Mark Lefebvre, Director of Kobo Writing Life, interviews Young Adult Fantasy and Chicklit author, Katie Cross as she shares strategies about how she was able to keep writing, with even more productivity, in her transition from full time author to full time Mom.
Her lifelong passion of writing and her recent passion of becoming a mother (which happened about a year and a half into her 3 years of publishing career) and how she juggles both with her 18 month old.
After the interview, Mark reflects on the manner by which Katie has made writing a priority and how other writers who struggle with balancing multiple priorities might be inspired by her as well as a reflective writing quote that has been with him for more than 20 years.
Katie Cross has been writing all of her life. And, in the process of acquiring a Bachelors of Nursing and working as a cardiac and pediatric nurse for eight years, the writing never stopped. When she finally decided to give publishing a shot, she released Miss Mabel's School for Girls and the writing never stopped. Although she worked and wrote for years, now she says that she writes as much as she can with a feral child running amok in her never-really-clean house. The one constant, of course, after all those years, she says, is that the writing has never stopped.
Phenomenal. So glad I followed Katie's FB link to your site. I am realizing that I'm a writer because I have to write. Words won't let me alone until I put them down on paper (screen). Ideas don't want to become clear until they are put down into words. And ideas are busting out of me. These days, I use the voice recorder on my phone or my digital voice recorder to make sure I don't lose ideas the moment they come to me. And I recently started putting them down in my Pages app on my iPad (using the voice to text mode most often). That way, the ideas are already in text form. I love voice to text!!
When I get to the point in my writing life where I feel like a book wants to be born, I'll be back. For now, writing for me is a process of clarifying my own personal journey and sharing parts of it that I feel are helpful for others. So thrilled to have discovered your site.


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News Assam Hindi Tamil
Bulbul Can Sing, Bombay Rose, Aamis to be screened at 17th San Francisco International South Asian Film Festival
The annual film festival will be held from 7–10 November in San Francisco, California, and on 16 November in Palo Alto.
Mumbai - 31 Oct 2019 2:38 IST
The five-day San Francisco International South Asian Film Festival will host features, documentaries and short films from India, Sri Lanka, the UK, Italy and the USA for its 17th edition.
The festival opens with Rima Das's Bulbul Can Sing and is followed by the documentary American Hasi featuring Indian-American comedian Tushar Singh and Ronny Sen's black and white film Cat Sticks at the New People Cinema in San Francisco.
Bhaskar Hazarika's Aamis, Dar Gai's Namdev Bhau: In Search Of Silence, Prasanna Vithanage's Children Of The Sun (Gaadi), and Gitanjali Rao's Bombay Rose will be screened at the Castro Theatre. Vithanage will be present for a panel discussion after the screening of his film.
The last day in San Francisco will showcase Safdar Rahman's Chippa, Vasanth S Sai's Sivaranjani And Two Other Women and the festival's signature shorts program. Varun Chounal's Gabroo (2018), Mahesh Pailoor's Mona Shaikh (2017), and Andrew Sturm's 31 Foot Ladders (2017) are just some of the shorts which will be screened.
Documentary filmmaker Nishtha Jain, known for Lakshmi And Me (2007) and Gulabi Gang (2012), will host a free masterclass and talk about her career and process on 10 November.
As the festival moves to Palo Alto on 16 November, Prarthana Mohan will present her film The Miseducation Of Bindu, starring Priyanka Bose and David Arquette. The film will be followed by a question-answer session.
Phaim Bhuiyan's romantic comedy Bangla and Rohena Gera's Sir will conclude the festival at the Palo Alto Art Center.
Bombay Rose
Aamis

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


when I was young girl, my mother always give me cookies when christmas. I also love any kind of cookies that my mother gave me. And now I make this cookies for my husband, since last year. This is so delicious and easy to make. Come on guys, lets make this cookies for our christmas!
Christmas Monster Cookies are delicious oatmeal peanut butter cookies loaded with red and green M&Ms. These flourless oatmeal cookies would be the perfect addition to your Christmas baking.
Dump peanut butter, softened butter, eggs, granulated sugar, brown sugar and vanilla extract into large mixing bowl.


If you're new to the guitar or Guitar Noise, there can be an awful lot of information to digest. Many of your guitar questions have probably been answered here already. This page will help you try and find those answers. If you need help and advice from other Guitar Noise users, head over to the Forums and join the conversation.
How do I submit articles I've written to Guitar Noise?
What pitfalls should I avoid as a beginning student?
If you're serious about becoming a guitarist, learning to read music is going to be an essential skill. Fortunately, it's easier to learn than you think.
Should I bother learning songs?
Which chords should I begin learning?
There's a lot of discussion about which guitar chords to learn first. This article clears things up for beginners who want learn guitar.
How much time should I spend practicing?
How are diminished power chords formed?


Abstract—Today by more complicating in smart grid, request and need for reliability, security and more efficiency and also environmental concerns, we need to change the operation and use of electrical networks. Power companies and the government consider that the smart grid will be salvation for the future. Recent advances in the fabrication of integrated circuits and the development of wireless communication technology that is cusses WSN entry in smart grid. One of the most important features of sensor networks used in smart grid is the energy constraints. So we will offer a new architecture for smart grid in the field of the WSNs to reduce the total energy. Moreover, we will improve some routing factors, QoS parameters such as delay and reliability with respect to the desired user.
Index Terms—Smart grid, wireless sensor network, sectoring, minimum spanning tree.
Ali Nabati and Sayyed Majid Mazinani are with Imam Reza International University, Mashhad, Iran (e-mail: nabati65@yahoo.com, smajid_mazinani@yahoo.com).
Iman Sariri Ajili is with Iranian Construction Engineering Organization Province of Khorasan Razavi, Iran (e-mail: iman.sariri@yahoo.com).
Cite:Ali Nabati, Sayyed Majid Mazinani, and Iman Sariri Ajili, "A Novel Energy-Efficient Architecture Based on QoS for the Smart Grid," Journal of Clean Energy Technologies vol. 3, no. 4, pp. 247-253, 2015.


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Kimberly Shirk joined Talent Plus in 2012 as a corporate communications writer and editor for the Branding and Marketing team and is now a senior marketing strategist on the branding and marketing team. Kimberly spends her time concepting and executing branding and marketing campaigns to share the value of becoming a Talent-Based Organization ®. This includes writing articles, research studies, blogs, press releases, biographies, video scripts, e-mail marketing campaigns and activities crafting and sharing the message of Talent Plus to external and internal communities. Her background is in broadcast journalism.


The university announced Tuesday that Castricone, who has been the play-by-play radio man for Clemson men's basketball since 2014, will succeed Bob Rondeau with the Huskies.
And he will follow one of the icon college-sports broadcasters this region has ever seen in Rondeau, who is in his 37th and final season with the Huskies.
Castricone has also done college football broadcasting work for Notre Dame, Ohio State, Michigan, as well as the Atlantic Coast Conference and Southeastern Conference.
Castricone will start Oct. 2, then take over UW men's basketball duties Nov. 10 when the Huskies host Belmont at Hec Edmundson Pavilion.
The Atlanta Falcons selected Washington Huskies offensive tackle Kaleb McGary with the No. 31 pick in the first round of the NFL Draft.


