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Australia: "Teachers for Assange and Manning" campaign in Melbourne
By Sue Phillips
Teachers and members of the Committee for Public Education (CFPE) campaigned in Melbourne last weekend to win support for the freedom of Julian Assange and Chelsea Manning. The campaign was organised in the aftermath of the opening week of Assange's US extradition hearing in London, which was exposed as a political show trial aimed at condemning the WikiLeaks founder to life imprisonment for exposing US war crimes.
"Teachers for Assange and Manning" was initiated by the CFPE as a result of a series of resolutions passed at Footscray City Secondary College moved by Will Marshall, a longstanding Socialist Equality Party (SEP) and CFPE member. The resolutions opposed the ongoing persecution of Assange and demanded the Morrison government do everything in its powers to secure the safe freedom of Assange. The resolution also called for a broadening of the campaign to other schools and workplaces.
Following the political lead given by Footscray educators, a meeting of the Hills Association of the New South Wales Teachers Federation in northwest Sydney unanimously passed a similar resolution moved by Erika Laslett, a secondary teacher and SEP member.
Last week, the same resolution was again passed unanimously by more than 30 teachers at a meeting of the Illawarra Teachers Association in Wollongong.
The resolution read: "That this meeting of teachers opposes the ongoing persecution of journalist publisher and founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange and courageous whistleblower, Chelsea Manning. The UN Special Rapporteur on Torture Nils Melzer warns specifically that 'Assange's continued exposure to arbitrariness and abuse may soon end up costing his life.' We insist that the federal Morrison government use its diplomatic powers to organise the safe return of Assange to Australia. We resolve to send this resolution to other schools and workplaces."
In moving the resolution, Pietro Mascetti, a secondary teacher, said he felt compelled to raise the resolution because "a great travesty of justice is being committed which has extremely serious consequences for teachers, for our children and for the world. We are in the business of educating, of informing our students and developing critical thinking attitudes, all of which are being attacked in the persecution of Julian Assange."
The active intervention of teachers and education support staff at workplaces and schools is just one indication of the growing concern among millions of people that a terrible injustice is being carried out and that Assange's persecution has immense implications.
This was evident on the Melbourne campaign, as workers and students stopped to talk to the campaign team, took leaflets, made comments, donated and signed up for more information.
Alan said: "I've followed Assange for a long time. I have researched this and the Five Eyes [surveillance] network which was set up to counter the Soviet Union. Now it's being used for economic espionage on an industrial scale. The US wants to use it and Australia is a minor partner. Assange has exposed things like that. But his prosecution opens up the floodgates to other journalists. He didn't break any laws. He's not a US citizen. This is draconian."
Yvon, a retired worker, said: "We need to save him. If Julian Assange goes, then freedom of speech is gone. He has committed no crime. He has published the truth." Liz a disability worker added: "Because of Assange, any journalist today is going to be vulnerable."
The fight for Assange and Manning has coincided with an upsurge of workers struggles internationally. Teachers have been at the forefront of this growing movement, battling the assault on public education and fighting for decent working conditions.
Yvon and Liz
Last month 200,000 teachers in Ontario went on strike to oppose the austerity program of the provincial government. This was followed by a national strike by 200,000 teachers in Sri Lanka. This week, teachers in the US walked out in Salt Lake City while graduate students at the University of California continued wildcat strikes. Some 50,000 academics in Britain took industrial action and maintained picket lines against casualisation and increasing workloads.
Several teachers stopped to discuss freedom for Assange, the suppression of democratic rights and the assault on public education.
Jude, a retired art teacher said: "I don't know all the ins-and-outs of what has happened to Julian Assange, but I do know he is in jail in the UK and faces extradition to the US. I know his health is not good and I am very concerned about both his physical and mental health.
"The Australian government should be doing something about his situation. This is all about freedom of speech and censorship. Assange is doing an important job by exposing war crimes. If people like him don't stand up or can't stand up, then we are living in a fascist state."
Jude was aware of the teacher strikes in the US over the last two years and commented on the retrogressive changes being imposed in public education. She commented: "I have a friend who is a middle school teacher in Texas. He is an art teacher and has 50 students in class. He is a fantastic teacher and gives the students great art projects, but this is impossible."
Mandy, who is a primary teacher and CFPE member, explained why she had joined the campaign: "The more I learn about the situation with Assange, the more outraged I become and the more I feel the need to tell other people. Others have to understand and become outraged too, and together we need to do something. The government won't do anything, but we need to. Assange's freedom can only come from what ordinary people do.
"Teachers rights are being suppressed. We don't have a voice in what happens in education. Assange's situation is a very extreme example of that same process. There is a link between democratic rights and suppression of freedom of speech and that is what attracts teachers. If we stand by and let this happen to Assange it will get worse for everyone."
Kate a secondary teacher and CFPE campaigner, said: "There is a lot of support out there for Julian Assange. Many people want to find a way forward. There is real concern about what his prosecution means for democratic rights. People are concerned that the truth is being concealed. They don't like it that governments are hiding what is going on. One man said to me on the campaign that Assange is the last bastion of democratic rights. That really stood out in my mind."
Phoebe, Kate and Mandy
Phoebe, who works in the Technical and Further Education (TAFE) sector and took part in the campaign, said: "I joined the team because if Assange is extradited to the US and sentenced for publishing the truth, it will create a precedent for anyone to be persecuted by the ruling elite for going against their narrative and their secrecy. This is a grave miscarriage of justice.
"I found a lot of people to be very open towards the campaign. You could see that they had respect for teachers being at the forefront of this campaign. Teachers taking a stand is important as it is also against the ruling elite, who feel threatened by the power of public education and intellectualism."
In contrast to the positive and enthusiastic response of teachers and other workers to the campaign for freedom of Assange, the trade union apparatuses, including the teacher unions, are maintaining a complicit silence—as is the official media and the official political parties.
To secure the freedom of Assange and Manning, educators, workers and young people need to act independently of the official organisations. Pass resolutions at your school, establish a defence committee, and send delegations to other workplaces. Teachers and education support staff who wish to take forward this critical fight contact the CFPE.
Email: Cfpe.aus@gmail.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/commforpubliceducation/
Twitter: @CFPE_Australia
Meeting of Australian teachers passes resolutions in defence of Julian Assange
[6 December 2019]
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Ayodhya verdict: India top court rejects review pleas by Muslims
Supreme Court rejects petitions seeking review of its recent verdict that granted disputed site to the Hindu majority.
The 16th-century Babri mosque in Ayodhya town was destroyed by a Hindu mob in 1992 [File: Barbara Walton/AP]
India's Supreme Court has dismissed petitions seeking a review of its recent ruling in favour of building a Hindu temple on a disputed site in northern India where a 16th-century mosque was torn down by a Hindu mob in 1992.
The petitioners, representing the Muslim litigants, had said they were aggrieved by the court's decision and sought reconsideration of the verdict. A total of 18 petitions were heard by the court.
"We have carefully gone through the review petitions and the connected papers filed therewith. We do not find any ground, whatsoever, to entertain the same. The review petitions are, accordingly, dismissed," a five-member bench headed by Chief Justice SA Bobde said.
Zafaryab Jilani, All India Muslim Personal Law Board on SC dismisses all review petitions in Ayodhya case judgment: It is unfortunate that SC has not entertained our review petitions. We cannot say what should be our next step , we will consult our senior counsel Rajeev Dhavan. pic.twitter.com/iWjd8mE2Yo
Muslim petitioners who pressed for a review said they found the verdict unfair and a majority of India's Muslim population was against the ruling.
The petitioners still have a last legal recourse of filing a curative petition in the Supreme Court, asking it to "cure" perceived defects in the verdict.
On November 9, the court held that the site in Ayodhya will be given to a government-run trust for the building of a Hindu temple, while Muslims were allotted five acres (two hectares) of land at an alternative site to construct a mosque there.
The ruling was seen as a major victory for Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, which has promised to build a Hindu temple at the demolished site as part of its election strategy for decades.
The dispute over the site of the Babri mosque in the town of Ayodhya in Uttar Pradesh state has lasted for more than 70 years.
Hindus believe Lord Ram, the warrior god, was born at the site and that a Mughal Muslim ruler built a mosque on top of a temple there.
A December 1992 riot following the destruction of the mosque sparked communal violence in which about 2,000 people, mostly Muslims, were killed.
The Trump business backlash: Corporate 'woke-washing' or new era?

