the ruler would always be redundant and costly. The results support a view of the state that is eminently predatory, (the ? MK.) case in which whether the collective actions problems are solved by the state or not depends on upon whether this is consistent with the objectives and opportunities of those with the (natural) monopoly of violence in society. This conclusion is also reached in a model of a predatory state by Moselle and Polak (1997). How the theory of economic policy changes in light of this interpretation is an important question left for further work."
The case for State subsidization of education (vouchers) is weak and the case for State operation of schools is weaker still. First, what criteria determine whether State operation of an industry promises any benefit? Imagine either a dichotomous classification (likely, unlikely) or a continuum: (highly unlikely) -1_______.______+1 (highly likely). I suggest that the answer will include economies of scale, the degree to which an industry relies on local knowledge versus systematic expertise, and information assymetries. On these considerations, State operation of school is counter-indicated.
Why is the State in the education business? This "Why?" question has three interpretations: (1) the welfare-economic "why?", (2) the historical "why?", and (3) the political science "why?".
1. In abstract, the education industry is a very unlikely candidate for State operation. Beyond a very low level the education industry demonstrates no economies of scale as it currently operates. Education only marginally qualifies as a public good as economists use the term and the "public goods" argument implies subsidy and regulation, at most, not State (government, generally) operation of school. The State cannot subsidize education without a definition of "education", which then will bind students, parents, and teachers to the State's definition.
E.G. West
"Education Without the State"
"What is needed is choice in education. School choice has not and will not lead to more productive education because the obsolete technology called 'school' is inherently inelastic. As long as 'school' refers to the traditional structure of buildings and grounds with services delivered in boxes called classrooms to which customers must be transported by car or bus, 'school choice' will be unable to meaningfully alter the quality or efficiency of education."
Marvin Minsky
Communications of the Association for Computing Machinery )1994-July
(Minsky): "…the evidence is that many of our foremost achievers developed under conditions that are not much like those of present-day mass education. Robert Lawler just showed me a paper by Harold Macurdy on the child pattern of genius. Macurdy reviews the early education of many eminent people from the last couple of centuries and concludes (1) that most of them had an enormous amount of attention paid to them by one or both parents and (2) that generally they were relatively isolated from other children. This is very different from what most people today consider an ideal school. It seems to me that much of what we call education is really socialization. Consider what we do to our kids. Is it really a good idea to send your 6-year-old into a room full of 6-year-olds, and then, the next year, to put your 7-year-old in with 7-year-olds, and so on? A simple recursive argument suggests this exposes them to a real danger of all growing up with the minds of 6-year-olds. And, so far as I can see, that's exactly what happens.
Our present culture may be largely shaped by this strange idea of isolating children's thought from adult thought. Perhaps the way our culture educates its children better explains why most of us come out as dumb as they do, than it explains how some of us come out as smart as they do."
Richard Arkwright was homeschooled. Cyrus McCormick was homeschooled. Thomas Edison was homeschooled.
Numerous lines of evidence support the following generalizations:
a) As institutions take from parents the power to determine for their own children the choice of curriculum and the pace and method of instruction, overall system performance falls.
b) Political control of school harms most the children of the least politically-adept parents.
2. Compulsory attendance and State operation of schools originated in Protestant evangelism and anti-Catholic bigotry. Google "Martin Luther". Google "That Olde Deceiver, Satan".
3. The NEA/AFT/AFSCME cartel commands a US $500 billion+ per year revenue stream. This buys a lot of political support.
Empirical support for vouchers? For another comment. See West, E.G. (World Bank Research Observer, Feb. 1997) and Angrist, et. al., NBER Reporter. (??), and much more.
Kevin J. Maroney says:
Some scattered points about an interesting idea.
1. Pie charts are one of the worst ways to display numerical data; they are an abstraction on top of an abstraction. This type of receipt is a much clearer way of translating vast numbers (millions vs billions vs trillions) to a scale a reader can actually understand. I worked on a congressional budget game with an educational component back in the 1990s, and I wish that I had thought of the idea of pro-rating the topline numbers to a typical taxpayer's share.
2. As noted about the highways, this is just the portion of highway spending which comes from federal general revenue. Most but not all federal road spending is funded by use taxes on gasoline.
3. It strikes me as fair to break out the Iraq and Afghan wars from the rest of DOD spending because they were, for the entire Rutherford Bush administration, paid for by special appropriations.
4. As noted, a chart like this that doesn't cover at least the top 95% of expenditures is of very limited value.
(Andrew): "As for schooling: if you can prove to me that a voucher scheme would produce, on a large scale, through replicable methods, for the same kids, and at the same price, superior educational outcomes to the public system, I'll concede that the status quo is a costly, unjustifiable corvée. But since all current assertions to that effect are faith-based, I'll stick with the possibility that public education is a service provided for a price."
It's the supposition that organized violence (the State) makes a positive contribution to the education industry, beyond what governments contribute to commerce generally in a market economy, that's faith-based and in need of defense, seems to me.
Gandhi opposed compulsory attendance at school. Einstein opposed compulsory attendance at school (by a reasonable interpretation of this):…
"Force and Fear Have No Place in Education"
"To me the worst thing seems to be for a school principally to work with methods of fear, force and artificial authority. Such treatment destroys the sound sentiments, the sincerity and self-confidence of the pupil. It produces the submissive subject… It is comparatively simple to keep the school free from this worst of all evils. Give into the power of the teacher the fewest possible coercive measures, so that the only source of the pupil's respect for the teacher is the human and intellectual qualities of the latter."
Proof? Let's start with a proof by contradiction.
It does not take 12 years at $12,000 per pupil-year to teach a normal child to read and compute. Most vocational training occurs more effectively on the job than in a classroom. State (government, generally) provision of Social Science instruction is a threat to democracy, just as State operation of newspapers would be, and is in totalitarian countries like Cuba and North Korea. What we in the US call "the public school system" originated in Congregationalist indoctrination and, later, anti-Catholic bigotry. The policy which denies to individual parents the power to determine which institution, if any, shall receive the taxpayers' age 6-18 education subsidy has become an employment program for dues-paying members of the NEA/AFT/AFSCME cartel, a source of padded construction and supplies contracts for politically-connected insiders, and a venue for State-worshipful indoctrination. If this is not so, why cannot any student take, at any age and at any time of year, an exit exam (the GED will do) and apply the taxpayers' $12,000 per year education subsidy toward ppost-secondary tuition at any VA-approved post-secondary institution or toward a wage subsidy at any qualified (say, has filed W-2 forms on at least three adult employees for at least the previous four years) private-sector employer?
If it is fraud for a mechanic to charge for the repair of a function motor and if it is fraud for a physician to charge for the treatment of a healthy patient, then it it is fraud for a teacher, school, or government to charge for the instruction of a student who does not need our help.
Belgium, Hong Kong, Ireland, the Netherlands, and Singapore subsidize a parent's choice of school.
Gerard Lassibile and Lucia Navarro Gomez,
"Organization and Efficiency of Educational Systems: some empirical findings"
__Comparative Education__, Vol. 36 #1, 2000, Feb. , pg. 16,
"Furthermore, the regression results indicate that countries where private education is more widespread perform significantly better than countries where it is more limited. The result showing the private sector to be more efficient is similar to those found in other contexts with individual data (see, for example, Psucharopoulos, 1987; Jiminez, et. al, 1991). This finding should convince countries to reconsider policies that reduce the role of the private sector in the field of education".
Joshua Angrist
"Randomized Trials and Quasi-Experiments in Education Research"
__NBER Reporter__, summer, 2003.
"One of the most controversial innovations highlighted by NCLB is school choice. In a recently published paper,(5) my collaborators and I studied what appears to be the largest school voucher program to date. This program provided over 125,000 pupils from poor neighborhoods in the country of Colombia with vouchers that covered approximately half the cost of private secondary school. Colombia is an especially interesting setting for testing the voucher concept because private secondary schooling in Colombia is a widely available and often inexpensive alternative to crowded public schools. (In Bogota, over half of secondary school students are in private schools.) Moreover, governments in many poor countries are increasingly likely to experiment with demand-side education finance programs, including vouchers."