Grey wall color with superb tilted handicap mirror using chrome finished faucet for sleek bathroom ideas are best with frameless handicap mirror with wall mounted sink for small bathroom ideas with modern decor. Below are a few arguments and can nonetheless be a fantastic pick.
6 list of handicap mirrors for bathrooms for your next home improvement project outlined in this article to support your full the task without trouble.


Discussion in 'News and Results' started by dimmer0707, Jan 23, 2010.
Well we had a good turn out today in bright sunshine as always .
Cheers for the help today guys and girls and hope to see you next month.
What a start eh? Second to last. It's my gun I tells ya, it's broken, a new one is needed.
I'll go round with you next shoot Ali.
Nothing wrong with an Air Arms.
Yakker put a dog biscuit in the tin, that must've affected them somehow.
Shhh, it's a good excuse for a new gun.
Crow? I'll have you know it was a squirrel, it makes allllll the difference.
Heh heh heh, did anyone actually knock it down?
Did somebody get a bit jealous of my superior nastyness?


I've tried searching the forum, other TR sites, Google, et al, but cannot find any other mention of this. I'm playing TRL on Windows 10 Professional 64, Xbox 1 Game Pad, digital copy on Steam. In Croft Manor, in the Gym, there is a ladder that swings out and moves a platform. Every time I get to the last jump before the ladder, Lara jumps but hits and "invisible wall", won't grab the ladder, and falls to the ground. If I swing the ladder against the wall, she will make the jump and grab the ladder, but climb it in mid air, as if it is protruding. The platform has been moved back to the center of the room so she can't reach it with the ladder flush against the wall. I've tried playing Croft Manor all the way through from scratch, no Reward Saves, played the Gym early, played it last, and it doesn't matter. Anyone else run into this glitch?I've tried to find a mod to left her fly, but from what I can tell, they aren't compatible with the Steam Version. Buyer Beware: these pristine Steam TR files aren't so pristine. Any help is greatly appreciated!


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Home News Hammond punches trains' ticket
Hammond punches trains' ticket
July 29, 2014 – Rob Earnshaw
When Johnny Cash sang about the trains that keep a rollin', he mustn't have been in Hammond.
If you live in or drive through Hammond, chances are you've been stopped at a crossing by a train. And not just a moving train. A stopped train. Just sitting there causing you to be late for work, school, or other appointments.
The good news is the Hammond police feel your pain, as they have issued more than 1,200 citations to a railroad since the start of 2012 for having its trains blocking a crossing.
The bad news is the police say the railroad doesn't care because "it's the cost of doing business."
Indiana state law says a railroad cannot block a crossing with its train for more than 10 minutes (unless it's for a reason over which the railroad has no control).
So far this year, Hammond police officers have written 427 citations to Norfolk Southern Railroad for doing just that.
The main problem crossings are the ones along the same track that has Norfolk Southern trains running east to west through Grand Avenue, 173rd Street, Parrish Avenue, Arizona Avenue, 169th Street and Kennedy Avenue.
Hammond Police Traffic Cmdr. Lt. Pat Vicari said Norfolk Southern has an intersection with the Indiana Harbor Belt railroad tracks west of Kennedy Avenue and they have to stop at a signal waiting to make a right turn onto the IHB track. The train usually stops just short of Arizona Avenue.
"Right off the top there's your three intersections – 173rd, Grand and Parrish," Vicari said. "We know they're going to be blocked because they're making that transition from Norfolk Southern to IHB and they go very, very slow. And those trains are always very long.
"It's almost guaranteed you're going to get three more citations at Arizona, 169th, and Kennedy…which are all probably within a couple hundred yards of each other. It's the same train. It's not uncommon to have five or six crossings blocked by one train."
Vicari said Norfolk Southern released a protocol in 2004 that states westbound trains will stop short of those crossings from Grand to Kennedy avenues to avoid blocking them.
The document, of which The Times received a copy, also states "it is important to note that when any known delay to a train will exceed 20 minutes, arrangements must be made to cut the grade crossing."
Vicari said Norfolk hasn't followed any of that protocol.
"The order says don't block these crossings and if you're gonna block them for more than 20 minutes, cut your train," he said. "Break it up for traffic. We've had trains out there for hours blocking things up."
Vicari said Norfolk Southern is supposed to call them when a train is blocking a crossing but "they never do."
"It is the cost of doing business to them," he said. "It is easier and cheaper to just block it and call it a day."
Norfolk Southern spokesman Dave Pidgeon said the railroad faces challenges in Hammond partly because it's along the single busiest train corridor in the nation.
"You have more than 100 trains a day moving through that corridor," Pidgeon said. "And the demand for rail transportation in the United States continues to go up. You see more trains and that puts an enormous challenge on our capacity."
Pidgeon said track maintenance in the area also has an impact on the railroad keeping its network fluid and it takes seriously its responsibility to each of the communities in which it operates.
"We are in the business of moving trains," he said. "We obviously want these trains to move. Our customers want them to move. But we have a challenge there from a logistical standpoint to keep those trains moving. We don't want to occupy crossings any longer than we have to."
Pidgeon said the nation's economy depends on the fluidity of the rail network and particularly in the Chicago/Northwest Indiana area.
"We don't want to slow it down any more than it already is," he said. "We are constantly looking for solutions."


Previously On Project Runway: Season 9, Episode 9 | Oh Sarah O !
aka. Let's Hear it for the Boys!
Last week, the Project Runway designers flipped out after the judges replaced their models with average men because they feared they would be designing menswear. Well they lucked out last week, when they discovered that they were really designing for men's (female) significant others, but this week the designers were not so lucky. This week the designers were asked to complete a menswear challenge and design a look for "up and coming band" the Sheepdogs. The winning look would be featured in editorials in Marie Claire and Rolling Stone magazine and worn by the band member at a Rolling Stone event. The designers were divided up into 2 teams, however the looks would be judged individually and the designers only needed to make sure the designers looked like they came from the same planet. Well, apparently all of the designers decided that they would have The Sheepdogs look like they came from the planet of cheap Jimi Hendrix rip offs with seriously hideous results.
I liked Anthony Ryan's shirt fabric which looked like a retro floral print, but upon further inspection had a wood pattern on it. That's about it. Saggy, dropped crotch flairs are never going to be stylish, and neither is a fringe back. Lucky for Anthony Ryan, there were plenty of other, even more hideous designs this week, so the judges kept him safe.
Anya's lack of sewing skills finally showed this week in her weird, Pocahontas looking frock. Not only was the garment hideous, and poorly sewn (the jeans were coming apart in the back), but the design was seriously lacking in Anya's masterful print selection. Since this was Anya's first time in the bottom and her first time designing menswear, the judges took pity on her and saved her for another week.
I appreciated that Laura listened to the client's request to have a red pant and agreed that the look had a bit of a 1970-80s Stephen Tyler of Aerosmith kind of vibe. But, I also agreed with the judges that the red tie dyed tank top looked a bit like the client had a shaving accident. I kind of wondered why none of the designers paired with this band member decided to dress him up like Project Runway session 2 designer, Santino Rice. Just a thought.
The judges liked Bert's design because he gave his band member a "look" as opposed to a costume, however I'm not sure if the band member was a fan of the purple striped pants, tank, and cardigan. I thought this look was alright and was defiantly the most modern of the designs, however I was not a fan of the braided pig tails. Bert will be back to sew another day.
Kimberly seemed to loose her way in the menswear challenge, creating a look that looked like a rejected outfit from a 1970s fast food chain. The colors were bland and the shirt looked like a bowling shirt with a weird collar. Kim ended up in the bottom 2 with this look, but the judges took into consideration that this was her first time doing menswear and her skillful pant sewing saved her from elimination.
Joshua returned to his old habit of overworking his look. I think Joshua created several decently made pieces, but together it was just too much. The judges liked the zipper detail on the pants, which I can also appreciate ;-) I also liked the print on the tank top, but I was not a fan of the vest. The judges decided that Joshes good pieces were good enough to keep him for another episode.
Olivier was touted as a menswear designer and he selected the lead singer as his muse. Then Olivier preceded to gripe the whole episode about how "over weight" his band member was, and how he couldn't sew his outfit because his muse was larger than his dress form. In the end, Oliver's look appeared boring and unfinished, and Olivier was sent home.
Did you watch Project Runway? Do you agree with the winners/ losers? Le t me know in the comments below.