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Day 2. Antigua.
When Tina was just twenty-one, she had left chilly Blighty to begin her career as an artist on the stunning island of Antigua. She had stayed for more than a year on the island turning tricks at a local pottery as many a Caribbean boy attempted to turn tricks on her.
As Linda's crew hit the island almost thirty years later not much had changed. The place was still gorgeous; the weather wonderful; the men quite insatiable!
They headed away from the main crowd – always a good idea on a cruise. Paul knew that to do the obvious meant that one would usually be joined by a few thousand passengers jostling for photo opportunities.
Or just jostling.
He hated to be herded, it made him feel like a cow in an abattoir. A sad creature on route to the slaughter! He was well aware he could manage the latter in a quiet bar somewhere minus the bovine melee. Besides, Tina knew the island well, and so at her behest their group made their way to one of the less fashionable beaches- Runaway Beach to be precise.
It was perfect.
They ran away from the three and a half thousand passengers aboard the 'Britannia' and found paradise – at a price.
They swayed beneath the palms as buckets of local beer made their way mysteriously towards their expensive parasol. Paul knew that Andrew probably had something to do with the alcohol on tap, but he wasn't complaining – it was such fun. Suffice to say it was a liquid lunch.
Grace, being Grace, immediately caught the attention of a young life guard. In fact Paul's attention had been pricked initially, after he spotted the handsome, smiling native lurking at his stern earlier in the day. It was more than obvious he had an interest in his beautiful niece, and it was more than obvious Paul was more interested in the lovely Travis than she was.
He was terribly sexy, despite the fact that he found it necessary to wear knee length black socks in 30 degrees. A rather dubious look Paul thought. But who was he to judge. He'd packed some rather dubious outfits himself, much to the chagrin of his husband. Bugger it he had thought. We have 23kg each and we're not carrying backpacks for once.
He was gonna dress to distress when he had the chance.
On the beach his mother had the time of her life. Floating in limbo in the crystal clear waters, her current age receding like a spring tide. It was wonderful to watch. Paul could not comprehend that she would be seventy in a few days. His own vanity made him not believe it. After all, if she were to be that old, what did that make him? It was quite hideous.
He had visited Tina in Antigua many Caribbean moons ago. He had stayed for a whole month and had fallen, like her, in love with the island in the sun.
Just like Harry Belafonte.
He had a clear image of Tina collecting him from the airport back then. She had appeared driving an open jeep and wearing a sun-hat – it was all terribly Meryl Streep.
He had just finished 'Little Shop Of Horrors' at Leicester Haymarket and had been offered the part of Benjamin in 'Seven Brides For Seven Brothers', so he had a little time to 'rest' before retreading the boards.
It was his first time in the tropics and he'd been so impressed with Tina's driving skills, not to mention the driving rain and the bath-like ocean.
He had lived in Australia previously, but had few memories. Probably quite a good thing as his parents had emigrated as 'ten-pound Pommies' to Sydney, cruising all the way. His father had apparently walked the handrail on the promenade deck whilst crossing the Indian Ocean. He had been cheered on by a drunken mob who clapped and sang 'Hava Naguila'. Paul was glad he had no memory of that performance. His knew his mother must have been terrified. His father had had a terrible habit of going overboard, luckily this was not one of those occasions. Although there were many to follow in later life.
The day on the beach went swimmingly and as it neared completion Travis, the lifeguard, with whom some of the family had shared a herbal cigarette, admitted that he found Grace smokin'! He approached Paul and asked if she would mind having a picture with her for his Instagram account.
'It be good for her, and good for me' he had sung sexily in his lilting Antiguan accent.
'I'll have a word' Paul assured him. Knowing that these young 'grammers' never resisted the opportunity to raise their profile. Grace had a highly successful Instagram account, having many more followers than 'The Lola Boys' tawdry affair.
Gracie reluctantly agreed. And a photo shoot, directed by Paul, took place on the beach just before the taxi arrived to take them back to the capital of St Johns.
It had all seemed terribly innocent to Paul as he snapped away. Directing his models to turn this way and that.
'I think take the tee-shirt off Travis' he'd heard himself saying far too lasciviously.
'It'll be so much better for the picture', he lied.
Travis, of course, readily complied. In fact he couldn't wait to show off his six-pack and the equally impressive ivory he sported in his mouth.
It was only on route back to the ship that Grace told them all that Travis had not quite behaved as the gentleman he purported to be. He had apparently been whispering unsweetened nothings in her ear as Paul had clicked away. Grace had handled the situation with balls whilst wanting to kick Travis in his. But she did not want to make him feel daft. And also, Paul knew, wanted a good shot for her Instagram account- @ Grace Owers.
When she discovered Travis had just twenty-four followers she realised she needn't have bothered.
On route back to the ship, Tina asked the driver to stop at the pottery at which her artistic life had first wheeled into action. Initially it seemed that the place didn't exist anymore – then all at once the little blue and white house in which she had once lived came into view. Paul recognised the charming little cottage too and both of them shared a poignant moment. They were suddenly in their early twenties again and the tears flowed – lachrymose lager streaked their cheeks with a golden hue. Paul knew that Tina had spent a special time on the island. Both brilliant and tragic, and he knew her memories must have bitten hard – it had been incredibly moving for the whole family.
A truly special moment.
As they made their way back to the ship the whole family reminisced and talked of the fantastic day they had shared together. Then out of the Caribbean blue Grace turned to Paul and said with a just a hint of irony,
'I can't believe he only had twenty-four followers!'
Paul knew that life could be a bitch sometimes. Or rather – a beach!
But what a beach!
Categories: Cruising With The Lola Boys!, The Lola Boys, The Lola Boys Abroad, The Lola Boys Blog
Tagged as: #gaytravel, #lgbtq, #thelolaboys, Andrew Kennedy, Antigua, Caribbean, paul Darnell, thelolaboysabroad, thelolaboysblog
Day 1. At Sea.
Day 3. St Maarten. AND Day 4 – At Sea!
Jan Mitchell says:
I bet you don't want to leave!!


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LSU Tigers Customized Jerseys, Tigers University Custom.
Large collection of LSU Tigers women's fashion, campus couture, and game day apparel, merchandise, and accessories. Ladies dresses, tops, button down shirts, t-shirts.
LSU breaking out new gold jerseys, alternate helmets for.
An arrest warrant has been issued for Cleveland Browns receiver Odell Beckham Jr. by New Orleans police after the NFL star slapped a security guard's butt after the national title game.Fun Facts about the name Lsu. How unique is the name Lsu? Out of 6,028,151 records in the U.S. Social Security Administration public data, the first name Lsu was not present. It is possible the name you are searching has less than five occurrences per year. Weird things about the name Lsu: The name spelled backwards is Usl.BATON ROUGE — LSU football coach Les Miles shouldered responsibility, and blame, for the questionable decisions made at the end of the Tigers' 25-23 loss at Ole Miss last Saturday."Certainly.
What is the meaning of LSU? The meaning of the LSU is also explained earlier. Till now you might have got some idea about the acronym, abbreviation or meaning of LSU. What does LSU mean? is explained earlier. You might also like some similar terms related to LSU to know more about it. This site contains various terms related to bank, Insurance companies, Automobiles, Finance, Mobile phones.During game one of the annual LSU Baseball Purple-Gold World Series, both teams showed positive signs, as fall baseball is coming to a close. The Gold Team won 1-0 after freshman catcher Alex Milazzo reached base on a single then later scored on a wild pitch in the fourth inning.
LSU Gold Stories featuring University College. LSU Chapter of Phi Eta Sigma Past-President Andrew Mahtook Receives Highest National Honor as Clark Scholar-Leader of the Year Award; Past-Secretary Emily Riley Receives Lejeune Scholarship by Jacquelyn Schulz Craddock Past Phi Eta Sigma officers receive national honor award and scholarship. Phi Eta Sigma, a national honor society rewarding first.
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — White T-shirts covered LSU's gold softball jerseys as the players warmed up before Sunday's rubber game against No. 1 Florida on Sunday.
LSU is at home against Auburn, but if the Stidham hype is true, then LSU could be in trouble. I would have the Gators a slight favorite in that game, but LSU definitely has a shot there. We aren.
LSU unveiled alternate uniforms on Thursday afternoon ahead of this weekend's Homecoming game. The Tigers will wear uniforms that pay homage to The Silent Season of 1918, when LSU did not suit.
Tigers fans, get geared up with Tigers Customized Jerseys at lsujerseystore.com. Buy a LSU Tigers University Custom Jersey featuring Tigers Personalized Uniforms.
What Does The Name Lsu Mean? - The Meaning of Names.
LSU Baseball. 388K likes. The Official Facebook page of LSU Baseball.
Looking for online definition of LSU or what LSU stands for? LSU is listed in the World's largest and most authoritative dictionary database of abbreviations and acronyms LSU is listed in the World's largest and most authoritative dictionary database of abbreviations and acronyms.
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LSU Alumni Association - Chicago, Chicago, Illinois. 418 likes. This is the official page for the LSU Alumni Association in Chicago, IL.
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LSU Gold had its beginnings more than 40 years ago. The Louisiana Agricultural Experiment Station conducted a fig-breeding program during the 1950s and early '60s to develop new varieties for Louisiana. During that time researchers, under the direction of Dr. Ed O'Rourke, made crosses and evaluated seedlings for adaptation. This breeding program was discontinued in the late 1960s, but some of.
Can Vanderbilt win the SEC Tournament? - Anchor Of Gold.
Tiger Stadium, popularly known as Death Valley, is an outdoor stadium located in Baton Rouge, Louisiana on the campus of Louisiana State University.It is the home stadium of the LSU Tigers football team. Prior to 1924, LSU played its home games at State Field, which was located on the old LSU campus in Downtown Baton Rouge. Tiger Stadium opened with a capacity of 12,000 in 1924.
BATON ROUGE, La. -- Catcher Alex Milazzo's leadoff base hit in the fourth inning set up the game's only run Wednesday night as the Gold team posted a 1-0 win over the Purple in Game 1 of the LSU.
Games of chance require a wager to have meaning at all. Games of sport involve the skill and strength of the opponents and the humiliation of defeat and the pride of victory are in themselves sufficient stake because they inhere in the worth of the principals and define them. But trial of chance or trial of worth all games aspire to the condition of war for here that which is wagered swallows.
The 2016 debate ended with LSU hosting the game six weeks later in Tiger Stadium, meaning two-straight matchups in Baton Rouge. Florida won that 2016 game 16-10. Florida won that 2016 game 16-10.