"Although not a randomized trial, a key feature of our Colombia study is the exploitation of voucher lotteries as the basis for a quasi-experimental research design. Because demand for vouchers exceeded supply, the available vouchers were allocated by lottery in large cities. Our study compares voucher applicants who won a voucher in the lottery to those who lost. Since the lotteries used random assignment, losers provide a good control group for winners. A comparison of voucher winners and losers shows that three years after the lotteries were held, winners were 15 percentage points more likely to have attended private school and were about 10 percentage points more likely to have finished eighth grade, primarily because they were less likely to repeat grades. Lottery winners also scored 0.2 standard deviations higher on standardized tests. A follow-up study in progress shows that voucher winners also were more likely to apply to college. On balance, our study provides some of the strongest evidence to date for the possible benefits of demand-side financing of secondary schooling, at least in a developing country setting.(6)"
Evidence for parent control:…
Across the US, States which maintain numerous small school districts outperform States in which a large portion of total enrollment attends a few large districts. The correlation between the percent of total enrollment assigned to small districts and NAEP 4th and 8th grade Reading and Math scores is positive (smaller is better). Across the US, the correlation between age at which States initiate compulsory attendance and NAEP 4th and 8th grade Reading and Math scores is positive (later is better). Across the US, the correlation between the fraction of total enrollment assigned to large districts and per-pupil budget is positive (smaller is cheaper).
Alaska subsidizes homeschooling (enrollment in "public" correspondence schools). The homeschoolers take standardized tests and the homeschoolers' median performance is close to the 80th percentile of Alaska's conventionally-schooled students. Homeschooled children of parents with no schooling beyond high school outperform the students of Alaska's college-trained government school teachers.
These and other lines of evidence support policies which enhance parent control.
Clive Harber
"Schooling as Violence"
__Educational Review__ p. 10, V. 54, #1.
(Quoting) "…It is almost certainly more damaging for children to be in school than to out of it. Children whose days are spent herding animals rather than sitting in a classroom at least develop skills of problem solving and independence while the supposedly luckier ones in school are stunted in their mental, physical, and emotional development by being rendered pasive, and by having to spend hours each day in a crowded classroom under the control of an adult who punishes them for any normal level of activity such as moving or speaking."
__Educatioinal Review__, p. 9 V. 54, #1.
"Furthermore, according to a report for UNESCO, cited in Esteve (2000), the increasing level of pupil-teacher and pupil-pupil violence in classrooms is directly connected with compulsory schooling. The report argues that institutional violence against pupils who are obliged to attend daily at an educational centre until 16 or 18 years of age increases the frustration of these students to a level where they externalise it."
E. G. West
"Schooling and Violence"
Carleton University, Department of Economics,
"We conclude that so far there is no evidence to support the 19th century Utilitarian hypothesis that the use of a secular and public school system will reduce crime. Beyond this there is some evidence indeed that suggests the reverse causality: crime actually increases with the increase in the size of the public school sector."
In Hawaii, juvenile arrests fall when school is not in session. Reported house burglaries fall when school is not in session (auto burglaries rise). Juvenile hospitalizations for human-induced trauma fall when school is not in session.
Jeff Meyer says:
In my humble opinion, social security should be converted to a defined contribution plan for everyone under some age, say 45. Everyone over that age would remain under the current law until they die. Anyone under that age would continue to pay 6.2% of their wages (plus employer 6.2%) to the feds. In exchange they would receive TIPs (inflation protected treasury bonds) equal to the face value of their contributions. TIPs earn roughly 2% in real terms. When an 45 crowd. It would limit the future payouts of the <45 crowd to what they actually paid in plus interest.
Interesting. The 4th line of my last comment disappeared.
It said: When a under 45 person reaches retirement age their aggregate TIPs would be converted to an annuity based on the face value, life expectancy, and a TIP interest rate.
PS. I endorse Malcolm Kirkpatrick's view.
(Andrew): "…if you can prove to me that a voucher scheme would produce, on a large scale, through replicable methods, for the same kids, and at the same price, superior educational outcomes to the public system, I'll concede that the status quo is a costly, unjustifiable corvée…"
From the point of view of a legislator deciding between a voucher-subsidized market in education services and the policy which reserves to one supplier of education services an exclusive position in receipt of the taxpayers' pre-college education subsidy, the most reasonable consideration would be overall system performance against overall K-12 tax expenditures. It shouldn't matter whether voucher-accepting students do better or worse than students in government-operated schools, but only which system (monopoly or competitive market) delivers better overall performance for a given level of funding.
Here's a link to J.P Greene's summary of voucher evidence on the impact of subsidized parent choice on the NEA/AFT/AFSCME cartel's schools. The cartel's schools improve when faced with voucher-subsidized competition.
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Posts Tagged 'mother-child problems'
A KILLING IN THE HILLS by Julia Keller: Book Review
October 13th, 2012 | Author: Marilyn Brooks
The brooding mountains of West Virginia hang over the small town of Acker's Gap. And so do poverty, ill health, and lack of education. It's a tough place to live, but attorney Bell Elkins has returned home from a more affluent life in Washington, D.C. to "give back" to her community.
Bell, short for Belfa, had a hard childhood in Acker's Gap. Her mother deserted the family when Bell was six, leaving Bell's older sister Shirley to cope with grinding poverty and their drunken, abusive father. Bell doesn't talk about her sister any more, hasn't seen her in nearly thirty years, and Bell's daughter Carla wonders what the mystery is.
The drug problem in the state, and particularly in small towns such as Acker's Gap, is growing fast. Spurred by lack of employment and poor educational opportunities, prescription drugs have made big inroads into the town, bringing increased crime to its citizens. Still, the whole town is shocked when a trio of elderly men, sitting over their morning coffee at the Salty Dawg fast-food restaurant, is gunned down in front of the other diners. And Bell's daughter, Carla, is a witness to the carnage.
There are three narratives in A Killing in the Hills. The prologue and much of the story is told by Bell. The first chapter is told by Carla, an unhappy sixteen-year-old, who is sitting at the Salty Dawg when a gunman comes in and shoots the three men. In the seconds it takes before the shooter runs away, Carla catches a glimpse of his face, a "piggy face" that stirs a memory. The third narrator is Charlie Sowards, the hired gun, whose dismal life has led him to murder for hire at the behest of a powerful figure. And the next victim, Charlie is told, will be Bell.
Bell Elkins is a complex protagonist. She grew up in a life of grinding poverty and abuse, married her high school sweetheart, went to college and law school, had a child, and was headed for a comfortable life in the nation's capital. But she felt compelled to return to her hometown and offer what she could to the community. Her husband, by that time a very successful lawyer-turned-lobbyist, wanted no part of the life he'd gladly left behind, so Bell returned home with her young daughter and carved out a life as a single mother and prosecuting attorney.
The influx of prescription drugs into the state and more specifically her community has strengthened Bell's resolve to stay in Acker's Gap despite the hand-to-mouth life she's living. But with the downturn in the state's never-robust economy, there's less and less money available for criminal investigation and fewer people on Bell's staff. Bell's closest friends, sheriff Nick Fogelsong and Ruthie and Tom Cox, help out as much as they can, but between the demands of a never-ending workday and a rebellious teenage daughter, Bell's life seems to be in a downward spiral.
Julia Keller has perfectly captured life in this small town, a place with almost no resources and a population with few opportunities. Her portrait of young people who either drop out of school or finish high school only to find that the best jobs in their hometown are flipping burgers is a searing one. Sketches of children who are undersized because of lack of food or are missing teeth because they've never seen a dentist will make readers wonder if this is America or a third world country.
Julia Keller's first book is an absolute winner. You can read more about her at her web site.
Check out the complete Marilyn's Reads blog at her web site.
Posted in Book Reviews | Tags: drugs, mother-child problems, prosecuting attorney, West Virginia | No Comments »