Are we getting young blood again? Wow, that makes me sound old. By school do you mean middle school, high school or college? (We have had people from all in past). And how do you like school? Building a house seems a lot of work. Sleep sounds nice. Sleep is great.
Welcome to the Black Tower! You should be able to see our private boards soon and...see what Tress has said. Another random question for you. What is your favourite food?
Why is there killing happening?
Mafia (just kidding, I don't have sudden interest in playing it again). Ludo? I don't remember when I last played it. Or maybe snake and ladders. Or hide and seek.
Welcome back to Black Tower! Getting people added to the private boards is at the top of my to-do list.
What is the last movie that you watched? 5 points for signing in, 5 for answering. Bonus question (no points involved): What do you think is the difference between signing in and answering and in which case you are doing only one? The last movie that I watched was La La Land yesterday because I was passing by my friend's room and another friend was explaining how well shot that movie is.
I am thinking of starting Sapiens next because someone keeps recommending that to me.
One of my reading goals for this year is to read a classic and read a piece of non fiction. I think I should change it to read anything because I am still on my first book of the year.


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Philanthropy and the "Jewish Continuity Crisis"
Today, Jewish philanthropy—like all philanthropy—is big business, thanks to US philanthropy's torturous entanglement with US capitalism.
By Hadas Binyamini
In a 2016 episode of the Comedy Central sitcom Broad City, costars Abbi and Ilana go on an "all-expense-paid trip to Israel" called "Birthmarc." On the plane, the two find themselves surrounded by the archetypes of their milieu: Ivy League–educated, nationalist, and horny young Jews, all wearing blue T-shirts featuring a Star of David, all ready to get married, right now, on the plane. The satire of the very real program Taglit-Birthright Israel mocks American Jews' classism and natalism, as well as an economic culture that promotes Jewish endogamy—or Jews marrying Jews. A young man named Mark runs to the front of the plane and tells his fellow participants, "I'm proudly gay—mazel—but I'm looking for a nice Jewish girl to marry … because that's the only way I can gain access to my trust fund." Their trip leader, Jared, wears a knitted blue-and-white kippa and arranges seating assignments according to participants' "match potential" (i.e., their likelihood to tie the knot). Eventually, he comes clean to Ilana about why he is so desperate for the young Jews to pair up: he gets a commission for every "match" made on the trip, with a double commission if he can provide proof of a hookup before the plane lands.
Viewers laugh because the episode exaggerates a familiar link between free Jewish programs, Jewish marriage and reproduction, and concentrated wealth. In the world outside the show, these familiar tropes are more commonly presented as hot-button Jewish issues, none more familiar than Jewish communal leaders' and commentators' moral panic over interfaith marriages, which these same commentators have called a Jewish "continuity crisis." Like white panic over urban crime rates, Christian opposition to gay rights, or conservative allegations that Aid to Families with Dependent Children encourages single motherhood, the Jewish continuity crisis emerged in the 1960s amid intensifying economic anxiety and attendant concerns about the decline of the nuclear family. Sexual liberalism, weak morals, low fertility, birth-control use, and, worst of all, intermarriage would lead—Jewish communal leaders feared—to the disintegration of the Jewish peoples.
Certainly, Jewish communal leaders have worried about intermarriage throughout American Jewish history. But opposition to intermarriage became, in the words of historian Lila Corwin Berman, Jews' "postwar communal obsession." And to match their all-consuming passion, Jewish leaders developed techniques to make sure their coffers would always be stocked in the fight against intermarriage.
The so-called Jewish continuity crisis reached disaster proportions in the 1990s, when philanthropy-funded studies revealed that 52 percent of American Jews married non-Jewish partners. In 1999, Jewish leaders responded to this sense of crisis by fusing Zionism and Jewish endogamy in the form of Birthright. At its launch, Birthright was funded with $210 million raised from American Jewish community federations, the Israeli government, hedge-fund manager Michael Steinhardt, and Seagram liquor heir Charles Bronfman.
Starting in 2005, Birthright's fundraising materials pointed to statistics compiled through the Steinhardt-funded Social Research Institute at Brandeis University. The data showed that Birthright participants married non-Jews less frequently than the general American Jewish population did. Successful promotion of Jewish endogamy went hand in hand with successful fundraising.
Birthright is undeniably ubiquitous in the Jewish world: it has provided free trips for over 700,000 Jews since its founding and generated revenues of $121 million and $99 million in 2018 and 2019, respectively. This reach has only been possible because of the US political economy, which allows Jewish philanthropies to accumulate capital indefinitely, assisted by massive American government subsidies, all in the name of the public's interest.
Birthright's product— "Jewish continuity"—encourages this economic arrangement. In the hands of multibillion-dollar nonprofit entities, "Jewish continuity" sanctions a political order in which nuclear families, wealth, and privately controlled communal institutions, rather than the government, provide a social safety net.
In her far-reaching new book, The American Jewish Philanthropic Complex: The History of a Multibillion-Dollar Institution, Berman, the Murray Friedman Chair of American Jewish History at Temple University, covers over 150 years of Jewish philanthropy in the US, as well as the government policies and financial practices that shaped them. Her book is the first comprehensive history of the subject. Berman does not provide a triumphant tale of Jewish generosity, solidarity, and uplift, but rather an ambivalent story about the evolution of one ethnic-religious community's institutions under American neoliberalism.
The "American Jewish philanthropic complex," Berman explains, was born out of the convergence of market-friendly government policies, the financial sector's growth, and Jewish leaders' belief that Jewish security and continuity could only be guaranteed through perpetual capital accumulation. The values driving Jewish institutions have been marked by philanthropy's entanglement with American capitalism.
Gradually and hesitantly, in the first decades of the 20th century, Jewish communal leaders allowed their organizations to amass capital. Like many progressives of the era, leaders of local Jewish federations—associations of nonsynagogical welfare and cultural institutions—understood their function as providing for the immediate material needs of poor and needy Jews. They did not want to indefinitely hoard money in trusts like Gilded Age robber barons. Federation bylaws, in fact, contained regulations against precisely such trusts; they set limits on the amount of money that could be held back from circulation and required that fundraised money be spent down annually, following a model of immediate distribution.
But in New York City in the early 1920s, the local federation amended its bylaws. The new bylaws allowed the federation to receive an initial $500,000 bequest (about $7.5 million today) from banker Jacob Schiff, followed up by another $500,000 in donated securities from his son-in-law and fellow banker, Felix Warburg. Such successively large gifts pushed federations to loosen their regulations against trusts and to normalize the buildup of charitable assets.
A century later, Jewish philanthropy—like all philanthropy—is big business. Most charitable capital is held back from annual circulation; donations of a couple million dollars likely do not spark heated debates in Jewish federation boardrooms, nor changes to the bylaws.
In total, between 2000 and 2015, $46.3 billion were held by 1,235 different Jewish funding organizations. These include federations, Jewish schools, advocacy groups, and social-service organizations, and do not include synagogues and religious institutions. This figure is probably a low estimate, as researchers only counted grants of over $500,000.
While most religious groups have preached inmarriage to some degree among their followers, in the 1960s American Jews adopted endogamy as a particularly vital and urgent communal family value.