When I received Surprised by God: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Religion, I devoured it like a delicious feast. Ruttenberg is best known for her first book, Yentl's Revenge: the Next Wave of Jewish Feminism, Yentl's Revenge: the Next Wave of Jewish Feminism, a volume of essays by young Jewish feminists. Surprised by God is an extraordinary follow-up, written entirely by Ruttenberg, in which she shares the unexpected adventures of her spiritual journey, including the death of her mother, her discovery of meditation, more religious observance, and ultimately to rabbinical school.
Ruttenberg punctuates the story of her own spiritual journey with wise guidance from spiritual leaders from a variety of faith traditions, including Henri Nouwen, Teresa of Avila, and Rabbi Arthur Green as well as several direct references to the usefulness of spiritual direction as a resource on the seeking path. The book's first chapter starts as far back as her bat mitzvah (age 13) and her budding sense of identity as a Jewish young woman, questioning proscribed gender roles and religious beliefs. She writes: "Gender roles, gender identity, choices about who to date, and physical appearance all seemed to be infinitely mutable, playgrounds to explore rather than assumptions to take for granted" (73).
She describes rituals of friendship and self expression during adolescence and young adulthood, which lead her down surprising roads toward a personal and unexpected experience of Mystery. International travel, yoga, and the death of her mother all became doorways to the Divine: "The God of the Torah, I had begun to discover, was the luminous God that I had already met" (87).
Surprised by God describes the spiritual journey of a young woman from a particular generation at this moment in history. Ruttenberg integrates a feminist sensibility with Jewish tradition and ritual, bringing a fresh and authentic voice to old and new questions. Spiritual directors who work with people from diverse faith traditions and age groups will find this book an invaluable resource for themselves and their directees.
Karen Lee Erlichman, MSS, LCSW, is a licensed clinical social worker in private practice in San Francisco, California, USA, where she provides psychotherapy and spiritual direction. Her writing has appeared in Tikkun and online at Interfaith Family. She is the Bay area Director of Jewish Mosaic: the National Center for Sexual and Gender Diversity.


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How Star Wars Turned Hollywood Into a Corporate Empire
42 years ago Star Wars was released. Now, the franchise is more about the toys than the films.
Ian Forsyth / Getty
In 2005, George Lucas was about to release Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith, which is technically the sixth film in the series, and according to 60 Minutes—with whom Lucas sat down for a broad retrospective—"The Last Star Wars." He was ready to move on.
"There is no episode seven," Lucas says confidently. Instead, he pines for failure making tiny art films. "I don't think everything should be these big, blown-out super kind of movie that I stumbled into," Lucas says. "I've sort of followed it to the end."
In fact, it was barely the beginning of the "big, blown-out super kind of movie." It wasn't even the end for the Star Wars franchise—which has continued to make millions 42 years after its debut in theatres.
In 2008, Marvel Studios released Iron Man, kicking off the Marvel cinematic universe. Films, studios had realized, could be connected in a vast web of money-making spinoffs, sequels (and sequels to sequels), TV shows, merchandise, theme parks, novels, comic books, and really anything that can bear a likeness or a logo. A perfectly fine, middling comedy—ahem, Ant-Man and the Wasp—now was a superhero movie too; you've got to see it to follow along! Entertainment morphed into an obsessive hobby, and people spend a lot of money on hobbies.
Marvel's universe-building strategy crystalized what the money was already saying: A movie was valuable because it established a brand. Adapting comic book storytelling to the big screen offered a natural way to cash that check. One that Star Wars foresaw but originally failed to fully seize.
Other movie franchises felt the monetary effects of zealous fandom. The Harry Potter films made $7.7 billion at the box office and an estimated $15 billion from merchandising; Hasbro became a $14 billion behemoth because of Transformers; in 1996, Mattell lost $300 million because of a Buzz Lightyear toy "famine" just before Christmas—more than Toy Story grossed at the box office.
We now live in a world of universes. Of the top ten grossing movies from 2018, only one wasn't an expansion of an already created brand, assuming that The Grinch isn't a building block in an upcoming Dr. Seuss cinematic tower of content. There's also intellectual property like Angry Birds, a game that was transformed into a movie in hopes it would be a universe—only to find the solar systems of some cultural touchstones aren't able to support content life. Even a prestige TV show like Big Little Lies needs to feed the beast.
But first, there was Star Wars.
"The deeper you go, there'll be more things to reward you," said Marvel Studios' Kevin Feige, the mastermind behind this capitalism-forward way of storytelling. "And I learned that directly from Star Wars." Feige says he read Star Wars novels as a kid.
The series inspired ravenous fandom from the beginning. The Washington Post described a neighborhood wrecked in 1977 because it was the only one with a theatre playing Star Wars: "It's … it's an invasion," said one resident, as if Godzilla was stomping around her borough. Toys created by Kenner for the film flew off the shelves. By the end of 1978, the company sold more 40 million action figures, generating more than $100 million in sales. But the true turning point was 1980, the year The Empire Strikes Back was released, when merchandising began to outpace ticket sales. By 2012, the Hollywood Reporter estimated that Lucas had built a $20 billion toy empire; his films made a little above $3 billion in tickets sales. And, decades later, kids are still buying a ton of Star Wars branded materials. "All the money's in the action figures," Lucas famously said.
LMPC / Getty
Lucas often hedges this massive enterprise as all in service of the movies. He told Rolling Stone in the 1970s he was going to use profits to build what became the Skywalker Ranch in Northern California, to get away from the Hollywood muck, an idyllic place to make those experimental art films. We've never seen evidence of such projects; instead, the Skywalker Ranch is a big business production studio, one campus of four owned by Lucasfilms that employs more than 2,000 employees who are famous for their computer-generated imagery. (Michael Bay was inspired to create his films after a summer job there.)
Despite the finality in Lucas' words in 2005, there was an episode seven. After Disney acquired Lucasfilm for $4 billion in 2012, the companies needed to churn out content. Now, J.J. Abrams is finishing up the last film in the new trilogy, to be released in late 2019; there are at least two Star Wars shows set to premiere on Disney's new streaming service; the Game of Thrones creators are going to create yet another trilogy of movies, the first set for a 2022 release; and Rian Johnson is also creating a spinoff trilogy. All of these will be accompanied by comic book and novel tie-ins, of course, and plenty of merchandise. Truly, the cherry on top here is a new theme park, Galaxy's Edge, to open its doors on May 31 and sell $200 lightsabers and $100 droids to the cash-positive fandom. "And if the people at the Walt Disney Company…have anything to say about it," wrote Adam Rogers in Wired when Disney unveiled the full post-merger plans, "the past four decades of Star Wars were merely prologue." Rogers dubbed it "the forever franchise." In many ways, Star Wars was catching up to its own lessons.
In 2015, George Lucas sat down for another sprawling retrospective interview, this time with Charlie Rose. Rose tells him that Steven Spielberg said that Star Wars' release changed everything in the movie business. He asks if he's proud. "Well it changed for the good and the bad," Lucas responds. "The studios realized they could make a lot of money: 'This is a license to kill.' And they did it…That's the downside of Star Wars."
Lucas seems to feel this personally. While A.O. Scott has described the birth of universe filmmaking as akin to a "workplace sitcom"—a never-ending story with our friends—Lucas sounds trapped. "It was a while before I realized that I'm never going to get out," he said to Rose. "I'm always going to be George 'Star Wars' Lucas. No matter how hard I try to be something else."
In some ways, we as viewers are in the same Sisyphean position.
The totality of these spaces stretches far beyond films. If you buy cereal or purchase suit or go to Burger King: there is a Star Wars version of that. They're called universes and not worlds for a reason. Like Luke, we can escape one planet—for Skywalker, to recuperate and train with Yoda; for us, by avoiding Rogue One—but we can never jettison the totality of Star Wars. We're destined to fulfill its cosmic laws, like how all heroes replay the same story—or see the same movie—over and over.
"Yes," Lucas confirmed after a bit of prodding in that 60 Minutes interview, "it ends in hell."
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Home >> News >> News Archive >> In Memoriam: Brother Abhedananda (1926-2016)
In Memoriam: Brother Abhedananda (1926-2016)
Self-Realization Fellowship minister Brother Abhedananda, a devoted SRF monk for more than 60 years, passed away peacefully at the Self-Realization Fellowship Encinitas Ashram Center on April 20, 2016. In his multifaceted service to Paramahansa Yogananda's work over many decades, Brother Abhedananda inspired countless souls in many lands through his wise counsel and ministry, his deep understanding of yoga and meditation, and his complete dedication to God.
Brother Abhedananda was born on June 30, 1926, in Strasbourg, France, and was named Bernard Tesniere. His father was a distinguished university professor of linguistics; his mother was a high school teacher. It was in 1950, while he was a medical student at the University of Montpellier in southern France, that he saw a copy of the Autobiography of a Yogi, which had just been published in French, in a bookstore window. He later recounted that as he looked at Paramahansaji's eyes in the photo on the book, this thought strongly impressed itself in his mind: "He knows what he's talking about. He will lead you to God if this is what you want." Shortly thereafter, Brother wrote a letter to Paramahansa Yogananda, expressing how happy he was about what he had read and how he sincerely wanted to embrace the monastic path as a disciple in the SRF ashram. Paramahansaji replied — on what happened to be Brother's birthday (June 30, 1950) — with a letter that included this passage:
Dear One, your letter deeply touched me. I am happy that my autobiography has stirred greater longing for God in your heart, for only by the pursuit of Him does one find at last the fulfillment for which the soul struggles through incarnations. Your wish to forsake all and dedicate your life to God is indeed commendable....
Paramahansaji also asked Brother to complete his medical studies before entering the ashram, while at the same time making time for daily meditation and studying the teachings. Brother obediently followed the Guru's instructions, graduating as a Doctor of Medicine in 1953; and traveled to the United States to enter the Self-Realization Fellowship monastic order in 1954 — two years after the Guru's mahasamadhi.
Paramahansaji's far-seeing guidance proved to be of great value, since over his years in the ashram Brother Abhedananda's expertise not only with medicine, anatomy, and physiology but also with languages enabled him to render great service to the SRF work. He wrote articles on yoga for Self-Realization magazine, and aided SRF's editors (Tara Mata, Mrinalini Mata, and Sahaja Mata) by providing scientific background on many facets of Paramahansaji's teachings. His classical education before entering the ashram had taught him Greek, Latin, English, and German in addition to his native French; and in subsequent years he also developed a working knowledge of Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, and Sanskrit. In addition to playing a key role in the French translation of SRF publications for decades, he traveled extensively to serve SRF centers and groups in Europe and Latin America, where his linguistic talents as well as his deep knowledge of the SRF teachings made him a wonderful and much-loved representative.
He received his final vows of renunciation (sannyas) from Sri Daya Mata in 1970, at which time he took the monastic name "Abhedananda" ("bliss through identity with the Absolute") in the Giri branch of the ancient Swami Order. Over the years, he fulfilled various responsibilities in the Self-Realization work — serving initially at the Mother Center and later in Encinitas, where he assisted Brother Premamoy in the spiritual training of young postulant monks and served as a minister at the San Diego SRF Temple.
Until the end of his life, Brother exuded the sweetness and spirituality born of lifelong dedication to God and Guru, and he never lost that twinkle in his eyes which was his special trademark. SRF/YSS president Sri Mrinalini Mata paid tribute to this loyal and dedicated monk in these words to the SRF monastic community:
The sincere desire to do Gurudeva's will, with which Brother Abhedananda began his relationship with Master, characterized his life and service throughout the years, and allowed God and Guru to use his skills in many ways. Though he never met Master in the physical form in this life, he surely received an even greater blessing for unhesitatingly obeying his guru's request [to finish his medical studies]. With what joy Guruji has now welcomed him in the realm of light beyond this world, as a beloved disciple whose unwavering loyalty and dedication have withstood the test of time….
Those who live purely for God and Guru, as he did, touch the lives of others and leave behind spiritual footprints for them to follow. I join you in sending to Brother Abhedananda's soul our eternal love and gratitude, and pray that his example encourage you on the path to God that we are walking together, which will lead us ultimately to a joyful reunion in Him.