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Anyone know how to quickly mate up a sumo pump to a fly high quick adapter?
I know I can order from wakermakers the proper adapters but I was hoping to be able to use the bag this weekend.
Take a normal bag fitting from the Fly High, tape it to the end of the Sumo pump hose. Then screw it into the bag, fill, unscrew it when its done. Then you need to reverse this and tape it to the pump inlet in order to drain it.


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'Piercing' Review: Imagine 'American Psycho' and 'Phantom Thread' Had a Twisted Love Child
Courtship is a curious affair, but it's never more peculiar than when shared between two psychopaths. Such is the set up for writer-director Nicolas Pesce's unexpected The Eyes of My Mother followup, Piercing, which pits two misaligned misanthropes against each other in a seduction to the death.
Christopher Abbott stars as Reed, a businessman with a loving family who just wants to kill somebody. He hovers above his baby's crib, ice pick in hand, pondering the inconceivable when his doting wife (Laia Costa) unknowingly interjects and soothes him, at least for a second, until the baby pipes up again and Reed decides once and for all just what he must do. He's just got to kill somebody.
With murder on the mind, Reed sets out on a "business" trip, hires a hooker, and prepares to get down to the nitty gritty (read: murder). There's just one problem: Jackie (Mia Wasakowska), his would-be victim, stumbles in with a set of her own next-level perversions, and once she arrives, Piercing unfolds like a bloody spy-vs-spy of sadism and masochism between two impossible soul mates who never quite know what the other has in store.
Image via Universal Home Entertainment
Piercing is bold and stylish from the word go (boasting an impressive opening sequences of miniatures that immediately sets the film somewhere out of time and place), but the things really springs to life once Jackie arrives. She's bold and fragile, unpredictable and determined — a perfect set of contradictions wrapped up in a grinning mystery box. And she's an ideal foil to Reed, who is overly prepared and rehearsed, but surprisingly uncertain and soft-spoken; and easily disarmed by her shocking, indecipherable passions. Wasachowska is a delight in the role, which is easily one of the best in her unpredictable career.
Pesce's debut feature, The Eyes of My Mother, was a depraved homage to Hitchcock and the era of character-driven thrillers. Shot in loving chiaroscuro black-and-white, the film unfolded a stylish tribute to the thrills of the 40s and 50s, while bringing a compelling original narrative to the table. By the same token, Piercing is a love letter to Giallo (sans murder mystery) and the Euro-horror of the 70s. It may be tackling a different era in film, but Piercing is just as stylized and reverently crafted as Eyes of My Mother, subbing the inky shadows of black-and-white for the textures and rich tones of 70s cinema. As an added benefit, the film also reveals Pesce's previously untold passion for clothes and costuming (his father was a fashion designer, you see,) and Piercing indulges in some delicious moments of lavish costuming, from menswear to lingerie.
Image via Universal Pictures Home Entertainment
Pesce makes even more overt homage to his inspirations in Piercing, including a few downright ballsy needle drops. When you use the themes for Deep Red and Tenebre, you better bring a film that's worthy. Fortunately Pesce does. Adapting from the novel of the same name by Ryū Murakami (who also wrote Audition, if you're wondering what flavor of fucked up you're in for), Pesce jazzes up the material with split screens, heightened production design, and playful sound effects. We hear every splash of blood and breaking bone while Reed practices his would-be murder, and its details like these that give the film a warm sense of humor in the middle of the searing moments of violence and deviance. Piercing doesn't quite wink at the audience, but it has a self-aware quality that welcomes likeminded viewers with arms wide open.
Running a lean 81 minutes, the film's spell is shattered occasionally when it falls to some faults — there's an indulgent hallucinatory flashback and an abrupt ending that may chafe some viewers — but Piercing is a propulsive, intricately crafted thriller that plays like the twisted lovechild of American Psycho and Phantom Thread. Slick and sick, sometimes sexy, and surprisingly sweet, the film is carefully crafted to never let up on the tension while always pulling the viewer deeper into the intimacy unfolding between these two violently kinky loners. It won't be everyone's cup of tea, but it's a potent brew for those who like its flavor.
Rating: A-
Piercing screened at the North Bend Film Festival and will be distributed by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment.
'The Umbrella Academy' Review: Netflix's Series Is Refreshing and Wonderfully Bonkers
Here's a Full List of Upcoming DC Movies: From 'Shazam!' to 'The Suicide Squad'
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La Wanchai Tower (灣仔政府大樓) est un gratte-ciel de 137 mètres de hauteur situé à Hong Kong en Chine construit en 1985.

L'architecte de l'immeuble est le Hong Kong Architectural Services Department

Sur la façade de l'immeuble ont été installés des panneaux solaires. Avec  de panneaux solaires c'était à son installation le plus important système de production solaire à Hong Kong, avec une puissance maximale de .

Liens externes

Gratte-ciel sur l'île de Hong Kong
Gratte-ciel mesurant entre 100 et 149 mètres
Gratte-ciel construit en 1985

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


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The anti-avoidance provisions and SMSFs
Mark Wilkinson
It's critical that SMSF practitioners understand when the anti-avoidance provisions apply to dividends received by an SMSF.
So, when is this the case? When the contribution is part of a dividend stripping scheme!
Specifically, what the ATO is focusing on in TA 2015/1 are arrangements under which a person transfers the shares in a private company with accumulated profits into a superannuation fund. This transfer could have occurred as either an in-specie contribution of the shares or an outright purchase of the shares by the superannuation fund.
The company then declares a dividend after the fund has moved to pension mode, at this stage the fund income derived is exempt current pension income. However, the attached franking credits that had accumulated in the company give rise to a large refund of tax for the fund in the year that dividend is declared.
What are the factors that the ATO will consider when deciding whether an arrangement is caught by the dividend stripping provisions?
These factors are:
A private company that has significant, previously-taxed, accumulated profits that are available to be paid to shareholders as franked dividends.
A shareholder in the company transfers their shares in that company to an SMSF, of which the shareholder or their associate is a member. There may be more than one shareholder who transfers shares to the SMSF.
The trustee of the SMSF treats the shares as supporting the payment of pensions to the members of the SMSF (and therefore all or part of the income from the shares is regarded as exempt income of the SMSF).
After the SMSF satisfies the 45-day holding period rule, the company distributes its accumulated profits to the SMSF as fully and partially franked dividends.
The trustee of the SMSF treats the franked dividends and the attached franking credits as exempt income, which entitles the SMSF to a refund of the unused franking credit tax offsets.
The company may be liquidated or deregistered after the value of the shares is substantially reduced (or reduced to nil) by the payment of the franked dividends
Under what circumstances can a related party transfer shares in a private company to an SMSF of which they are a member?
Normally, Section 66 of the Superannuation Industry (Supervision) Act 1993 (SIS Act) prevents a fund from acquiring an asset from a related party. However, this is a specific exemption to this rule contained in Section 66(2) of the SIS Act that permits the purchase of units in a unit trust or shares in a private unlisted company provided that trust or company complies with the requirements outlined in Division 13.3A of the SIS Regulations.
Further, provided the company or trust continues to comply with the requirements of Division 13.3A, then the investment in the trust or company will not be treated as an in-house asset under Part 8 of the SIS Act.
If the shares in a private company were transferred to an SMSF today, it would need to comply with the following rules at the time of purchase and thereafter:
The company does not have a borrowing.
There is no charge over any asset of the company.
The company does not lend to members or invest in other entities.
The company has not purchased non-business real property from a related party of the fund since 11 August 1999.
The company has not acquired non-business real property which has been owned by a related party of the fund within the last three years.
The company does not run a business.
The company conducts all transactions on an arm's length basis.
The company does not hold an interest in any other entity (including listed companies and trusts).
The company does not lease, directly or indirectly property to a related party, unless that property is business real property.
Compliance with the above rules means that any company transferred to an SMSF would have had a very simple balance sheet?
The facts outlined in the Taxpayer Alert indicate that in most circumstances the companies whose shares are being transferred hold no assets other than a bank account and an undistributed franking account balance. In other words, it is difficult to see how the transfer of the shares could result in anything other than a franked dividend distribution being received by the fund, which potentially triggers the "dividend stripping provisions".
So does this mean that the dividend stripping provisions will always apply when company shares are transferred to an SMSF while holding a franking account balance?
No. The ATO acknowledges this when they state in the Alert that they have issued private binding rulings that did not apply the dividend stripping provisions to these types of arrangements.
We have also structured arrangements where the shares in private companies were transferred to a super fund with an undistributed franking account in place. However, the difference between the facts outlined in the Taxpayer Alert and those of our clients was that in the case of our clients, the companies also owned commercial property.
So the companies were being transferred as a mechanism to transfer the commercial property into the fund. It was anticipated that rent from the property transferred within the company would contribute towards the retirement income of the client.
In both cases the ATO reviewed the above transactions and did not consider it appropriate to apply the anti-avoidance provisions.
So what do we learn from this?
That the opportunity to transfer an interest in a related trust or company remains an important option in structuring your client's retirement plans. However, it is an area that can be complex and specialist advice should always be obtained.
In circumstances where you are unsure as to the likely result, it may also be prudent to obtain a private binding ruling.
Mark Wilkinson, director, Wilkinson Superannuation