Reporter Josh Nathan-Kazis called this concentration of wealth "a tax-exempt Jewish communal apparatus that operates on the scale of a Fortune 500 company."1 That's true: the 70th and 71st most profitable companies in the US, American Airlines and Charter Communications (which runs Spectrum and Time Warner), both had revenues of $45.7 billion in 2020. The $46.3 billion held by Jewish funding organizations is a few billions more than Harvard University's endowment of $40 billion, but less than the current net worth of Michael Bloomberg ($54.9 billion).
What enabled this massive concentration of capital? Why did so many Jewish organizations switch from prioritizing immediate distribution to indefinite financial growth? In part, Berman explains, communal wealth accumulation reflected both the changing economic makeup of American Jewry and new government social policies.
Many early 20th-century Jewish organizations sought to meet the health and economic needs of Jewish immigrants, who constituted almost a 10th of the 30 million immigrants to the US between 1880 and 1920. These Jewish charities—orphanages and hospitals, interest-free-loan associations, educational institutions, and settlement houses—provided relief for the recently arrived working-class, highly urbanized Jewish immigrants.
But thanks to social and economic reforms passed between the New Deal and the Great Society, Jewish Americans' average income and wealth rose, as government programs provided employment assistance, loan guarantees, education stipends, and social insurance. The government's midcentury social policies, then, decreased the pressure on Jewish organizations to provide these services themselves.
The Failure of Climate Philanthropy
By Edouard Morena
The mixed economy of public-private partnerships also altered philanthropic priorities. Before the creation of Medicare and Medicaid in 1965, for example, federations spent the largest share of their funds on hospitals and medical services. But as federal spending on social services exploded in the late '60s, so did the portion of charities' budgets that came from public funds. The New York federation in the '50s and '60s, facing what political scientist Matt Berman calls "financial insecurity, bordering on crisis," remained solvent by relying on government funding. With their medical and social-services programs partially covered by the state, Jewish institutions could shift their focus. Instead of health care and housing, they turned to culture and education. While the New York federation, in the 1950s, spent 30 percent of its expenditures on health and human services, by 1971 it spent only 5 percent on these categories.
As Jewish philanthropies increased their investments in cultural and educational programming in the postwar decades, they also began using new financial instruments. In the postwar years, Jewish federations accepted larger gifts such as cash, property, or bonds and held them in endowments, which were investment funds generating profit from interest by not spending down any of the original gift or principal. Federations' nearly simultaneous shifts toward endowments and toward cultural-funding priorities is one of Berman's key historical insights in The American Jewish Philanthropic Complex.
In the 1940s, as American Jews reckoned with the genocide of European Jewry, endowment building promised long-term communal financial sustainability. In 1943, during the height of the Nazis' systematic mass murder of Jews, the New York federation set up a special reserve, or rainy-day fund, for the first time, to prepare for any upcoming emergency. New York federation chair Norman Goetz called these reserve funds "sacred." A different federation director in Boston called American Jews' fundraised dollars their weapons in a "battle for survival."
The violent destruction of the demographic center of Jewish life, Berman writes, led American Jewish leaders to "understand how much of the Jewish future now rested in their hands." In a period of American prosperity and abundance, American Jews felt a solemn responsibility to prepare for a possible future of scarcity and communal devastation. The meaning of Jewish survival and continuity was quite literal for American Jewry in the face of the systematic murder of their families, relatives, friends, hometown residents, and coreligionists. Jewish philanthropies embraced endowments in the aftermath of genocide under the belief that only perpetual capital growth could ensure Jewish perdurance.
As Jewish philanthropies increased their investments in cultural and educational programming in the postwar decades, they also began using new financial instruments.
As early adopters of endowments, Jewish philanthropies actively embraced the growth of the financial sector. In doing so, they tied the fate of Jewish communal institutions to their investments, to the stock market, and to the expertise and skill of financial professionals.
Of course, Jewish leaders were not unique in embracing financialization; they allied with United Way, universities, and Catholic Charities to protect their financial interests and subsidies. The evangelical National Christian Foundation followed a similar path. Decades before free-market crusaders led the White House, philanthropies promoted their own dependence on the market.
But Jewish leaders did draw on particular Jewish narratives to justify their transition from a policy of immediate distribution to one of capital growth, narratives that Berman skillfully explicates. Indeed, financialization and "Jewish identity" discourse, as Berman asserts, must be understood as interlinked phenomena.
When communal leaders evoked Jewish continuity and a strong Jewish identity to justify endowment building, charitable-tax exemptions, and hiring financial consultants, they were linking identity politics to the process of financialization. By the late 1960s, both young Jewish activists and Jewish communal leaders embraced the ethos of capital accumulation in the service of Jewish continuity.
In the 1960s, Jewish organizational leaders advocated for government policies that would increase profits on their investments and maximize donors' control over their gifts. Federations lobbied Congress before the passage of tax reforms, following the lead of Norman Sugarman, a Cleveland-based tax lawyer and a central figure in Berman's work. Their goal was to allow gifts of appreciated property, private foundations, and community foundations (later known as donor-advised funds, or DAFs) to be classified as "public charities" for tax purposes, so long as they were administered by actual public charities. Such a classification would provide financial incentives for potential donors to set up their funds inside Jewish federations. This would allow federations to compete with proliferating private Jewish charitable foundations, which operated outside federation control.
Charitable classification was such a high priority for federations that, in an assembly convened before the passage of the 1969 Tax Reform Act, they resolved to redouble their tax-lobbying efforts. In the process, the federations aligned themselves with supporters of welfare retrenchment and deregulation. DAFs in particular epitomized the spirit of privatization. According to Sugarman, DAFs "should be encouraged to be a model for involvement of the private sector in the community as an alternate and supplement to governmental programs." Federations' appeals were successful: the 1969 Tax Reform Act, and later statements by Congress and Treasury, did allow DAFs to be classified as public charities, as Sugarman had envisioned.
Even as the 1969 Act imposed limitations and regulations on private foundations, this reclassification paved the way for public philanthropies' oligarchic structure. Through such political lobbying activities, Jewish organizational leaders pursued privatization and deregulation regardless of their personal politics. The Jewish American philanthropic complex, Berman writes, "affirmed and enacted the structure of late-twentieth-century American political economy, in its inequality and its support of private forms of power over public goods and processes."
The Problem with Philanthropy
By Cassandra Ritas
Presumably nonpolitical philanthropies exemplify the adoption of market-based solutions to social issues. Though the book sheds light on the little-studied Republican Jewish Coalition and Jewish Republican Party insiders, Berman's actors do not fit into any clear-cut partisan alignments. In telling the story of government and communal institutions outside the frame of party politics and polarization, The American Jewish Philanthropic Complex is a valuable contribution to recent historians' debates on the policies and agendas that, since the 1960s, have united Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives.
Following the passage of the 1969 Tax Reform Act, federations, DAFs, and endowments grew especially quickly. Between 1975 and 1977 alone, federations' holdings in endowments almost doubled, to a total of $276 million. To administer and grow their donor-advised funds (DFAs) and the "ballooning endowments" that housed them, federations set up a supporting infrastructure. They opened investment working groups, hired outside financial advisers, and held workshops and seminars for potential donors on the benefits they would receive by moving their funds to federation auspices. By the early 1980s, according to Berman, "federations were slowly transforming themselves into financial-service providers for privately controlled philanthropic capital."