Last evening our church had the privilege of shining the the light of Christ on our street corner during the annual "trick or treat" night here in the city. It was a wonderful blessing to sing songs about Jesus Christ as many people paraded by. The children and several of the adults had the fun of handing out packets with a gospel cd, tracts, toy etc to the other children coming down the street.
You hear this phrase around alot "The Stakes are High" especially right now during the elections. What do you think about when you hear that phrase? I think about risk, I think about the adrenaline that must flow through your blood when "the stakes are high". I think about what happens to me when I am preparing for something when " the stakes are high".


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Paternity Fraud, a Blow to the Stomach
Increasingly entering common parlance is the term "paternity fraud" which is the naming of a man as being the biological father of a child by that child's mother, when in fact, she knows he is not the father.
Paternity fraud is a subset of "mis-attributed paternity", where a child has been fathered by one man, but is actually the child of another and that mis-attribution is deliberate rather than accidental.
In other cases the male may have agreed to bring up the child of another (e.g. from a previous relationship or adoption), but in others, the male mating tactic of cuckoldry has occurred and the male is unaware that the child he is bringing up is not his.
While this metaphor can be taken a little too far (since the child is genetically linked to the mother and does not generally expunge the half siblings from the house), it is a common term in evolutionary biology, where it is applied to unwitting males who make a significant parental investment in off-spring which are not genetically related to them.
The motivation for paternity fraud includes; a) false claims from either parent with the objective or avoiding or receiving child maintenance payments, b) mothers who wish to hold their family together rather than discourage parental investment from the incumbent male or expose her infidelities or c) males who wish to avoid responsibilities, whether these be financial or familial or indeed, cover up their own indiscretions from their spouse or partner.
As to the frequency of paternity fraud, then there are no clear figures and one should be aware of often misquoted data from mispaternity studies where subjects had a reason to take the DNA test. These data are valid in their own right but are not applicable to paternity fraud.
The emotive headlines we often see in the popular press, which potentiate the urban myth of increasing paternity fraud in UK society, does us all little service and there is no verifiable evidence that paternity fraud is on the increase.
However, it does occur. DNA profiling provides evidence of biological relationships and as responsible test providers, we are acutely aware that with the prospect of incontrovertible evidence, people who are contemplating or indeed, driven to, paternity fraud may attempt to obfuscate the procedure. Accordingly, procedures are in place to minimise this possibility.
In fact, paternity fraud is not a new concept, it has been with us for generations and our literature and law is littered with reference to it. It is also mentioned several times by Shakespeare in his various works, where the husband of an adulterous wife, the "cuckold", is often seething with underlying suspicion.
For example, when Iago addresses Othello (III.iii.165); "That cuckold lives in bliss, who certain of his fate loves not his wronger, but O, what damned minutes he tells o'er, who dotes yet doubts, suspects yet fondly loves (1). To which Othello replies.."Oh, misery!". It is the "Oh misery" that is instructive, the discovery of a paternity fraud has been described as "a blow to the stomach".
The origin of paternity fraud dates from the 1576 Poor Act, when the law required mothers with illegitimate children to name the father in order to ensure that he supported her financially, thus placing a lesser burden on the Parish Poor Law Overseers.
They ensured weekly payments from the named "father" by issuance of "bastardy bonds" and which thus created the first opportunity for paternity fraud, as blackmail and perjury then became rife. The law was repealed in the "New Poor Law" of 1834 in order to save poor men from unsuitable marriages and then, a woman with an illegitimate child was sent to the workhouse without financial compensation.
These days paternity fraud may be pursued using the tort of deceit (on the balance of probabilities that the intention was fraudulent) and is not a criminal matter unless a false statement is knowingly made on a public document, such as on a birth certificate or perhaps in information provided to the CMA.
There have been a handful of cases which have reached the courts and where damages have been awarded to the male for "indignity, mental suffering/distress, humiliation" or "emotional hurt", though there are also cases where this approach has been unsuccessful (2). It has not yet been possible however, for the male to retrieve maintenance payments, as the court takes the view that bringing up a child confers benefits as well as costs.
Paternity fraud has thus been with us for generations and is of course hard to completely eliminate, but the use of an accredited DNA testing procedure makes it difficult for this to remain undetected and also provides unequivocal evidence to support cases involving the tort of deceit.
In the UK the use of the rather explosive paternity fraud accusation is relatively modest; this is largely due to the judicious use of accredited paternity testing.
Dr Neil Sullivan Complement Genomics Ltd, trading as dadcheck®.
www.dadcheckgold.com
1The modern text… The man who knowns his wife is cheating on him is happy, because at least he isn't friends with the man she's sleeping with. But think of the unhappiness of a man who worships his wife, yet doubts her faithfulness. He suspects her, but still loves her. http://nfs.sparknotes.com/othello/page_142. html, accessed 10th May 2017.
2P v B (Paternity: Damages for Deceit) [2001] 1 FLR 1041; A v B (Damages: Paternity) [2007] 2 FLR 1051; Webb v Chapman [2009] EXCA Civ 55.
More News & Articles
From Eternity to Paternity
An Introduction to the Use of DNA tests in Legal Practice – The Test of a Relationship


Microsoft is readying a long slew of announcements for tomorrow about new features it will cram into its Xbox, according to people briefed on the company's plans. Of interest to many of you: The ability to use the game system as a cable box/streaming video service.
But let's be clear about what this is: An extension of the "TV Everywhere"/"authentication" concept that lets cable subscribers watch programming via alternate delivery systems.
And let's be clear about what this isn't: A tool for cable cord cutters or cord shavers.
Bloomberg laid most of this out last month in a story previewing tomorrow's announcement. Steve Ballmer has been "promoting the Xbox 360 console as a way to switch easily between games, DVDs and pay TV" — not as a way to ditch cable. Which is why cable providers and programmers like Comcast and Verizon are working with him.
Another way to think about it: Look at the iPad and iPhone apps we've already seen from the likes of Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Cablevision and ESPN. They let subscribers watch some (though usually not all) of what they can get from their various cable packages on a different device. The Xbox deals should work the same way.
There's always a miniscule chance that one of Microsoft's partners will stray way outside the reservation and actually offer cable-like programming without requiring a cable subscription. One day, for instance, I could see Time Warner finally giving its HBO unit the go-ahead to start selling a la carte subscriptions to the pay service, at the same rates that it's charging the cable guys.
The cable guys wouldn't like it, but they didn't like when HBO, et al, did the same with the satellite guys in the '90s. There's not much they can do about it.
But given that Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes is the chief proponent of the cable-protecting "TV Everywhere" plan, I don't see it happening anytime soon.
More tomorrow, once Microsoft makes it all official.