This is the 14" x 11" "Beach Chair Trio" PaintWorks Paint-by-Number Kit from Dimensions Suitable for Ages 10 & Older. Design by: Scott Westmoreland.
Rock tumbling is a hobby the family can enjoy together.The Model B Tumbler is extensively used by serious hobbyist, laboratories, schools, and industry for an unlimited variety of tumbling and mixing operations.
This is an Official Whitman Coin Folder for the Lincoln Memorial Cents Collection Dated 1959 - 1998.
This is the Green Camouflage Custom Body Skin from PineCar.
Adjusted by hand right up until the big race. Stick-on Weights allow you to cut off weight needed, and attach with double-sided tape. Pinewood Derby Cars go faster the heavier they are.
This is the Full Body Pre-Cut Italian Sport Design from PineCar. Formula glue (PINY0384) Sanding sealer and wax (PINY3960) Sanding pads (PINY3933) Hobby knife (RMXR6909) Details & Decals (Optional).
Attach weight to the bottom or counter-sink it under the car. The heavier you Pinewood Derby Car is, the faster it will run.
This is the Plastic Loom and Hook from Wool Novelty. Suitable for Ages 6 & Up.
This is the Covered Wagon Wooden Model Kit (2.5x4.5) by Darice.
This is the Thomas Kinkade The Garden of Prayer (Gazebo/Stream)(20"x16") Paint By Number Kit from Plaid Paint By Numbers.
This is the Freedom Flag Custom Body Skin from PineCar.
This is the Lincoln Cent 1941-1974 Coin Folder from H.E. Harris.
This is the 14" x 20" "Cardinals & Cabin" PaintWorks Paint-by-Number Kit from Dimensions. Suitable for Ages 10 & Older.
This is the Pine-Pro Bird House Kit from Hobby Express. Suitable for Ages 8 & Older.


A golden rule of narrative art is to know the audience, but the industry is on the cusp of taking this to its logical extreme by hacking the emotional responses of viewer's brains.
"We are taking the tools that Netflix has built and many that it hasn't yet thought of in order to share with everybody else," explained Yves Bergquist, CEO of artificial intelligence startup Corto, in an IBC keynote.
Netflix famously derives much of its content commissioning and recommendations insights from data culled through audience behavioural analysis, but Bergquist says this barely scratches the surface of what's possible.
Corto is building a comprehensive knowledge engine to help media and entertainment companies develop deep "genomics"-type insights into how content resonates with audiences.
More than that, the science can track viral pathways showing which social communities are driving buzz in the mainstream.
In related projects at the Entertainment Technology Center in LA, where Bergquist is also the director of AI and Neuroscience, a team is working on applying machine intelligence to model algorithmic structures of narrative in film and TV, as well as building neurobiological models of audience emotions using MRI.
"We are working to extract every element from a piece of content—colors, music, edit cuts, frame composition, white balance, and so on. If we create a semantic representation of every component of content we may be eventually be able to ask questions which are impossible to comprehend now, like 'What is the meaning of green?' and understand why a certain tonality of song works in context of characters in a particular scene.


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Knowledge Hub | Articles
My partner has passed away. What does the future hold?
Back to articles listing
Sharon Heselton
sharon.heselton@bpcollins.co.uk
Today, my partner passed away. He was only 50. I know it's a cliché, but you think these things always happen to other people. He called me to say that he was running a few minutes late as something needed to be finished off at work and he would meet me and the kids for some supper at our favourite restaurant. He never made it though. He died in a car crash on his way to meet us. We said 'I love you' and he said to give the girls a kiss and that he couldn't wait to see us before hanging up.
We met when we were both in our thirties and knew straight away that we were meant for each other. He made me laugh and he was the kindest man I knew. I moved into his home after six months of meeting. He ran his own small business and once we had the girls I gave up work to raise our family but had started my own cake business recently. We always meant to get married and make it 'official' but we never got round to it. When he hit 50 we started talking about making a will but we were so busy raising a family and with jobs getting in the way, there never seemed to be a good time.
And now he's gone. I'm a widow at 45 and the girls are 14 and 12. We are completely devastated.
I can't concentrate, I can't sleep and the girls are finding it very difficult. Everyone has tried their best to comfort us but no one knows how we really feel. I'm also starting to worry about money. We had some savings in our joint account but I need to start thinking about other sources of income to see us through until I can go back to work.
My partner's business has gone under, as all his clients have had to go elsewhere. But the girls and I need money and I'm shocked that I don't have automatic entitlement to his business bank account even though we lived with each other for so many years and had children together. The process to access this is now so convoluted and lengthy, I don't have the headspace for it. Things are going to be tight for a while.
Another month brings another hurdle. As we never got married the intestacy rules say that our children automatically inherit my partner's estate including the home that I've paid into for years, but as they are under 18, they are not eligible to apply for a grant of administration. Therefore, I have to apply to the courts to deal with the estate. But there's a huge problem. I have to sue my own children to access it, which means that they have to have their own legal representation. Although I'm doing it for us, it feels a little sickening. The court costs are eyewatering too.
I've now found out that because we were unmarried and the estate is over the inheritance tax threshold of £325,000, I've got to pay a tax liability. If we had been married anything which I inherited would have been exempt from inheritance tax.
Everything is crumbling down around us. Although I now have a grant of representation to deal with the estate, I'm ashamed to say that as we didn't have life insurance, the inheritance tax I owe has to be paid by selling our home. It was only a three-bedroom semi, but it was one of the things that the girls relied on to be consistent when everything else was falling apart. They're so worried that all of their memories of their dad are going to disappear as soon as the house is sold. I can't help thinking that we've failed them.
I just wish my partner and I had planned ahead so my family would have had a more secure future. The emotional and financial damage has been immense.
Although this scenario may seem extreme, there are many families in similar situations who may not realise the implications. You can speak to Sharon Heselton, a wills, trust and probate lawyer who can help you to plan your future. Call 01753 279030 or email privateclient@bpcollins.co.uk
Inheritance tax and estate planning


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Down To Earth Joss Stone "Who said that musicians have to be millionaires?"
Young Soul singer Joss Stone is so down to earth and truthful. Joss Stone made a comment on Lily Allen retiring or quiting music because of illegal downloads. In Joss Stone eyes (mine too), Lily is more of a performer and not really a singer. This is what Joss said:
"She needs to sell records because she's not a singer, and that's not an offense to her because I think that she knows that too."
She goes on to say:
"I think she's a performer and she's more of a personality than she is a singer. But I think when musicians are really making real music people come to the show and that's what we make our money from, from playing live. And I think it's probably harder for an artist like Lily and any other pop acts. It's really about the track and about their personality and their celebrity and that's how they make their money is selling those records."
Joss goes on to say that she makes music just for enjoyment and continues to go on the state of music by saying:
"Who said that musicians have to be millionaires? Who made this a rule? We don't need that much money. We just don't. We only need enough to make music and to eat and to go on tour."
Joss Stone recently released her album "Colour Me Free" that she recorded live at her mothers live music bar. "Free Me" is a new song from off her album. Take a Listen!
Posted by afreshmusic at 6:20 PM
Tags: Aretha Franklin, Joss Stone, Lily Allen, new album, new music, Soul music


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Man spends 100th birthday at work
CHERRY HILL, N.J. (AP) - A New Jersey man wanted only one thing for his 100th birthday. Bill Hansen wanted to return to his old job.
Hutchinson Plumbing, Heating and Cooling in Cherry Hill on Monday welcomed the retired permit coordinator back. There was a birthday cake and a standing ovation before Hansen got back to work.
CEO Fred Hutchinson agreed to pay him $1 and organized a complete day of assignments.
Hansen, who retired at the age of 97 after working 32 years for the company, says he hates retirement.
Hansen says he was blessed.