Individual donations to Jewish organizations have steadily declined since the 1980s. And yet, despite the decline in individual giving, the monetary value of Jewish philanthropic capital as a whole has increased dramatically. Most Jewish federations' profits are derived from interests on assets held in endowments, not from individual donations received through annual campaigns. The value of Jewish philanthropic capital has also increased due to the growing number of private Jewish foundations, which have challenged federations' place as the undisputed mangers of institutional Jewish life. From the mid-'90s to the early aughts, the number of Jewish private family foundations exploded from 3,000 to 10,000. In this way, even as federations continue to compete with private foundations, endowments did have their desired effect of ensuring financial longevity: today, as long as Jewish institutions do not spend down their principal, they can weather any storm.
But this financial security came at a cost. Endowments tied the vitality of communal institutions to monetary returns on investments. DAFs empowered wealthy individuals' private control of funds that were ostensibly meant to serve the public good, as the proponents of financialized philanthropy aligned with a neoliberal political vision. "The promise of philanthropy," Berman argues, "legitimated the state's contraction of its social welfare responsibilities. In its financial structure, underwritten by the state yet free to move through the market to accumulate and grow capital, philanthropy [exemplified] the logic of meeting public scarcity with private enrichment."
The values driving Jewish institutions have been marked by philanthropy's entanglement with American capitalism.
The American Jewish Philanthropic Complex highlights the financial practices that accompany the discourse of "Jewish continuity." Berman has written widely about Jewish leaders' and academics' perception of a "continuity crisis," including their intermarriage panic, in her public and academic work.2 In this book, however, she gives less attention to the gendered meanings of "Jewish continuity," as she notes in the introduction.
But the financial and reproductive meanings of Jewish continuity are not separate; social, economic, and political issues are seldom so neatly disentangled. Jewish continuity is a dictate aimed to structure both Jewish reproduction (endogamy) and financial activity (endowment building, tax exemptions, deregulation.) In the logic of the American Jewish philanthropic complex, Jewish continuity requires both durable capital reserves and continuous Jewish heterosexual reproduction. The supposed crisis in Jewish continuity—suggesting a failure in exponential financial growth or a failure in social reproduction—is just the Jewish name for the "crisis of care," a crisis endemic to financialized capitalism as a whole.
As many Christian Americans turned to "family values" to alleviate their economic anxieties in the 1960s, Jewish organizations offered "Jewish continuity" as their own solution to the supposed decline of the American family. Jewish organizations would ensure communal survival by transmitting "Jewish values" through trips to Israel and attendance at day schools, summer camps, or after-school youth-enrichment programs. All that was required for this model to succeed was a stable Jewish household—with two young, fertile, heterosexual Jewish parents—and enough disposable income to spend money on Jewish education.
While most religious groups have preached inmarriage to some degree among their followers, in the 1960s American Jews adopted endogamy as a particularly vital and urgent communal family value. There were many other strategies for controlling reproduction at the time: means-testing, for example, or opposing interracial marriages, homosexuality, birth control use, or abortion. But Jewish leaders, who supported integration and accepted gender equality, birth control, and gay rights, favored endogamy as their answer to the 1960s crisis of the family.
Translating these visions of Jewish family structure required an equally ambitious vision of the political economy. Advocates for "family values" positioned the heterosexual nuclear family as the main source of social stability amid volatile market forces. In their ideal society, the nuclear family, rather than a welfare state or robust public services, would provide a safety net. In parallel to family values, Jewish continuity discourse stressed the important role of privately controlled communal institutions, as opposed to the nuclear family, in providing this safety net.
But, as Berman has argued elsewhere, the imperative of communal child-rearing did not push American Jews in the last decades of the 20th century to support an expanded welfare state. Instead, the Jewish continuity agenda increased communal institutions' investment in privately controlled social programs. "By the closing decades of the twentieth century," Berman writes, "the logic of philanthropy refuted that of the welfare state, creating a zero-sum game."
American Jews have long understood their history and civic engagement via their relationship to philanthropies. Since the beginning of the 20th century, charitable giving and communal associations facilitated participation in Jewish life in the United States. Although it might seem that synagogues would be the bedrock of Jewish communal life, historian Hasia Diner explains that, already in the 1820s, "American Jews could live a full Jewish life and not belong [to]—or even enter—a synagogue." Nonprofit organizations sustained a whole civic world that included schools, hometown immigrant benevolent societies, mutual-aid groups, health-care and social-services providers, labor unions and workers' associations, advocacy agencies, and Jewish press and cultural production. Philanthropy, not synagogues, anchored this full Jewish life.
Many commentators suggest that the prominence of philanthropy in American Jewish history reflects unique and inherent Jewish values of tzedakah (the obligation of charity) and tikkun olam (literally, repairing the world). But religious values do not explain the particular legal, political, and financial transformations of Jewish organizations.
Rejecting this explanation, Berman insists that readers understand philanthropy as an expression of statecraft. She argues that the creation of the Jewish American philanthropic complex was not inevitable or natural, but historically contingent.
Philanthropists Will Not Save Us
By Kim Phillips-Fein
The dramatic changes in Jewish institutions' financial practices mirrored, and influenced, the political evolution of the state. The American Jewish philanthropic complex of the present day, like the US government, holds up private entities and capital growth as the best providers of the public good. A number of factors led to this, including changes in government regulation of charities through tax exemptions, subsidies, and classification; the upward mobility of many American Jews over the course of the 20th century; and communal responses to the genocide of European Jewry.
American Jewish philanthropy, Berman shows, has always been embedded in this country's political economy. For organizational leaders, reformers, commentators, and antiestablishment activists, this book is an invitation to dispense with sentimental explanations of the current philanthropic landscape, which isolate organizations from their political and economic contexts. It is an offer to confront, openly and honestly, the role of the state and of private capital in shaping ethnic-religious communal institutions.
The dilemma of having large sums in private religious hands is not unique to Jewish Americans. The Mormon Church's finances sparked similar concerns in 2019, when a whistleblower revealed that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has been secretly maintaining a $100 billion investment fund. ↩
Questions about Jewish "continuity" and intermarriage still provoke lively scholarly debate, including in two recent issues of the academic publications Contemporary Jewry and American Jewish History. ↩
Featured image: Israel Outdoors, Summer (2016). Photograph by HRYMX / Flickr
American Studies Capitalism History Jewish Philanthropy Politics Princeton University Press Religion Sexuality
Writers: Know Thyself in Excess
By Aaron Colton
By Genevieve Negrón-Gonzales et al.
Pay Attention When They Tell You to Forget
By Christina Proenza-Coles
The Crisis for Asylum-Seekers Is Gender-Based Violence
By Laura Briggs et al.
Thoreau in Good Faith
By Caleb Smith
Worker Worries Are the Seeds of Worker Action
By Katie J. Wells
Tolerance by Accident, Trust by Design
By Saumitra Jha
The American Jewish Philanthropic Complex: The History of a Multibillion-Dollar Institution
Lila Corwin Berman
Princeton University Press, 2020