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A: You need to use DefaultIfEmpty
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Alternate way
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


The William Morris Gallery re-opened yesterday and Neri took me there today as a treat. I have mixed feelings about it to be honest. The house itself is beautiful, with a wonderfully generous landing at the top of the central staircase. I would love to design a house with an open room of this scale which a staircase leads in to.
The works on display are interesting, including the "Walthamstow Tapestry", a work by man of the moment Grayson Perry. He seems to be everyone's favourite artist right now, and is everywhere, but I think he is wonderful - the makings of a national treasure. His show at the BM was truly inspirational (thanks Bea). I remember him coming to lecture at the Ruskin and give one-to-one tutorials afterwards in drag. He turned all the lecture theatre seats round by 90 degrees so we faced a wall we had never looked at before.
Anyway, back to Morris, whose lovely childhood home has been turned in to a play centre for groups of school children, with each room filled with giant jigsaws and interactive multi-media. I am all for getting children in to art, and going to galleries, but there is a limit.
There is an extension that houses what I think is a non permanent collection / show (where Grayson's brilliant tapestry is currently) and a café. Very good Earl Grey, but swamped with Walthamstow yummy mummys drinking frappucinos like there's no tomorrow, relieved to have found a middle-class hang out after such a dirth.
All the furniture is revolting - and I do not know how it has been allowed, when the curating (of the works that are not playground games) is so in-keeping and tastful.
I photographed a collection of his rush seats which includes a 3-seater I had not seen before. I also bought a postcard with a picture of Morris' daughter May on it. I think she is very beautiful in a strange English Rose way, and she looks so like Burne-Jones' model too?
Also, the front driveway of the house always had a kind of circular lawn in the middle. They have adapted the steps at the front and installed ramps for disabled access using the correct stone and that all looks fine - but the circular section has a curb made from a kind of granite composite and it looks dreadful.


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Pay rates at the Carry On films
It's long been a standard complaint that the Carry On films just paid horrendously low amounts of money to the acting talent.
Hmm, well:
The average male manual worker earns £13 2s 11d (about £13.15) a week.
Note that's in a time of strong unionisation. And the Carry On rates?
I got very little money, perhaps £50 a week. I thought, 'I don't think Michael Elliott would approve if I went on making this trash.' " So she asked for an extra £50 a week. Not only was her request denied, she was sacked on the spot.
Four times that average wage is terrible pay, is it?
I also dimly recall a Kenneth Williams lament about that low pay. He was getting £7,000 for a film I think. That's 10x that average annual wage for the couple of months it took to film a Carry On.
Sure, Carry On might have been dismal pay given the rate for the job – film acting – but compared to the society around it not too bad.
And, well, you know, we've all sorts of people lamenting high pay these days, recalling as they do that things were much better when the CEO to worker multiple was only 20:1. We've even the OberstSpudder at one time insisting that higher multiples than that should not be tax allowable.
So why is it that Carry On is derided as being low paying, rather than wondrously equitable? Or is it just that luvvies are different?
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19 thoughts on "Pay rates at the Carry On films"
jgh December 24, 2020 at 10:04 am
I have Immense Talent, why isn't is being Paid For commensurately, why must I Slum It here in IT.
Ted S, Catskill Mtns, NY, USA December 24, 2020 at 10:12 am
I'd have thought the luvvies would be trying to memory hole the Carry On series.
Something the proles like too much, isn't it?
Maybe the tax rates of the time should be taken into account? What would Williams have paid in tax on his £7k? Ten times average annual salary today would be what, somewhere around £250k? Tax on that would be 96k, or just under 40%. What tax rates applied in the 60s? Famously quite high ones I recall, as the Beatles discovered. So if the tax man was taking the lions share they might well have felt underpaid.
Bloke in Germany December 24, 2020 at 10:35 am
Er, how many weeks a year of work was involved in making a carry on film? Three? Six?
And the proper comparison is to what they could get elsewhere, innit? That's one of your regular lessons. Compensation is determined by what else you can do, not what other people doing your job can get. If Mr Aguero went to play for Macclesfield Town, he'd be foregoing what he can earn at City, not jubilant at earning several times the local unskilled wage.
Flatcap Army December 24, 2020 at 10:41 am
I have long held that acting suffers leptokurtosis of earnings – compared to other professions you have a disproportionate of participants earning tiny amounts and a smaller but still disporportionately large number of people earning big salaries; actors who earn a steady middle class kind of income are much rarer than in other jobs.
That said, although I think the Carry On stars were paid well above average, Gerald Thomas was famous for keeping most of the money himself.
allthegoodnamesaretaken December 24, 2020 at 10:56 am
Luvvies whinging?
Hoodavfortit?
Bloke on M4 December 24, 2020 at 11:07 am
Always that "well, if you can do better, why don't you fuck off there?"
Some of the Carry On actors probably grasped this, and if you were one of the big half dozen actors, you could keep getting work. Sid James, Kenneth Williams, Charles Hawtrey, Bernard Bresslaw and Jim Dale played the same archetype character in every film. Not much different to Desmond Llewelyn getting a call to play Q. He wasn't in competition with anyone else for the part. It was his for the taking.
Henry Crun December 24, 2020 at 11:12 am
BiG, in its current state Mr Aguero could probably buy Macclesfield Town with just 1 week's wages. If he were to ply his trade elsewhere if far rather he sign for Altrincham.
Ottokring December 24, 2020 at 11:20 am
BonM4, same goes for Lois Maxwell, she was earning £5,000 for a James Bond film, but that was right at the end of her reign.
Sid James, Joan Sims and Bernard Bresslaw had a lot of TV work, Williams was never off the wireless. Jim Dale went to the US in the 1970s and hit it really big on Broadway. Charles Hawtrey had been a major youth star and was a regular foil for Will Hay, he spent his spare time setting fire to his flat so that he could be rescued by butch firemen.
PaulF December 24, 2020 at 11:43 am
To be pendantic, Macclesfield Town no longer exist. Financial issues re. unpaid tax, points deductions re. unpaid wages, relegation from League Two to the National League, winding-up by the High Court, then finally expulsion from the National League and then oblivion. A sad story: as BiG says, any premier league star could probably have saved them with a week or so of his wages. A great shame for the fans, less so for the owners who caused the mess.
Apparently Macclesfield F.C. have been launched in their stead, and aim to play in the North West Counties Football League in season 2021/22. That's basically at a Division Nine level.
Baron Jackfield December 24, 2020 at 12:39 pm
ISTR Kenneth Williams saying that later on in the "Carry On" series he could make as much money from a voice-over for a TV commercial than he did from a complete "Carry On" film…
djc December 24, 2020 at 12:41 pm
Might need to consider the irregular and uncertain employment. Do you also have a day job, something to fall back on? Do you live within the means afforded by the day job and consider the filming a bonus? How much time do you have to devote to looking for work and auditioning compared to paid work obtained. Lifetime average— with heavy tax bills in the good years?
RichardT December 24, 2020 at 12:47 pm
Baron Jackfield said:
Aye, but how much of the advertising work would he have got without the massive recognition he had from Carry On?
Dr Evil December 24, 2020 at 1:54 pm
My father bought a very nice house with a massive front and back garden looking out onto fields for £3,500 in 1960. So Williams got the equivalent of two nice houses per film.
Andy ex-Taiwan December 24, 2020 at 1:58 pm
Given how the Carry On films were produced from 1958 to 1978 it would be interesting to see how pay rates changed over that timespan, esp. given the inflation of that era.
Also, I remember seeing somewhere once an explanation linking pay with why actors tend to be lefties- the ones that hit the big time remember their contemporaries that didn't, so this makes them feel redistribution of wealth is fine as they were just lucky, and not particularly more worthwhile of success.
Bloke in Wales December 24, 2020 at 2:01 pm
the ones that hit the big time remember their contemporaries that didn't, so this makes them feel redistribution of wealth is fine as they were just lucky, and not particularly more worthwhile of success.
Insisting that everyone else should have their wealth redistributed, rather than dipping into their own pockets and giving away that which they feel they didn't earn, just makes them cunts.
Bloke in Germany December 24, 2020 at 2:12 pm
They all illustrate the old joke about how you make a small fortune. Start with a large fortune and buy a football club. Which is why sane premier league stars don't do it (that and there are probably a lot of arcane conflict of interest rules).
The only ones I really miss are Bury and Stockport County (the latter still financially in existence but not really in a footballing sense).
Ltw December 25, 2020 at 11:07 am
Given how bad the Carry On films are they were probably overpaid. I like cheesy crap, but there's a limit!
Reg December 28, 2020 at 6:25 am
Surely the only relevant points are how much was a film actor getting paid in other films that were topping the box office in the UK at the time? Plus you have to factor in the "star attraction" value – people would go to see a film because x was in it. Union scale doesn't come into it (well, only as a legal minimum) so it is really down to your agent to get as much as they can for you.
Obviously there is also the convention of top billing and "further down the bill", which in films equates to Starring, Also Starring, With, Featuring, Special Guest Star etc. Bottom line is that your agent is there to negotiate the highest amount of money for you based on all of the above factors.
What other people in completely different industries earn is ridiculously irrelevant!
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Xiaomi Max became the biggest smartphone ever released Xiaomi. For comparison, the Xiaomi Mi Note Pro only has a 5.7 inch screen with Quad HD resolution. Interestingly, this smartphone screen will be protected layer of Corning Gorilla Glass 4 is likely to protect the front side and back side. Design of this smartphone is not much different from Xiaomi MI5, only in larger screen sizes. namely wear IPS display measuring 6.4 inches and has a Quad HD resolution of 1440 x 2560 pixels. The screen is capable of displaying images are very clear, because wearing a Quad HD resolution screen has a screen density of 459 pixels per inch reach.
A home button on the front of Xiaomi Max will be integrated in the sensor fingerprint scanner (Fingerprint Sensor). Then for business kitchen runway, this smartphone will reportedly rely on Qualcomm MSM8996 Snapdragon chipset and processor 820 Quad Core 64-Bit-speed (Dual-core Kryo 2:15 GHz and 1.6 GHz dual-core Kryo). Then there were the Adreno 530 graphics processing type that optimize the capabilities of this smartphone when executing high-definition games and high-resolution video content.
Hardware specs this smartphone is not much different from Xiaomi MI5, and likely there will be a capacity of 3GB or 4GB Ram therein. As for the internal memory capacity, reportedly will have a capacity of 32GB or 64GB of memory in the absence of external memory slot. Unfortunately not yet known how this smartphone battery capacity. But certainly, Xiaomi Max battery power required is huge, because it has a 6.4 inch display with Quad HD resolution that would automatically require the supply of battery power is very large.
Reporting from gsmarena.com, reportedly Xiaomi Max will have a 16 Megapixel primary camera which may include the same features as the camera's Xiaomi MI5. Where there will be a feature Optical Image stabilizer (OIS), Dual Tone LED Flash and Phase Detection Autofocus. This smartphone will have the ability to record 4K video resolution. As for the future, is likely to be embedded 4 Megapixel camera lenses like those of Xiaomi MI5.
Connectivity The smartphone is definitely very complete, and supports 4G LTE network with Dual Sim therein. In addition, at the bottom is also available USB port Type-C will speed up charging and transmission of files from the computer. Then there are also features NFC, Infared, and Wi-Fi 802.11 a / b / g / n / ac dual-band technology.