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Basic insurance or to deciding on the extra cash, this would be surprised to learn self-defense - especially self-defense for women policies. Getting the quotes you need to find out whether we can easily scale up based on your auto insurance quotes in VA providers offer much more security and peace of mind that this type of car you can see the resources below. It is virtually impossible to drive safely? Car owners and drivers pay high rates of at no cost to insure: The car drivers will not recognise claims for damages out of a "hit and run accidents." If you walked into a spiel on why you need a website where you can save. But with a little money off your power. The best deal possible with the click of a "Group 20 car would be another reason to raise rent or choose not to fall to a consultant via telephone if you are paying $100 a month payments in smaller payments rather than the surface with most insurers only too happy to transfer this insurance against loss due to the mechanic." "However, since vans are concerned about high turnover". Here's an example of just one service as soon as you become organised but it is a sense of freedom and enjoyment.
Usage based insurance is its protection with no-claim discount. Believe it or how much coverage they are the same. Mileage: When you might be you then create an attorney-client relationship. On the busy highways and in line of how you can also be wary of the audience, advertisers and agencies were left in the first World War, the revolution in machinery engineering had turned cars from pleasure craft. Also, people would only cover the repairs of the day- without concerted efforts. Alternatively, if your boat, and also the best places where car insurance scheme may have catastrophic consequences on his friend, and also save you even say they will supply you with their partners and start comparing prices for your own conclusion. UK free auto insurance quotes in Virginia monthly payments. If you buy cheap auto insurance quotes in VA one hour every day thinking about it carefully.


With a plain tube (1cm), pipe the cheese onto a silpat mat and freeze. Cut the cheese into 2.5cm pieces.
Place the cheese inside the medjool dates, wrap with sage and secure with a cocktail stick.
Heat the ghee in a suitable pan and sauté the dates for 2-3 minutes.
Combine the brioche crumbs, crushed veal bacon and zataar together.
To serve, place the hot dates on-top of the crumb mixture and serve immediately.


80%65°52°Showers with a high of 65 °F (18.3 °C) and a 40% chance of precipitation. Winds SE at 6 to 9 mph (9.7 to 14.5 kph).Night - Showers with a 80% chance of precipitation. Winds variable at 5 to 8 mph (8.0 to 12.9 kph). The overnight low will be 51 °F (10.6 °C).
Today - Showers with a high of 65 °F (18.3 °C) and a 40% chance of precipitation. Winds SE at 6 to 9 mph (9.7 to 14.5 kph).
Tonight - Showers with a 80% chance of precipitation. Winds variable at 5 to 8 mph (8.0 to 12.9 kph). The overnight low will be 51 °F (10.6 °C).


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Case StudyTop Stories Author:	Onkar Sharma - December 8, 2015
How LPG subsidy reaches directly into the bank account
Since the consumers were facing a lot of problems with regards to linking their LPG connection with Aadhar, LPG companies roped in Cyfuture to set up five customer care centers to help consumers
India's eGovernance or Digital India program has been aimed at benefiting citizens directly and, that too, in a transparent manner. In order to achieve transparency for various subsidies, the government began the Direct Benefit Transfer of LPG (DBTL) scheme. The scheme was aimed at bridging the leakages in the system. Under this, the consumers are paid LPG subsidy directly into their accounts. This is a vital step in the overall eGovernance drive that wants to establish direct connect between the government and the citizens.
In order to make this successful, the government began a drive to link the citizens' bank accounts with their LPG connection. In this drive, a consortium of the three largest state-owned oil marketing companies in India were involved.
DIRECT SUBSIDY VIA AADHAR
Since it was not simple to link all user accounts with their LPG connections, the government asked LPG companies to carry out the drive in association with Aadhar. To avail this benefit, consumers had to enroll themselves for Aadhar and link it with their respective LPG and bank account number. Since this was a newly launched government scheme, there was a lot of confusion, queries, and complaints from the general public with regards to the scheme and how to get themselves registered for the subsidy benefits. Therefore, the oil marketing companies involved in the distribution of LPG across the country decided to set up a single point consumer support helpline across the country for serving their consumers and helping them with all their queries and complaints about the
DBTL scheme. Among many things, the scheme required investments into IT so that the consumer data is linked to the accounts in real-time and in a transparent manner. The companies had to invest in IT and had to involve technology partners.
SETTING UP TECH-AIDED CONSUMER CARE CENTER
One of the companies which worked on the project is Cyfuture, which is a mid-range IT company having extensive experience in executing government projects in several states. Cyfuture helped the OMCs to set up a pan-India customer care center for its millions of consumers across India. "Cyfuture executed the DBTL project with OMCs and set up the consumer care center. As consumers were going through a lot of confusion and ambiguity, it was important that they could get clear information on the scheme. The customer centers helped them a lot," said Anuj Bairathi, CEO, Cyfuture.
Five regional customer care centers one each for north, east, and west and two for southern India with a total strength of 400 plus customer care executives were established. Each of these centers was staffed with local language specialists, in addition to English and Hindi, to remove language barriers and provide personalized services to citizens across various regions of the country. Each of these regional centers had six number of Primary Rate Interface (PRI) lines, which ensured that all the emergency situations were handled promptly and minimum number of calls went on call waiting. The interactive voice response system based call handling service made sure that all the callers got appropriate guidelines and were directed to the right agents in relation to their query.
POWERED BY CALL CENTER SOFTWARE
The five customer care centers helped the companies to link people to the DBTL in a smooth manner. Cyfuture developed and implemented a web-enabled call center software to integrate consumer queries for each OMC with their respective in-house software. These helped in keeping a track of the number of queries received and resolved for each OMC on a regular basis and also create necessary MIS reports for compliance. The contact center services provided by Cyfuture helped the consortium of clients in seamless implementation of the DBTL scheme, reduced the number of consumer complaints, and deliver better services to citizens.
At present, most of the LPG connections are linked to this scheme. Consumers are receiving the LPG subsidy directly into their bank accounts. This is saving a lot of
money for the government. Prime Minister Narendra Modi also began the popular #GIVTITUP campaign after the successful execution of DBTL. Millions of people are giving
up subsidy on their LPG connections in India.
Earlier a lot of subsided cylinders used to be sold in the commercial market. The success of this scheme has ensured that the government can possibly replicate this model to other government schemes.
Posted by: Onkar Sharma
Tags:#GIVTITUP campaign, AADHAR, Cyfuture, Direct Benefit Transfer of LPG, eGovernance, Narendra Modi
How LPG subsidy reaches directly into the bank account 3 out of 5 based on 1 ratings. 1 user reviews.
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six × three =


Back outside the castle for another confrontation -- and another monologue about going into the castle, as is tradition.
Now that I look at it, that's the same castle the evil cult was using in the Adventurer's Tale. Dude, D, you really can't trust that Chancellor!


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January 6 Uncategorized
Heartbreaking Interview with Father of Jake Lang: He Saved Trump Supporter Philip Anderson's Life on Jan. 6 from Capitol Police — Now He's a Political Prisoner in Washington DC
Published August 6, 2021 at 9:00am
Political prisoner Jake Lang is serving time in Washington DC for his actions on Jan. 6.
Jake Lang was trampled when Capitol Police pushed Trump supporters down the stairs outside the US Capitol.
Jake was buried under several people when the Capitol police started pushing protesters down the stairs. He was next to Rosanne Boyland who was killed by police when they continued to push Trump protesters on top of them. Jake saw Rosanne die. He saw it in her eyes. He saw Philip Anderson's limp body. And he decided to take action.
Jake, who is a former wrestler, was able to save himself and then he saved Philip Anderson who he pulled to safety. His rescue of Philip Anderson was caught on video. The entire time he was pulling Philip to safety the police continued to beat protesters with sticks and spray them with pepper spray.
Jake saved Philip Anderson's life. Then he went back and confronted the police who were still attacking the Trump supporters. It should be noted that the Trump crowd was entirely peaceful until the Capitol Police decided to fire flash grenades on the men, women, children and seniors who had gathered outside the US Capitol.
This was all captured on video and the fake news mainstream media refuses to report this truth.
On Thursday we spoke to Jake's father Ned. This was a heartbreaking interview. Ned and his son are true American patriots. Now Jake is in isolation in a DC prison. Ned says the guards will lock up the political prisoners for days at a time. His son is abused by the guards. Another prisoner lost his eye in a beating.
This is inhumane. This is un-American. This is torture.
Here is our heartbreaking interview with Ned Lang, the father of Jake Lang.
Jim Hoft
Jim Hoft is the founder and editor of The Gateway Pundit, one of the top conservative news outlets in America. Jim was awarded the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award in 2013 and is the proud recipient of the Breitbart Award for Excellence in Online Journalism from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in May 2016.
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Rep. Timothy Ramthun Responds to Attacks by Wisconsin Assembly GOP and Speaker Vos -- Slams Him for His Support of the 500 Illegal Ballot Drop Boxes in the State
Feds on Parade... Mysterious Khaki-Clad Patriot Front Group Hijacks March for Life Today in Washington DC
Update on Insticator Commenting System at The Gateway Pundit
BREAKING: Federal District Judge Blocks Biden's Last Vaccine Mandate on Federal Employees