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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
SWJ.DE - Swisscom AG
XETRA - XETRA Delayed Price. Currency in EUR
As of 5:11PM CEST. Market open.
Ask 0.00 x 20000
Day's Range 438.40 - 440.20
52 Week Range 375.00 - 446.80
Avg. Volume 17
Market Cap 22.559B
EPS (TTM) 29.55
Earnings Date N/A
Forward Dividend & Yield 19.61 (4.45%)
Ex-Dividend Date 2019-04-04
1y Target Est 556.00
Reuters•5 months ago
Sunrise hits snag after announcing $6.3 billion deal for Liberty Global's Swiss assets
Sunrise said earlier on Thursday that it had agreed to buy UPC Switzerland from John Malone's Liberty Global and that it would finance the transaction with a $4.1 billion rights issue. The acquisition will bolster Sunrise's position against Switzerland's dominant mobile and internet provider Swisscom and comes as Malone is cashing out of some of his European investments. In a potential obstacle, however, Freenet, which owns a nearly 25 percent stake in Sunrise, said it would not participate in the rights issue, arguing that it saddles existing investors with all the risk.
Sunrise challenges Swisscom with $6.3 bln deal for Liberty Global's assets
Liberty Global is the vehicle of U.S. cable pioneer John Malone, who is cashing out of some of his European investments. Sunrise shares fell as much as 13 percent after the company said on Thursday it had agreed to purchase Liberty's UPC Switzerland as it said it would be accompanied by a 4.1 billion Swiss franc ($4.1 billion) rights issue. Sunrise said it will pay Liberty Global around 2.7 billion francs in cash and assume 3.6 billion Swiss francs of UPC's debt.
Sunrise challenges Swisscom with $6.29 billion deal for Liberty Global assets
The purchase of Liberty's UPC Switzerland, to be accompanied by a 4.1 billion francs rights issue, bolsters Sunrise's position as Switzerland's second largest telecoms company, and follows Liberty Global's sale of its Austrian business to T-Mobile Austria last year. Sunrise will pay Liberty Global 2.6 billion Swiss francs in cash, and assume 3.6 billion Swiss francs of UPC's debt, the company said in a statement.
Swisscom cannot be forced to block illegal film websites: court
Swiss telecom company Swisscom cannot be forced to block access to foreign internet sites that illegally make films available, the highest Swiss court said on Wednesday, ending a three-year-old copyright case brought by a local film company. The Swiss Supreme Court dismissed the complaint of the company, Zurich-based Praesens-Film, that owns the Swiss rights for numerous films and had demanded Swisscom deploy technology to block downloads or streaming access. The decision, which confirms a lower-court ruling, concluded that in order for Swisscom to be forced to block the sites in question, it would have to be a participant in the copyright infringement.
Telecoms watchdog says Swisscom overcharged rivals
Switzerland's Federal Communications Commission (ComCom) has retroactively cut some regulated prices that Swisscom charges rivals, the agency said on Tuesday after concluding that some of its prices were too high. "Responding to requests from Sunrise and Salt, the Federal Communications Commission has reviewed the prices charged for the regulated telecoms services offered by Swisscom. In many cases, these prices have been reduced with retroactive effect for the 2013–2016 period," it said in a statement.
Swisscom, Sunrise, Salt pay $380 million for Swiss 5G frequencies
Swisscom, Sunrise and Salt have paid a relatively modest 380 million Swiss francs (292 million pounds) for fifth-generation wireless frequencies that will tighten their grip on the Swiss mobile market. The three were able to secure an attractively priced deal after a fourth company, London-based newcomer Dense Air, dropped out of the process, auction results showed on Friday. The exit of Dense Air -- part of the Airspan Group that hosts 4G and 5G mobile phone networks in Europe, Australia and New Zealand -- also removes a potential rival for the three companies in the already crowded Swiss mobile market.
Swisscom highlights fierce competition, posts in-line results
Swisscom said it faced "fierce" competition with global internet companies while reporting 2018 net profit that matched expectations amid looming market consolidation in Switzerland. The internet, mobile phone and digital television provider reported net profit down 3 percent to 1.52 billion Swiss francs (£1.2 billion), matching estimates in an Infront Data poll. The company, which is 51 percent owned by the Swiss government, proposed paying an unchanged dividend of 22 francs per share, in line with its previous guidance.
Swisscom well placed to handle Swiss consolidation - CEO
ZURICH (Reuters) - Swisscom is well placed to handle the fallout from potential merger activity that will sharpen competition in Switzerland's telecommunications market, Chief Executive Urs Schaeppi said ...
Switzerland's Sunrise in takeover talks for Liberty Global unit
Analysts have said a tie-up makes sense, given that Sunrise and UPC's fixed and mobile services would make the combined entity a stronger rival to the dominance of state-controlled Swisscom. "We also see 1-2 billion Swiss francs ($1 billion to $2 billion) of potential synergies," Barclays analysts said.
Simply Wall St.•10 months ago
Are Swisscom AG (VTX:SCMN) Shareholders Getting A Good Deal?
Swisscom AG (VTX:SCMN) shareholders, and potential investors, need to understand how much cash the business makes from its core operational activities, as well as how much is invested back intoRead More...
Zacks•10 months ago
Ericsson Inks 5G IP Transport Network Deal With Swisscom
Leveraging Ericsson's (ERIC) Router 6000, Swisscom aims to provide end-to-end 5G transport network from radio base stations to the data center
Calculating The Intrinsic Value Of Swisscom AG (VTX:SCMN)
I am going to run you through how I calculated the intrinsic value of Swisscom AG (VTX:SCMN) by taking the expected future cash flows and discounting them to today's value.Read More...
What Makes Swisscom AG (VTX:SCMN) A Great Dividend Stock?
Swisscom AG (VTX:SCMN) is a true Dividend Rock Star. Its yield of 4.80% makes it one of the market's top dividend payer. In the past ten years, Swisscom has alsoRead More...