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35 year old Educational Psychologist Leo Sia from Cumberland, has interests which includes singing in choir, acting school and music-drums. Intends to retire and take the family to most of the great heritage listed destinations on the globe like Teide National Park.
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Last weekend my family and I paid two visits to the Olympic Park, to watch the Paralympic Games. On Saturday morning we spent a few hours at the Velodrome, watching the cycling, and on Sunday evening we were at the Olympic Stadium itself to see the athletics. Both were brilliant.
The Velodrome is a wonderful building, inside and outside. Affectionately nicknamed the "Pringle" its wooden curves make for the most distinctive architecture in the Park. Inside it is impressive too, though strangely it seemed a bit smaller than I'd imagined from viewing it on the TV.
This is a shot I took back in May when we visited the park for London Prepares.
It's a venue fit for heroics and the cyclists certainly obliged on Saturday morning. There was some extraordinary racing. Now, you start at first observing what any particular athlete's disability is and marvelling at how they can perform at such a high level; but very quickly that is all forgotten and it's just raw excitement at the brilliant competition. Readers of this blog will know from earlier Sportthoughts entries that I love the cycling, both on the road and in the velodrome, and the racing on Saturday was a real privilege to watch.
Lots going on in the technical areas.
The first race was the men's 1km time trial tandem race for visually impaired riders. It's a two man race (obviously, being a tandem!) with a guide at the front and the main cyclist at the back. Quite how it's designed so that the rider at the back determines the speed, I'm not sure, except that the cogs at the back wheel are much bigger than those that the front rider are pedalling through. There were two British partnerships in the race: Neil Fachie and Barney Storey and Anthony Kappes and Craig Maclean. They were the last two pairs to race, so were favourites. Faschie and Storey were amazing and the roar that drove them on was immense. You get this wave of sound as each part of the crowd urges them on as they pass that section by. So in the crowd it's like a sonic Mexican wave. But for the riders it will be constant as they move around the track. It has to be inspirational.
Faschie and Storey set the best time and waited for Kappes and Maclean They began… and stopped. The chain had slipped. After a tense interlude, it was deemed a technical fault rather than the riders' fault, so they had another chance. Ready, steady… same happened. Two false starts and out. Gutting. But Fachie and Storey Gold.
We then had two sets of heats for individual pursuit at 4km. 16 laps of the tracks. Different disabilities, C4 and C5. In the first set, C4, Jody Cundy, who the day before had dominated the media with his outburst after being disqualified in another race, raced to the third best time, which put him in the bronze medal race later in the day. Hugely popular. His parents and other supporters were sitting just in front of us. So proud.
Sod's law – camera battery ran out, but I've googled some images from the final later. It then dawned on me that I had the iPhone, from whence the next few shots come.
In the second set, the C5, Jon Allan Butterworth was GB's hope. He lost an arm in the Iraq war. He was up against Irishman Cathal Miller. Plenty of Irish fans in the crowd. They set off. Slowly but surely (or is that quickly?) Butterworth caught up with Miller, who was one of the best himself. Eventually, Butterworth overtook his rival, and right in front of us. Amazing moment and frightening when you see how close the bikes were to each other. Butterworth went on to break the world record time, to a huge roar.
But in the last pursuit, the Aussie, Michael Gallagher, did even better and broke the world record again. Brilliant, and given a reception equal to any of the GB boys. That's what the Olympics and Paralympics have been about. Partisan yes, but also appreciative of excellence from all participants.
In the finals, Cundy got the bronze and Butterworth the silver. Cundy caught his rival after six laps and that was it, being a final. Butterworth went off fast, led for a good part of the race, but was then overtaken and well beaten by Gallagher. Credit to both.
And those bikes – I'd love one!
Jody Cundy winning that bronze.
So, on to Sunday and the athletics. The stadium packed to the rafters, 80,000 people. Must be amazing for the athletes. I imagine the crowds they usually perform in front of are quite small. And then 80,000! Inspiring yes, but also pretty frightening!
What we saw was a succession of astounding races. (And, this night, long jump, javelin and discus). Again you marvel at what people are capable of, given their disabilities, and then simply succumb to the excitement of the finishes. Just a few highlights here, biased as ever to GB.
The visually impaired athletes run with a guide. So they've got to be pretty good themselves! But what a wonderful partnership. What trust and understanding it must involve. An inspiring example of teamwork. Here's the first example we saw, with the winner the Brazilian Terezinha Guilhermina, in the women's T11 200m.
Graeme Ballard lined up for the men's T36 100m. He got silver, pipped by Evgenii Shvetcov of Russia.
GB's Libby Clegg won silver in the women's T12 100m for visually impaired racers. A really popular result. First photo here is before the race, second after.
In the men's T64 100m, which was a wheelchair race, the Finn Leo Pekka Tahti won, I think, for the fourth Paralympics in a row. Respect.
Lots of great races, but the first of the Big Two was the great man, Oscar Pistorius of South Africa, in the T44 200m. Tremendous excitement in the stadium. Pistorius is the first worldwide hero of Paralympics, and the man who crossed over and competed superbly in the Olympics 400m. This would be his crowning glory.
A couple of shots. The side-on one, if nothing else, shows how fast they were going.
But shock. After leading so clearly, Pistorius was overtaken on the line by Alan Fouteles Cardoso Oliveira of Brazil (the guy in green, lying third in this shot). In the stadium we applauded the winner, and remained unaware that soon after Pistorius cast doubt on Oliveira's blades. Great story for the media. Overshadowed everything else. On the one hand a shame. On the other, the controversy normalises the Paralympics. Gives it greater prominence in the headlines. Pity, but that is how the media operates. Jody Cundy's outburst and Pistorius' allegations were the headline moments. The Paralympics go mainstream.
But then, the best moment of all. GB's David Weir in the men's T54 5000m. One of four races he is going for, from 800m to the Marathon. Yes, the Marathon! Talk about a combination of speed and endurance. And what a race! The wheel chairs are extraordinary, especially when they start moving at the speeds the athletes propel them. You almost think you are watching a form of cycling or something like go-karting. Having 5000m allows the race to ebb and flow, allows the tension, the anticipation, to build. And it did. The lead changed hands countless times. Early on I guess it was everyone doing their bit to keep the pace up. Later, it got very tactical. Weir lurked two or there back and then, on the final straight, pounced. And won! The crowd went crazy. It was the Mo Farrar moment for the British Paralympics. Fantastic.
We all went home happy after that!
The positive feeling around the Paralympics is amazing. And Channel 4's coverage has been excellent too. I'm no expert on Paralympic sport, but this must be a watershed for all the sports. The moment when people realised, hey, this is just great sport, and the fact that the participants have disabilities just makes it even more admirable. Rather than being an afterthought, a speciality.
Since the weekend, the events have carried on thrilling, and David Weir has had another win, in the 1500m. More uproar in the stadium. And tomorrow we have one of the most anticipated showdowns. GB's Jonny Peacock against Oscar Pistorius in the 100m.
This entry was posted in Photos, Sportsthoughts and tagged David Weir, Graeme Ballard, Jody Cundy, Jon Allan Butterworth, Libby Clegg, London, London Olympics, London Olympics velodrome, Neil Fachie, Oscar Pistorius, Paralympics, Photography, photos. Bookmark the permalink.