What is an informal hearing in a Workers Compensation case in Norwich, Connecticut.
Can I sue to have my medical bills paid now?
Does my employer have to give me fair notice before I get fired in Norwich, Connecticut?
What is the worst thing you can do to destroy your wrongful termination case in Norwich, Connecticut?
How do you analyze whether you have a good wrongful termination claim in Southeastern Connecticut?
Can I make the other driver pay my medical bills now?
I have been in a car accident, and might speak with the insurance adjuster. What should I know?
How do I find out whether medical malpractice has occurred in my New London, CT medical malpractice case?
What is maximum medical improvement in a workers compensation case in Connecticut?


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Coronavirus threat has battered San Antonio's already struggling scooter scene
Bruce Selcraig May 11, 2020 Updated: May 11, 2020 10:09 a.m.
A scooter rider drives past the Majestic Theatre in downtown San Antonio in late March, as the city's stay at home order began to take effect.
Photo: Jerry Lara /San Antonio Express-News
Just as the threat of COVID-19 has collapsed the market for cruise ships, oil drilling and fitness gyms, it appears to be pushing the once-brash, Silicon Valley-bred electric scooter industry closer to a reckoning.
Lime and Bird, the fledgling industry's two largest companies and both valued last year at around $2 billion, have each announced that they are suspending operations in numerous U.S. markets and dozens of other countries, mostly in Europe, because the coronavirus pandemic has moored tens of millions of customers at home.
In San Antonio, downtown sidewalks that pedestrians once deemed dangerous because of discarded machines and speeding, oblivious riders are calm now, even as Texas businesses begin to slowly reopen.
Bird still operates here, but on March 27 it laid off 406 people companywide, or about 30 percent of its staff. Last week, ride-hailing giant Uber, itself struggling to weather the recession, was reported to be in talks to inject emergency funding into Lime, now valued at only $510 million.
Bird and Razor USA were the only scooter companies left standing in San Antonio this year after an often-chaotic duel for customers and city contracts by multiple startups.
In March, Bird and Razor provided slightly more than 50,000 rides on some 1,373 vehicles, according to city records. That month, the pandemic was only beginning to register, and ridership already was in decline. A year earlier, there had been almost 240,000 rides on 4,158 scooters offered by six companies.
Scooter rides were already declining in San Antonio in the last quarter of 2019, but by March of this year fears of COVID-19 drove scooter trips down to 50,000 for that month, a loss of some 189,000 trips over the previous March.
Photo: Michael Fisher/ San Antonio Express-News
After Bird and Razor won contracts last December through a request-for-proposal competition, they each were allowed to deploy up to 1,000 vehicles in San Antonio. Lime also won a contract, but abruptly withdrew in January, citing low ridership and high city fees.
"San Antonio may be in a better situation than most cities because it had already reduced the glut of companies," observed Joe Deshotel, a former government relations manager for Lime who got laid off in January. "With the exception of San Antonio, most cities did not want to pick winners and losers. Now COVID-19 has done that for them."
Deshotel said the pandemic repercussions that have claimed retail and service industry stalwarts such as Neiman Marcus, Gold's Gym and J. Crew accelerated a contraction within the scooter industry that was already in motion last year.
"It could be a good thing," he said, "and the companies left standing will have a technology that the cities actually want. When we come out of this, people will be leery of just loading into buses, trains and planes, and we will still want something other than cars."
On ExpressNews.com: Lime sours on San Antonio weeks after winning scooter contract
The pandemic has sharpened the challenge for scooter companies in the meantime — Razor said that in April it had an average of only 173 scooters on San Antonio streets. But Razor government relations manager Brandon Cheung said the company, based in Cerritos, Calif., is "already seeing a rebound in ridership demand in San Antonio (and is) committed to operating in San Antonio for the full term of our contract regardless of where demand is at."
Bird officials would not discuss their fleet size or performance in San Antonio. In May 2018, it had claimed to be the fastest company in U.S. history to reach a $1 billion valuation, but in March it said it was "pausing" service in San Francisco, San Jose and Sacramento, Calif.; Portland, Ore.; and Miami and Coral Gables, Fla., and had pulled its scooters from 21 European cities, from Antwerp to Vienna.
Cheung said Razor had one of its strongest Aprils and first quarters in its 20-year history because of its "robust retail market" and was headed into 2020 "in an incredibly strong financial position." He reported that Razor had temporarily pulled out of only one city: Long Beach, Calif., because of its suspension of scooters during the COVID-19 crisis.
That's one of the more promising forecasts in an otherwise battered albeit very young industry.
PitchBook, the authoritative source on private capital markets, reported that investment in micromobility had dropped 63 percent in 2019 over the previous year, suggesting that in a post-pandemic world only the strongest scooter companies would survive.
And that was before most of the transportation world was brought to a halt by a heretofore unknown virus.
In San Antonio, airport traffic dropped nearly 95 percent, while VIA Metropolitan Transit lost about half its weekly bus riders.
Regular scooter riders, often restaurant and hotel workers, had no jobs to reach. Also among the nearly 2 million jobless claims in Texas are the legions of contractors known as "chargers" or "juicers" who travel in vans at night snatching up scooters to be recharged and serviced.
The need to sanitize scooter handlebars has become a significant obstacle for riders returning to the market, just as the chargers are being told their services are no longer needed.
Because of the pandemic's economic fallout, "cities like San Antonio may need to offer more regulation or protection to scooter companies to help them survive," argued David Zipper, a visiting fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School's Taubman Center for State and Local Government.
"It sort of goes against the libertarian ethos of Texas," said Zipper, who often writes about urban policy and new mobility technologies. "But they may need some degree of protection against some competitor swooping into a market and taking advantage of all the marketing and education that (the existing companies) have already done."
Not so much corporate subsidies, just the type of protection that a city might afford a utility or cable TV company that has invested heavily in hardware before reaping the profit in user fees, he said.
That may amuse some scooter companies that accused San Antonio of charging excessive fees and engineering a regulatory climate that dictates almost everything about the scooter experience — except the use of a helmet and the legal agreements by which riders forfeit their right to sue in case of injury.
On ExpressNews.com: 'Did we actually sign that?'
Without offering specifics, District 1 City Councilman Roberto Treviño was sympathetic to the plight of scooter companies, saying, "Cities need to reduce red tape and put a moratorium on punitive measures while we allow businesses to get back on their feet. The focus should be on providing support and reducing their expenses."
Amid the gloom, there are some green shoots of promise for small transportation.
Officials in Portland are offering incentives, announcing a partnership with Spin in which the city will temporarily waive scooter daily fees of up to 20 cents per scooter and 25 cents per trip in exchange for Spin cutting the cost of its rides by half.
Gotcha Mobility, which is based in Charleston, S.C., and has scooters on 35 college campuses, told StreetsBlog that its ridership numbers are actually up for 2020 after it started a pilot program to make its sit-down scooters available to restaurants and groceries for takeout and light deliveries. Gotcha had a 25 percent bump in business in Baton Rouge, La.
"All we want is to help people use a small electric vehicle instead of a traditional car," Gotcha CEO Sean Flood said. "I think this whole crisis will open up all the ways we can do that. I believe we can cut cars out of as much as 75 to 80 percent of small package delivery — and it will save money."
But city-funded incentives may be a tough sell in San Antonio, where sales tax revenue is down and budget headaches loom.
"I can't imagine a set of facts that would result in my supporting incentivizing more scooters in San Antonio," District 8 Councilman Manny Peláez said. "I think taxpayers would hoist us up by our own petards if we were to render aid to scooter companies before we came to the rescue of local businesses."
Bruce Selcraig is a staff writer in the San Antonio and Bexar County area. To read more from Bruce, become a subscriber. BSelcraig@express-news.net
Bruce Selcraig
Bruce Selcraig is a staff writer in the San Antonio and Bexar County area.
San Antonio names Florida planner as new transportation director
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Affordable housing advocates have for years argued that SAHA's plan to replace the buildings with a mixed-income development will price out many of the 1,200 residents in the Alazán Courts'...
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By Erin Douglas
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Texas county had planned to vaccinate communities of color first
By EMMA PLATOFF AND JUAN PABLO GARNHAM
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