Customize this 18" x 12" aluminum sign with 6 lines total, 2 lines of text at the top and up to 4 lines on the bottom. Features White and Black letters on a Blue and White background. Heavy duty aluminum with 2 pre-drilled holes for easy installation.


There's an assumption that what I am doing, because it is putting out results that contradict commonly held assumptions, must somehow be bogus. This is because with most people, belief trumps evidence.When evidence contradicts belief, it is ignored.
Those who understand without seeing.
Those who see and understand.
Those who see and do not understand.
Those who see and refuse to understand.
I clearly fall under the second heading. Left to my own devices, I have occasionally stumbled on new knowledge, and then gradually come to understand it. But for the most part, I have to be shown something before I come to understand it.
Unfortunately, the majority of people fall under the last two categories, either being unable to grasp, or stubborn in indoctrinated beliefs to the point of being hard-boiled and determined to be wrong, and remain wrong. I cannot change that, nor will I let it hinder me in any way in my explorations.
The above photo is a rerun. It is me. Another blogger thought he could unseat my work by clumsily showing that I am actually John Candy, a nice joke, but one that allowed me to prove my point as well, that my technology is solid.
I use pupil distance as a starting point, and then lay one-half of a face in one photo next to a face in another. I do not monkey with that distance. It is a constant.
or one in ten raised to the 7th power, or one in ten million. Ten is an arbitrary number. I could have as easily used twenty or fifty or one hundred to describe all the possibilities with the human face.
The point is that when we get alignment as I did with my own face at age 30 and age 64, there is an extremely high likelihood, almost a certainty, that we are looking at the same person. Further, failure to achieve these alignments means we are looking at two different people. Each conclusion is useful.
Previous Previous post: Baba Wawa was wepwaced?
Traveling. Whe. We return next week.
And yet all the features seem to line up except for the nose and ears. That's gotta be pretty long odds already. And how many times have we heard the excuse that nose and ears get longer with age – shouldn't those be taken out of the equation anyway? !
Really Mark, we all know you're not John Candy. The original poster admitted it was a joke anyway – his point was, even if you get an astronomically unlikely facial match, that doesn't prove a zombie – especially when the entertainment industry is so incestuous, as repeatedly proven by the MMC.
My own approach to it is to take the empirical evidence and then use my own eyes and brain to determine if the two candidates actually look remotely like the same person. I don't hold the same degree of skepticism as our hilarious blogger does, and I think many of your conclusions are absolutely correct, but I also don't think the face splitting technique is a particularly rigorous method. Or, to put it in a way that sounds rather less like an incredulous white coat – perhaps your conclusions should be tempered with a little common sense?
This post was written years ago. You are late on the scene. I don't do face splits anymore due to lack of rigor. I don't search for zombies anymore, as I don't care. I've simply backed off and formed a highly skeptical attitude about all news, science, sports and entertainment. All the world's a stage. But more importantly, the vast majority of the population is easily fooled, kept in a state of perpetual anxiety by fake events, and thus controlled. Others who write about the human condition often have a Pollyannish notion that things can change with more and better knowledge of our 'reality,' like ministers of the gospel. I do not suffer such illusions. I am only along for the ride.
I do wonder at times what our existence would be like if people were not controlled as they are, the few ruling the many. What if education was real, people were developed as thinking creatures, "news" was put out to pasture and events allowed to unfold in the humdrum routine that they do … utter chaos or utter boredom? I choose the latter. At least our fake reality is interesting.
That was pretty good,Mark. You told it like it is,or at least the way you see it. I've been skeptical of some of the things you wrote in the past. But that's what gives the individual reader a right to think for themselves. One of the things I have come to admire and respect,is that you do value the input of your other writers contribution to this blog.( and they know who they are ) They can draw conclusion,without jumping to conclusion )"KNOW WHEN" and "WHEN NOT"to give in, and yes,even sometime walk away with a different point of view…I think having an open mind,is what" real research" is about.
Thanks for the kind words. We do have very good writers here, and I enjoy their work. In addition, each has his/her own focus.


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Articles > Features
Is the future bright for Britain's green spaces?
Paul Collings, managing director at Timberplay, takes a look at the huge challenges facing Britain's parks, with a spotlight on Sheffield and how they are approaching the impending crisis…
Britain's parks are in peril. As Government cuts continue, parks are set to be one of the biggest losers, and it is easy to see why. While councils scramble for the pennies to keep essential services like social care and refuge collection operational, as a non-statuary service, parks are an easy target.
The value of our green spaces is very difficult to quantify; we do not measure use and, as they are free at point of entry, it is problematic to get a true indication of the groups that regularly use and benefit from parks. However, anecdotally, we know that they are an essential resource for groups across all society – families, the elderly, students, those with limited mobility, fitness fans, dog walkers and ramblers amongst others.
As the nation sets its sites on targeting obesity, the role of parks in fighting that inactivity needs to be better communicated, valued and understood. Moreover, there is also a growing body of evidence that highlights the value of parks and green spaces in reducing anxiety and preventing mental health problems.
HLF has been aware of the impending crisis and worked with NESTA to develop the Rethinking Parks programme in 2014.
Working with various councils and organisations, this programme seeks to better understand the options for generating income for parks. Projects all around the UK have looked at different ways of achieving this, and two are well underway in Sheffield –currently the Greenest City in Europe – one from the National Trust and the second from the People's Park, a community park comprising a collection of small pocket parks within the Heeley suburb of Sheffield.
The National Trust has received £100,000 funding to work on an 18-month project which seeks to explore an endowment model.
The figure required in order to operate a successful endowment is £100m, and the research seeks to explore how realistic this is.
Harry Bowell, regional director at the National Trust is heading up the programme: "One of the National Trust's priorities has always been to protect the nation's green spaces for future generations and, as such, public parks are of immense value to the population. It is now clear that central Government won't underwrite the nation's parks and recreational open spaces – so what is the alternative?
"The solution can't be for national charities to ride to the rescue with a wholesale takeover of the council's parks. Nor can local communities be expected to take on this huge responsibly alone. With the traditional models for funding parks breaking down, we need bold new ideas, new solutions that, while locally specific, can work in every city and town.
"Although this project is only half way through, various routes are being explored. One of the potential income streams identified is to make the link between health outcomes and the use of green space in the city. The trust has also identified more effective use of park facilities, café's, car parking, and hire revenue for use of public spaces for events.
"These elements have been a very effective part of the National Trust's model, making up a large part of its income. The extent of the problem is not being effectively communicated, there is no funding, we need creative solutions to safeguard the future of our green spaces, so we need open dialogue in order for residents to appreciate just how critical this situation is."
The other Sheffield scheme underway approaches the problem from a different standpoint. Rather than the nationwide, big brand charity status that the National Trust has, The People's Park is an initiative grown from a community social enterprise – Heeley Development Trust.
Andy Jackson has been at the helm of this organisation for the last 15 years, taking on the management of small green spaces and linking them together to create a variety of experiences, including a play area, BMX pump track, landscape-led play features, a large event field and a natural amphitheatre.
Trust manager, Andy Jackson, commented: "Our parks and many of our important heritage buildings are public assets – they define the places we live in and they are ours. They should not be sold – they should be cherished and we think public retention and community stewardship offers a new model.
"With budgets as they are, it is increasingly difficult for the local authority to take care of Sheffield's green spaces in the way they have. We have shown in Heeley how it is possible for local stakeholders to take on the care and management of our own green spaces, creating spaces to suit the local community.
The People's Park idea builds on this philosophy of civic responsibility and community stewardship."
The People's Park model harks back to the Victorian concept of a subscription society – with local residents supporting their green spaces with a regular payment. Andy explains the initiative:
"People think parks are paid for by Council Taxes – they aren't. Our park receives no council funding at all so, year-on-year we are fighting to secure funding for the upkeep of the park. To deliver the ongoing maintenance, community involvement, festivals and events programme, we need to find £45,000 annually; the more we raise, the more we can do.
There are currently 4,500 households in our community – by inviting each household to contribute £10 per year, our income would, potentially, be secure. This would mean that the foundation for the maintenance was safe and our time and manpower resources could be freed up to access further funding or run events to enhance the space further for the benefit of the local community."
Heeley is by no means an affluent area, and not all households will be willing or able to contribute to the scheme. However, Andy believes that green spaces also benefit the businesses that operate with, in and around that space, so sees their financial contribution as a key element.
This model however relies on the presence of a passionate and enthusiastic team working on each park project. Andy continues: "Looking at Sheffield, we have enough project managers, green estate managers, creatives, academics, event organisers and musicians to pull together an enviable team of experts who can work with local groups and organisations to support them in managing their own green spaces.
"By operating in this way, we will succeed in having the management and expertise necessary to professionally manage the projects, and the local passion and enthusiasm to create spaces that truly reflect the needs, wants and personality of the local community."
These two projects both represent different approaches to plugging the funding gap – it remains to be seen which one will be most workable. In order to gather support for this scheme, the initial battle is in getting the population to understand the position we are now in – local authorities are no longer able to pay for our beloved green spaces and, rather than lamenting over this fact, we need to embrace the problem and actively seek positive solutions.
Find out more in the April 2016 issue of PSB Magazine