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photo by: MF Sacca
Stopping the Deceptive "Utopia" That Threatened 4 Historic Vermont Towns
More: 11 Most Endangered Historic Places
By: Carson Bear
In late March 2016, a librarian at the Sharon Vermont Library noticed a foundation called NewVistas had been quietly buying up land in four small towns, including her own, for the past year. When the NewVistas Foundation website outlined their plans for a "sustainable," high-density city, residents of Royalton, Sharon, Strafford, and Tunbridge realized that Vermont's characteristic wilderness dotted with small towns was under threat.
NewVistas is owned by Mormon entrepreneur David Hall, who envisioned a utopic, futuristic city that would house 20,000 people over 1,300 acres of land. This particular city—one of between 50 and 100 cities Hall had been planning to build across Vermont—would be walkable and completely self-sustained. Residents would live in micro-apartments, with robots and other currently nonexistent technological advances to help maintain their compact living spaces.
Hall's idea for the towns came from documents Joseph Smith (the founder of Mormonism) allegedly created in the 1830s, according to a 2018 CityLab story. The documents refer to an Old Testament passage that cites an architect called Enoch, "who designed a city so perfect that it was immediately ushered into heaven."
Here, Royalton demonstrates the interplay between the built environment and the natural world typical of all four Vermont towns.
Many residents rely on agriculture as their primary source of income.
Vermonters also spend their free time exploring the state's abundant green spaces.
Though Hall's plans were decades from being implemented, the threat from the parcels he had purchased were enough to worry Vermonters. "The idea of plunking a community of 20,000 people into the center of these four communities [with] a combined population of less than 10,000 was what really unnerved people," says Paul Bruhn, president of Preservation Trust of Vermont.
The plan's disruption to the rural Vermont way of life, consistent across all four towns, immediately turned locals off. The state is made up of quaint village centers surrounded by countryside and working forests that residents have interacted with for centuries.
The four towns mostly consist of a few central buildings, like a post office, school, cafe, library, and general store (Bruhn considers general stores particularly integral to Vermont's historic identity). Community members gather in these public spaces for dances, town meetings, festivals, and other social events. Meanwhile, locals regularly interact with the wilderness surrounding their towns—growing their own food and keeping animals, working in agriculture and forestry, or spending a day off hiking, hunting, fishing, or otherwise enjoying the natural world around them.
When developers first threatened the towns' historic integrity in the 1960s, preservationists established Act 250, the state's Land Use and Development Act. Similar to the Section 106 review process of the National Historic Preservation Act, Act 250 mandates the review of any project's potential impact on Vermont's historic and cultural resources. The NewVistas project would certainly have impacted Vermont's historic character in a way that locals wouldn't stand for.
In August 2016, Tunbridge resident Michael Sacca formed the Alliance for Vermont Communities in opposition to the NewVistas development. The alliance teamed up with other organizations, including Preservation Trust of Vermont, to raise awareness of the threat through social media, public events, and even a 2017 town hall meeting where 93 percent of voters opposed Hall's plan.
Preservation Magazine: How Artisanal Cheese Is Helping Save Vermont's Historic Landscape
For more than two decades, Vermont seems to have been in danger of falling from an idyllic Eden. Some of its dairy farms are working to preserve the state's heritage.
The alliance also raised $300,000 from the local community and used a bridge loan from Vermont Land Trust to buy a parcel in the center of the area Hall owned and gift it back to the towns as a working community forest.
Despite these strong local efforts, the organizations involved needed to shine a national spotlight on Hall's development plans. The Alliance for Vermont Communities and Preservation Trust of Vermont brought the four towns to the attention of the National Trust in 2018. While the threat from Hall wasn't immediate enough to formally add the towns to America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places List, Royalton, Sharon, Strafford, and Tunbridge were added as "watch status" sites, or places worthy of a closer eye, on June 26, 2018.
Then, something completely unexpected happened. To the shock of Vermonters and opposition groups, the developer withdrew plans for his utopian city that same night. What's more, Hall specifically cited the 11 Most listing as the reason he gave up. On June 27, Hall said in an interview with Vermont Public Radio, "That was kind of like a last straw for me … I don't want to be on a national watch. Those who are opposing my dream did a really good job, so I tip my hat to them. I'm tired of the drama."
While the outcome for the four towns appears bright, there is still reason to be concerned, according to Sacca. Though he initially agreed to sell the 30 parcels of land and had listed them online last June, Hall has since removed the listings from his website.
Sacca hoped Hall would donate a portion of his land to conservation groups like the Upper Valley Land Trust, but there has been no movement around these efforts, either. As to whether Hall will decide to quietly resume his plans for development, Sacca is unsure. "We're not convinced," he says. "We don't know what will happen to the land."
If Hall does move forward with NewVistas, one thing is certain: Local and national organizations will continue to protect the historic integrity of Royalton, Tunbridge, Sharon, and Strafford.
Carson Bear was an Editorial Coordinator at the National Trust. She's passionate about combining popular culture with historic places, and loves her 200-year-old childhood farmhouse in Pennsylvania.
11 Most Endangered Historic Places Rassawek and the Monacan Indian Nation's Fight to Protect its Historic Capital
Now accepting applications for the 2021 list of America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places! Do you know of an important site that could benefit from the national spotlight? Submit the application today!


Are you a group of tourists who would want to go on gorilla safari holidays and adventure Uganda very bad? Travelling in a small group is fun since you have a lot of people to share the fun with. Rwanda or Uganda group safaris are fun. The only downside of group trips is complications in the planning process especially if they have activities like mountain gorilla trekking and Chimpanzee trekking. Some of you might prefer certain activities to others and some might want to sleep alone where as others are comfortable with sharing twin rooms. Availability of certain facilities might be a hassle as well.
Good news is we have all the safari experience you need in organizing large and small group safaris in Uganda, Rwanda or Congo. Whether you are budget or luxury tour clients, we are a tours and travel operator that still gets you the best bargain on safari lodges and other facilities. We have a fleet of air conditioned safari vehicles that can accommodate up to 10 persons each. If you are more in numbers, we can organize multiple vehicles to accommodate you with all your luggage. All these vehicles are installed with WiFi and so do they have ice boxes to keep your drinks cool. Let the experts handle your small group safari, get in touch with us now.
Uganda is an all year round destination and can be visited any time. This is because the sun comes out often on rainy days and dries up the soil. The best Uganda safaris experiences are got in the months of June to September and December to February just like Rwanda tours experiences. So if you are planning to visit as a group, endeavor to schedule your safari for such months.
Why go on group safari holidays?
When you travel in a small safari group or big numbers, your safari becomes much more cheaper at individual levels. You get to share costs like accommodation, vehicle, fuel and more. This way, you will spend absolute less for comfortable services. This is one of the best ways of cutting down costs on a safari.
How fun are gorilla safari holidays?
Taking an adventurous hike into the forests as you search for mountain gorillas in an experience worth experiencing. These gorillas are critically endangered and less than 800 live apparently. They are only found in Uganda Rwanda and Congo; Specifically in Bwindi Impenetrable National Park, Mgahinga Gorilla National Park, Volcanoes National Park and Virunga National Park respectively. They share over 98% human DNA and act much like the same as we humans. They have feelings, they get envied, some are humble and some are brave, a few are protective where as some get their power by stealing females from other groups and turning them into wives. When you book your gorilla holidays with us, we shall craft for you the best small group tour package to see these wonderful creatures in their natural habitats.


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REPORTJennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt May Reunite on TV — and We Haven't Stopped Hyperventilating
Updated: Aug 9, 2017 11:20 am·
By Allison Cacich
Everyone stop what they're doing. A new rumor about early '00s "It" couple Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston has made its way around the Internet, and fans are having trouble processing the news. E! alleges that someone's been spreading gossip about a possible Jimmy Kimmel sit-down between the exes — and literally nothing would make us miss a televised interview like this!
But according to the outlet, the report is 100% false. While we do find it hard to believe that the former couple, who was married from 2000 to 2005, would agree to a candid discussion about their failed relationship, Life & Style previously revealed that Brad apologized to Jen for the pain he caused her during their highly-publicized divorce.
MORE: Chelsea Handler Admits She and Jennifer Aniston Had a Falling Out
"Brad apologized for all the heartbreak," an insider shared. "He doesn't usually open up like that, but through therapy and recovery, he's learned to express his feelings. He addressed all the hurt he caused her." And the Friends star accepted his olive branch. "She was incredibly receptive to the amends he was making. She told him she forgives him and to focus on the future. She actually vowed to start over with him as a genuine friend," the insider added.
Rumors about a possible reunion between the duo comes just days after Angelina Jolie spoke out about her divorce from the actor. "Things got bad. I don't want to use that word… Things became 'difficult,'" she told Vanity Fair. "[Our lifestyle] was not in any way a negative. That was not the problem."
MORE: Shiloh and Vivienne Jolie-Pitt Step out Shoe-Less at Target, But Look Happy Following Parents' Divorce
Angie also revealed how the pair's six children are handling the split. "They're six very strong-minded, thoughtful, worldly individuals. I'm very proud of them. [Our children have been] very brave… in times they needed to be," she said. "We're all just healing from the events that led to the filing… They're not healing from the divorce. They're healing from some… from life, from things in life."
Scroll through the gallery below for a look back at photos from Brad and Jennifer's marriage!