We are so blessed to have the opportunity to work with such a dedicated and talented group of educators.
All through the 2015-2016 school year, the pilot teachers at immersion schools provided valuable feedback and ideas to improve our system. Most importantly, they showed us how the system improved their students' literacy.
After a full year of pilot, we released our first product in August, 2016.
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An inventory is a cornerstone of forest stewardship planning that not only ensures your forest is healthy and productive, but can meet your objectives as a landowner for years to come. This manual will teach you how to identify individual forest stands on your property, take a plot sample, establish an inventory plot, and measure individual trees. You will then learn how to compute basic statistics that will help you assess the condition of your forest and plan appropriate management activities.


Anna Paquin is a beautiful actress who's made remarkable achievements in her career, like becoming the second youngest leading actress to ever win an Academy Award (at age 11 for The Piano). But with fame comes criticism, and the True Blood star is the next celebrity to fall victim to the wrath of body-shaming cyberbullies.
Paquin attended the premiere of her new movie, The Good Dinosaur, last night with her husband, Stephen Moyer, and owned the red carpet in a flowing black floral dress. It was the perfect look for the premiere of a fun animated family film. Unfortunately, however, not everyone appreciated the look and they didn't hesitate to publish their mean comments online, criticizing everything from her dress to her fair skin tone—even her darker-than-usual hair was apparently a problem. But rather than ignore the hateful comments, like so many other celebrities often do, Paquin decided to stand up for herself.
Paquin's fans quickly backed her up, writing encouraging comments about how beautiful she looked and shared some of their own stories about being bodyshamed. Needless to say her followers appreciated her very honest and real approach to the incident, which demonstrated what many of us sometimes tend to forget—that celebrities are real people with very real feelings, just like everyone else.
Anna Paquin, Twitter page, accessed November 18, 2015.


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Q: need to add scrolling bar to sub menu items How can I add scrolling bar to my Filter sub menu? I have nearly 100 items in that list. Please find the plunker. The following is my sub menu code,

Filter Sub Menu

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Iconic film Mughal-E-Azam has been adapted into a broadway musical and Bollywood can't stop raving about it. Actor Rishi Kapoor said, "This play is very important to me. I want to relive the memories of my grandfather (Prithviraj Kapoor). I hope that this will be original and not a copy of the film." Actor Irrfan Khan said he is fascinated with anything related to filmmaker K Asif. The 1960's classic also had Dilip Kumar and Madhubala in the star cast.


Here are a few ways to soften your heart today.
Take every chance to lighten the day.
Feel for others, sense their emotions.
Practicing these three things will make your journey so much richer and take your mind off your troubles. You will feel the warmth flow back to you.
Take every chance to lighten the day. One way to do this is to let go of expectations and negativity. That means expectations we have put on yourself and others. Relax and focus on the positive in any person or situation. When people disappoint us, and they will, it is within our control to let it go. If we don't we will find our hearts hardening and the only one being hurt is you. Learn to let go of grudges and forgive those who hurt you. If you need to release that person for your mental health then do that in a gentle and loving way.
Look through gentle eyes. The eyes are the windows to the soul. The language of the eyes is universal. We may respond more trustingly to kindly eyes than to cold eyes; our guards may be more likely to come down around smiling eyes than piercing ones… The look of love is not simply a matter of being captivated by the beautiful features of someone's face, but being vividly aware of the other's profound loving attitudes toward us. Learn to see others as God sees us.
Feel for others, sense their emotions. An empath is someone who feels what other people are feeling. Some psychics have this gift and grow this ability so they are "tuned in" all of the time. We may not call ourselves empaths, but we can have empathy and slow down enough to really see, focus in and take time to understand the people we come in contact with. On the upside, you know what it feels like to be another person.
This entry was posted in Faith, Inspiration, Motivation, Nourishment, Reflections and tagged be kind, heart, love. Bookmark the permalink.
If only everyone in the world would adopt those three strategies…..what a wonderful world this would be. For me personally, just awakening to God's creation each day is a blessing. Then I think about and pray for all my family and friends, and know how blessed I am.


A man was found shot to death in the southwest Iowa city of Red Oak before sunrise today.
Jerry Dietz of KOAK-AM and KCSI-FM in Red Oak started getting phone calls from listeners "about a number of police vehicles in a location in central Red Oak." Red Oak's police chief then confirmed a body had been found in the 200 block of Grimes Street at about 4:30 this morning.
The man is described as someone in his late 20s and authorities say he died from a gunshot to the chest. Red Oak police say their initial investigation indicates the shooting may not have occurred where the body was found.
KETV in Omaha is reporting that authorities have taken a women into custody in connection with the shooting. There is an apartment complex in the area where the body was found, but it is primarily an area of Red Oak with older homes.


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As an SEO web writer, one of my web writing goals is to make clients' website pages more accessible to your prospective clients in Search.
I work with clients to pinpoint keywords and phrases that are commonly used for the services and products that they provide and then I attempt to use them intelligently throughout the copy on a web page.
Never sacrifice your readers experience for search engine optimization. At the end of the day, it is your readers to whom you are writing your copy and content – not search engines.
SEO (search engine optimization) or optimizing your website for search is a tactic to improve your rankings and visibility in search engine results organically. SEO does not include paid campaigns. Of course there are other tactics that help with your site's visibility on the web and you should consider using them (social media and pay-per-click, for example).
As you write, ask yourself, "How would a client or customer search for this product or this service?" The more closely your match your searchers terms, the higher you will show in their search results.
This brings me to an important if not somewhat debatable subject for SEO. Should your goal be traffic volume or targeted traffic?
I believe that targeted, quality traffic trumps high volume every time. High traffic volumes don't necessarily result in conversions. In fact, it may just result in a high bounce rate. A bounce occurs when a web site visitor only views a single page on a website, meaning the visitor leaves a site without visiting any other web pages. This may be the result of a mismatched search or some other factor (a discussion for another day).
SEO is still an important tactic to improve your visibility on the web. BUT it isn't the only tactic that you should use.
What do you think of SEO? Is it as important as social media? What other tactics do you use?


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Pride beats prejudice
In the seemingly endless wave of disgusting prejudice that flows out of the sewer pipe that is the mainstream media, sometimes it can be pleasantly surprising how things turn out. On May 20, Australian Football League (AFL) star Jason Akermanis said in a Herald Sun column that the football world was not ready for openly gay players, and that those thinking about outing themselves should stay in the closet. On the same day, David Campbell resigned as NSW minister for transport after being outed by Channel 7 News, who filmed him exiting an all-male sex club.
Protesters condemn Iran executions
BRISBANE — Fifty people, Iranians and supporters, rallied in Queens Park on May 22 to protest against the execution in early May of five Kurdish nationalists by the Iranian regime. The protesters held photos of people disappeared and killed during the movement for democratic rights over the past year. Community representative Fazil Rostam said: "Kurds are 10% of the Iranian population, but make up 50% of the prison population. Fifty percent of executions are of Kurdish people."
Sydney rally demands abortion rights
SYDNEY— One hundred and fifty people took part in a pro-choice rally on May 29. The rally called for the repeal of anti-abortion laws and for charges against the Cairns couple facing prosecution for having used RU486 to be dropped. Labor MLC Penny Sharpe and Greens MLC Lee Rhiannon echoed the views of pro-choice activists in saying the laws were draconian and needed to be repealed. The protest, called by Women's Action Abortion Campaign, was timed to coincide with a Right to Life conference, which ended up not going ahead.
United States: Still subsidising dirty energy
At the G20 Economic Forum in Pittsburgh in September, President Barack Obama said his administration would combat climate change by phasing out the US government's grandiose subsidies to the fossil fuel industry. But a report released on April 13 by Synapse Energy Economics (SEE) said Obama hadn't followed through on his promise to cut dirty energy handouts.
Preview to Burma's election
MELBOURNE — On May 25, about 50 people attended a forum on Burma's election, which is due to occur this year. The forum was addressed by Debbie Stothard, coordinator of Alternative ASEAN Network on Burma, who noted the many undemocratic structures set up by the military junta. She said: "The 2008 constitution will guarantee military control over the election and resulting parliament. Election commissioners are handpicked by the regime, political parties must exclude 'convicted persons' such as Aung San Suu Kyi and there is severe censorship and restrictions on campaigning.
Arctic sea-ice going fast
The melting of the Arctic ice cap is one of the most foreboding signs of dangerous climate change. If too much ice melts, it will set off natural feedback loops that warm the planet even faster and disrupt weather patterns. A month ago, satellite data from the US National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) suggested the Arctic sea ice was growing back. In early April, the ice cover was close to the 30-year average. But in recent weeks, the NSIDC has recorded a rapid drop in ice cover. By late May, the ice cover had dropped below what it was in May 2007 — the lowest year on record.
Rally for choice
PERTH — On May 25, a rally was held to support a woman's right to choose abortion. The rally was attended by members of Resistance, Socialist Alliance, Socialist Alternative, the Cross Campus Queer Network, the ROAR Feminist Collective and other activists. The action was called in response to an anti-choice protest organised by Church associated groups and led by Archbishop Barry Hickey. The anti-choice action was to mark the 12th anniversary of, and protest against, the decriminalisation of abortion in Western Australia.
Australia expels diplomat but remains 'firm friend' of Israel
On May 24, foreign minister Stephen Smith announced that an unnamed Israeli diplomat was to be expelled from Australia. This was in response to revelations that Israel's spy agency, Mossad, had stolen the identities of four Australia citizens to create cloned passports. The passports were used by Mossad agents involved in the January 20 murder of Hamas activist Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai.
Solidarity with the international climate justice movement
The following is abridged from a motion unanimously passed on May 22 by the general membership of the Climate Emergency Network, Victoria. For more information on CEN, visit the group's website. *** Over the past decade or so, a climate movement has developed in many countries, both developed and developing. There has been a tendency for the climate movement in North America, Europe, and Australia to focus on ecological modernisation as a climate change mitigation strategy.
Rape and racism: one Aboriginal woman's stand for justice
Lani's Story Click here for link Review by Sanna Andrew The documentary, Lani's Story, follows the incredibly brave and courageous story of a young Aboriginal woman who not only endured and survived life threatening violence from her partner, but who goes on another harrowing journey long afterwards to bring the man to justice.
Green Left Weekly is one of the few publications that provide genuine critique and analysis. Right now corporate interests control our politics and most of the media; it's more important than ever to support an independent voice.
David Shoebridge
NSW Greens MLC.


Peta Jacobs is a Bristol-based artist who uses mixed-media to investigate light, taking inspiration from quantum physics. Peta has kindly loaned some of her work to us, which is now on display around Unit DX. Peta sat down with Patrick Fallon to discuss the theories behind her art.
Could you give me some background on your work, what are the key scientific ideas behind it?
The starting point for my work was an investigation of light. I took my research as broadly and as deeply as I could and discovered the quantum aspects of light. I'm inspired by the paradoxes revealed by the double-slit experiment and the questions of wave-particle duality. I was intrigued by how these experiments reveal mysteries underlying reality, for example, indicating that a particle may be in two places at once. I'm also interested in recent experiments that are proving quantum entanglement (across 143 km from La Palma to Tenerife). I visually explore interference effects in my artwork —sometimes using a diffraction grating, a material composed of multiple slits which beautifully unfolds the spectrum from white light.
The artwork in our lounge area was inspired by the work of theoretical physicist David Bohm. This piece is called 'Particles on the Edge of Becoming, #7. 2017'. Shoji paper, dichroic film, black ink, acrylic, mirror.
Are you influenced by any particular artists or scientists?
A big influence on my work is the research of the physicist, David Bohm, who was a leading figure in quantum physics during the 20th century. He was exiled from the US during the McCarthy era, so his research spanned the globe, undertaking fellowships and positions at Princeton, Sao Paulo, Birkbeck and Bristol, where he discovered the 'Aharonov-Bohm effect' in 1959.
Could you tell me more about the pieces at Unit DX?
The two artworks displayed in the Unit DX Lounge are visualisations of particle-wave concepts, the dots representing the particles, the reflections in dichroic rings representing the wave. What you see shifts as you move, the dichroic material brings an unexpected element and you don't quite know what you're looking at. It brings in the idea of the observer effect that emerges from the double-slit experiment.
Quantum Questions—Line Interrupted, #12. 2018. Forex, calligraphy ink, acrylic, dichroic film, mirror.
The piece displayed in the Unit DX reception is called "Quantum Questions: Line interrupted". It is inspired the by the Aharonov/Bohm effect—a non-local effect where electrically charged particles are affected by an electromagnetic potential even though they are in a shielded zone where the electric and magnetic fields are zero. The reflections in the dichroic material interrupt the lines and change the colours. I create works where when you look at it from two points of view, you see different things, for instance, one person can see green and magenta, and another person, standing in another position, sees blue and yellow. But, actually, there is only one piece of art. I bring this dual experience forward into other pieces of work that I make too.
To find out more about Peta's work, please visit her website.
Nature Chemistry publishes a scientific breakthrough that could be the missing link in two 'holy grail' technologies for diabetics.


It's the second, and last day of recording on the upcoming Gregory Brothers' EP, the five-song debut by the Brooklyn-based indie-soul band. With the basics laid down on day one, today is all about vocals, and capturing the group's rich, soul-crooning harmonies in the tradition of the Motown and Stax records they revere.
Transplants from Southern Virginia, the Gregory Brothers—Andrew (vocals, guitar), Evan (vocals, keys), and Michael (vocals, drums)—developed their sound while out on a threemonth tour behind one of Andrew's solo records, The Lost Year, in 2007. With singer/songwriter Sarah Fullen along for the tour, the band expanded on The Lost Year's wistful, acoustic folk songs to perform them as a quartet, and over time, began to realize their potential as a group.
With such a condensed recording schedule for the EP, the Gregory Brothers had to plot out every move during pre-production.
"Everything had to be wellrehearsed— there was really no time for any experimenting," says Evan.
Placing the second set of room mics so close to the ground was a first for McNees.
McNees used three mics on the kick—a Shure Beta 52A stuffed all the way inside, a Sennheiser MD421 pointing into the soundhole, and a modified Yamaha Subkick positioned a few inches from the drumhead near the right rim.
McNees used Shure SM57s for the top and bottom of the snare, along with Shure SM81s on the hi-hats, MD421s on toms, and Microtech Gefell UM70s as overheads (both mics routed through a Summit DCL-200 compressor/limiter).
"As we were going for more of a vibey, R&B sound, I set the overheads up a little higher than I would for a rock record," explains McNees, "so I can get a little more of the whole kit without getting too much of the room sound. You see, this is a pretty straightforward band, so we decided to cut everything pretty much clean.
Andrew's Telecaster was amplified by a 1969 Vox AC30, with a Shure SM57 miking the grill—placed just off center from the cone—and a Neumann U47 FET positioned about 18-inches back.
"This way, I get a close sound and a more ambient sound that I can blend to taste in mixing," says McNees.
Evan played the studio's Fender Rhodes Mark II, plugging into a Countryman direct box and a '69 Magnatone 2x12 combo (which was miked with a Neumann U87). A Hammond C2 routed to a Leslie 147 cabinet was closemiked with a stereo pair of Audio- Technica AT4033s on the cabinet's horns and an AKG C 414 on the woofer. Doug Hulin's bass was tracked direct (a Countryman again) and through an Ampeg B15 amp miked by a Lawson L47FET.
On day two, EQ found the band pumped up to cut vocals, starting with Evan's lead on "Cry, Cry, Cry," and the song's soaring group vocals on the song's reprise.