Perminder Sachdev does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
When people think of lithium, it's usually to do with batteries, but lithium also has a long history in medicine. Lithium carbonate, or lithium salt, is mainly used to treat and prevent bipolar disorder. This is a condition in which a person experiences significant mood swings from highs that can tip into mania to lows that can plunge into depression.
More recently, though, lithium has been explored as a potential preventive therapy for dementia. A recent paper even led some to question whether we should start putting lithium in drinking water to lower population dementia rates.
But despite early studies linking lithium to better cognitive function, there is currently not enough evidence to start using it as a preventive dementia strategy.
Lithium is a soft, light-silver metal present in many water systems, which means humans have always been exposed to it. Its concentrations in water range from undetectable to very high, especially in geothermal waters and oil-gas field brines. The high concentration of lithium in some natural springs led to it being related to healing.
In the 19th century, lithium water was used to treat gout and rheumatism. Of course this was with little objective evidence of any benefit. Early attempts to treat diseases such as kidney stones with higher doses of lithium often led to lithium toxicity – potentially irreversible damage to the kidneys and brain.
The landmark event in the medical history of lithium was a 1949 paper by Australian psychiatrist John Cade in the Medical Journal of Australia. This demonstrated its benefit in bipolar disorder, then known as manic-depressive illness. The psychiatric community took some time to absorb this finding – the US regulator the Food and Drug Administration only approved lithium for use in 1970.
After that, lithium as a drug transformed psychiatric practice, especially in the treatment and prevention of bipolar disorder. This led to extensive research into the mechanisms of lithium in the brain.
We don't know exactly how lithium works, but we know it helps the way brain cell connections remodel themselves, usually referred to as synaptic plasticity. It also protects brain neurons by controlling cellular pathways, such as those involved in oxidative stress (where the brain struggles to control toxins) and inflammation.
Animal studies have shown that long-term treatment with lithium leads to improvement in memory and learning. These observations led to studies of lithium's protective effects on brain neurons in bipolar patients who had been taking it for a long time.
One of these was a review of more than 20 studies, seven of which examined dementia rates in patients with mood disorders (such as bipolar) being treated with standard therapeutic doses of lithium. Five of these studies showed lithium treatment was related to low dementia rates.
The review looked at four randomised controlled trials (comparing one group of patients on lithium with a group taking a placebo). These examined lithium's effects on cognitive impairment (such as memory loss) or dementia over six to 15 months.
One study did not show a statistically significant benefit on cognition but showed a biologically positive effect on the levels of a protein that promotes nerve cell growth. The other three showed statistically significant, albeit modest, beneficial effects of lithium on cognitive decline.
A number of epidemiological studies – which track patterns and causes of diseases in populations – have linked lithium concentrations in drinking water with rates of psychiatric disease. In the above-mentioned review, nine out of 11 studies found an association between trace-dose lithium (low doses in drinking water but not detectable in blood of the people consuming it) and low rates of suicide and, less commonly, homicide, mortality and crime.
More recently, researchers in Denmark conducted a nation-wide study linking dementia rates based on hospital records for people aged 50-90 with their likely exposure to lithium. This was based on the lithium levels in the waterworks predominantly supplying the region where they lived.
Those with higher dementia rates came from regions with lower mean levels of lithium in the water than those without. This was 11.5 micrograms (µg) per litre compared to 12.2µg per litre.
The Danish population is geographically stable and the health record linkage is excellent for such studies. The reliability and validity of dementia diagnosis in Danish health registers is also high. But the study had a number of limitations.
The lithium intake was based on sampling of waterworks that provide water to only 42% of the population. The sampling was done for only four years (2009-2013) and extrapolated to a lifetime.
Many potential, additional variables were not considered. For instance, a major source of lithium is diet, and some bottled water contains lithium. The study did not take this into account.
An intriguing aspect of the results, for which no explanation was given, was that the relationship wasn't linear. That is, lower doses (5.1-10µg per litre) increased the risk of dementia by about 20%, whereas exposure to levels over 15µg/L reduced the risk by about the same amount.
Observational studies (which make educated assumptions by observing a sample of the population) have considerable merit in the epidemiology of dementia, but have sometimes led to blind alleys. Aluminium is a useful example, with its preventive role in dementia still unclear after several decades of observations. A concern is lithium may take the same path.
Lithium was once widely used as an elixir and even as a salt substitute, but was discredited because of lack of effectiveness, marked toxicity and early death. We must wait for more observational studies with the rigour such studies warrant before we start clinical tests of its effects in drinking water.
We must also study the potential harmful effects of lithium on the thyroid and the kidney, as these organs bear the brunt of long-term harms of lithium. For now, there is insufficient evidence to add lithium to the drinking water.


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Home » DVD » Paths Of Glory
Reviewed on July 25, 1999 by Guido Henkel in DVD, Reviews // 0 Comments
Cast: Kirk Douglas
Extras: Production Notes
The bitter, numbing mindlessness of war and the exploitation of military ranks has been material for a number of films, both good and bad. If there has ever been a film that made it brazenly obvious, tangible for everyone, it has to be late director Stanley Kubrick's compelling film, "Paths Of Glory". It is a movie that exposes excessive hatch plots within the military ranks during stress situations where coward men try to save their own hides without respect or second-though about others. The cowards in this film are, of course the rank highest staff members of the French army, who rather send thousands of their own foot-soldiers into certain death than admitting their own fears – fears that would be only too human, I suppose. But it seems to take a certain personality to climb the ranks, and courage is oftentimes not one of the supporting virtues. That's what the common soldier is here for after all. Director Stanley Kubrick cast a harsh glance at this scenario, indicting the military politics. The result is a memorable film that leaves the viewer pondering and that after more than 40 years is just as important a lesson in humanity and social incompetence as it was back then.
Stanley Kubrick explores the whole spectrum of misguided personalities during times of war in his brilliant film. It all starts when the French General Staff decides from the safety of their little chateau far off enemy lines that it is time to attack the "Ant Hill". It is a hilltop held by the German army during World War I, without any strategic value. For the sole purpose of claiming it their own the officers are determined to see it taken by their men. The order is passed down directly to the soldiers in the trenches right in front of the Ant Hill. Lead by the energetic and charismatic Colonel Dax (Kirk Douglas), the men in those trenches are battered, worn, weak and long overdue for some well-deserved rest after countless successful advancements into enemy territory. Despite Dax's concerns over the men's morale and fighting power, the order is enforced and the coming morning, these men try to fight their way up the Ant Hill. The attack is a complete failure and results in the pointless loss of many men.
The attack is a suicide mission in the first place, but it turns completely fatal in part due to one commanding officer's cowardice, who never orders his men to leave the trenches, leaving the first line of soldiers without backup. Frantic over the incident the supervising General even orders his artillery to fire at their own men in the trenches. The order is refused and the aggravated General has only one thing on his mind. To cover up for his blunder, he seeks revenge for the failure by charging the men for mutiny and cowardice in the face of the enemy, while he was comfortably sipping his cognac from a safe distance. Dax has to pull all his registers to rescue three men who are about to be executed exemplarily to satisfy the Generals' blood thirst. What follows is a travesty to any legal system and defies any respect for human life.
With Kirk Douglas in the lead, "Paths Of Glory" is truly one of the most memorable anti-war films I have ever seen. It is his sanity, his warmth and determination that helps making the unbearable injustice we witness so despicable. In him we see all the virtues of a true hero without glorifying the character in any way. We see the virtues you would think are concentrated within army Generals, but are lost on those men. All we find are corrupt, self-centered marionettes, strung up to play the game of decadence and opportunism at the most inappropriate of all times.
In the rather short but gripping attack sequence, Kubrick manages to show us the carnage and the horror of war in a series of impressive images that set the stage for the events to come. How can anyone who is not standing side-by-side at the front lines with these men have the arrogance to accuse them of cowardice? The question is literally screaming at the viewer and as the story unfolds, all we can hope is that somehow sanity prevails. MGM Home Entertainment has now release "Paths Of Glory" to honor director Stanley Kubrick's recent passing. The black & white movie is presented in a <$PS,fullscreen> version on the disc, restoring the film's original 1.33:1 aspect ratio. While the transfer is excellent for the most part, there are a handful of scenes in which it shows serious noticeable damage on the sides of the frame. Apart from those deficiencies however, the picture quality is surprisingly good with deep blacks and good highlights. The image never appears flat or lifeless. The compression has been done very carefully and no mentionable artifacting is evident in the presentation.
"Paths Of Glory" contains a monaural soundtrack in <$DD,Dolby Digital>. Unfortunately the soundtrack has not held up as well as the images while the film aged, and serious distortion is noticeable throughout the movie. From the opening moments where fanfares are seriously clipped to dialog sequences where the voices sound harsh and distorted, the quality of the soundtrack is unfortunately rather poor. Add to that the fact that the noise reduction system used to clean up the audio track is clearly cutting off much of the ambient sound effects, and you have film that sounds absolutely unnatural. To make matters worse the noise gate used to limit the audible noise floor is set too high and doesn't open fast enough and frequently chops off initial pieces of dialog, making it hard to understand many of the spoken lines.
There can be no doubt, this film needs a restoration in order to survive the next 40 years, and I can only hope that the good people at MGM are aware of the gem they are having in their library with "Paths Of Glory". It is a powerful film that should not be forgotten and although this DVD gives us a great chance to witness the movie's strengths, as well as director Stanley Kubrick's masterful skills, we can only hope that MGM will find the funds to see this film fully restored one day.
If you want to learn more about film deterioration, preservation and restoration, please visit the website of the "American Film Institute" who is dedicated to preserving films for the future. It also tells you what you can do to support the AFI's film preservation efforts to make sure films like "Paths Of Glory" will not be lost. It is very valuable information no film enthusiast should miss!
The Heiress
Brooklyn's Finest


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Q: Is it possible to have both appengine fleixble and standard in single project I have an standard appengine app currently running. I am currently developing another flask app which will use flexible runtime. I am wondering is it possible for me to have both apps in same project?

A: Yes, it is possible, with each of your "applications" being implemented as separate services/modules in the same GAE app. Services/modules offer complete code isolation, see Comparison of service isolation and project isolation.
See also: Custom runtime for non-flexible environment app?

A: There is an even easier way to do this that doesn't require creating a separate service :)
Since you are only developing your second application, you do not need to set it as the default version to serve traffic to the public.  You only need to access it yourself, (or perhaps whoever you give the URL to).  The only drawback really is that you will not be able to access your project at the default url, usually .appspot.com
Therefore, you can simply deploy your flexible app engine project, but make sure you don't give it any traffic sharing or promote it to the main version!!  You can then access your version simply by clicking on the version in the google cloud console, or by visiting http://-dot-.appspot.com/ (It was not possible to access individual versions like this for flexible for quite some time, but this has now been resolved.)