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Zimbabwean girl becomes the first black to win Miss London 2019
1/5Zimbabwean girl becomes the first black to win Miss London 2019
24-year-old, Zimbawean girl Vimbai Chapungu, has been crowned Miss London 2019, making her the first black person to hold the title and also a finalist for this year's Miss England beauty pageant.
Vimbai is a Masters' degree student at a London University. Her Master's thesis is on the Natural Hair Movement, which is a social phenomenon that seeks to empower Black women to wear their hair in its natural state, as opposed to chemically processing their hair which has adverse health issues.
She is an advocate of natural African hair. According to her, "Black is still being policed in today's society, and it is only now that people are talking about it, thanks to the few women who have fought for the normalization of natural hair."
According to reports, Chapungu wore her natural hair during the pageant and she emerged in the top three of the 55 contestants for the bare-faced model title. Talented newly crowned queen is also a trained singer and part-time model.
Chapungu participated in the Miss England Final which was held in Newcastle. She qualified as one of the 50 finalists out of other 20,000 women that entered this year's competition.


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Oak Ridge Today
Council members suggest next steps for Main Street Oak Ridge
Posted at 12:52 pm January 27, 2019
By John Huotari Leave a Comment
Most of Main Street Oak Ridge is pictured above in this proposed plan from Nov. 29, 2018.
Oak Ridge City Council members on Tuesday suggested next steps for Main Street Oak Ridge. The discussion occurred about a week after Council rejected a revised plan for the second phase of the project in a 4-3 vote, creating uncertainty about what will happen next. The Tuesday evening discussion was meant to help guide Oak Ridge City Manager Mark Watson in his conversations with RealtyLink, the developer.
The four City Council members who voted against the revised plan expressed a range of concerns on Tuesday that included having a main entrance, ensuring that there is a way to get into and see the center of Main Street, and making sure the project is walkable and has a comprehensive system of sidewalks. Individually or collectively, they objected to the proposed layout of the buildings as the site prepared to welcome a second wave of tenants, advocated for a public forum on the project, and mentioned the importance of mixed-use development. (Mixed-use developments can include retailers and residential and commercial units, among other possibilities.)
The three Council members who voted for the revised plan continued to stress the potential benefits of welcoming four new national retailers to Oak Ridge, pointed out that RealtyLink has spent tens of millions of dollars here, and emphasized the importance of the potential sales tax revenues. They said those revenues will be crucial to help pay off such debts as the renovation of Oak Ridge High School. That debt is expected to spike in 2022 and 2023, about the same time as the city will permanently lose its revenues from the state's Hall income tax, Oak Ridge Mayor Warren Gooch said.
Gooch issued a dire warning about the possibility of city inaction bringing the project to a standstill on Tuesday.
"The clock is running, and it's going to impact us going forward," Gooch said. "I view this as absolutely imperative to go forward. The fiscal viability of this city is at risk."
The Council members who have raised concerns and voted against the revised plan on Monday, January 14, have stressed the importance of making sure that the city and developer pursue the best development option. They have said they want to ensure the project's long-term success.
Here is a summary of some of the city officials' comments from the Tuesday night non-voting work session: [Read more…]
Filed Under: Business, Business, Front Page News, Government, Oak Ridge, Oak Ridge, Slider Tagged With: Chuck Hope, Derrick Hammond, Ellen Smith, Jim Dodson, Kelly Callison, Main Street—Oak Ridge, Mark Watson, mixed-use development, Oak Ridge City Council, Oak Ridge Municipal Planning Commission, RealtyLink, retail, revised plan, Rick Chinn, sales tax revenues, Warren Gooch
Main Street developer asks for changes to plan recommendations
Posted at 1:51 pm December 17, 2018
The developer of Main Street Oak Ridge has asked for changes or the removal of some conditions recommended by city officials as they consider possible changes to the master plan for the 58-acre project.
The developer, TN Oak Ridge Rutgers LLC, said last week that it will not be able to comply with a request from the Oak Ridge Municipal Planning Commission to include a significant central gathering space as part of Phase III. It has asked to remove language calling for a commitment to create a mixed-use center along Wilson Street. It also wants to remove language calling for significant multi-family residential units as part of the potential mixed-use center along Wilson Street.
TN Oak Ridge Rutgers, which is affiliated with RealtyLink of Greenville, South Carolina, was responding to 10 conditions recommended by the Planning Commission when it approved a revised master plan in a split 5-4 vote during a special meeting on Wednesday, December 5.
What happens next will be up to Oak Ridge City Council, which will consider the proposed revisions during a special meeting Tuesday evening.
One revision that initially caused concern appears to have been accepted, at least so far. That's the closure of the access road from Rutgers Avenue to the roundabout at Main Street Oak Ridge. That access road would be removed to allow four new stores to be built between PetSmart, a new store, and JCPenney, an anchor store remaining from the former Oak Ridge Mall. The conditions recommended by Planning Commission did not mention the access road. It's not clear what Council's position will be. [Read more…]
Filed Under: Business, Business, Front Page News, Government, Oak Ridge, Oak Ridge, Slider Tagged With: Belk, Brett Rogers, Cinemark Tinseltown, Crosland Southeast, JCPenney, Main Street—Oak Ridge, master plan, mixed use, mixed-use area, mixed-use development, multi-family residential, Neil Wilson, Oak Ridge City Council, Oak Ridge Mall, Oak Ridge Municipal Planning Commission, PetSmart, planned unit development, PUD, RealtyLink, roundabout, Rutgers Avenue, TN Oak Ridge Rutgers LLC, Wilson Street
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Public Notice: NNSA announces no significant impact of Y-12 Development Organization operations at Horizon Center
AVAILABILITY OF THE FINAL ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT FOR THE OFFSITE HOUSING OF THE Y-12 DEVELOPMENT … [Read More...]
ADFAC seeks contractors for five homes
Aid to Distressed Families of Appalachian Counties (ADFAC) is a non-profit community based agency, … [Read More...]
Public notice: Draft environmental assessment for Y-12 Development Organization at Horizon Center
AVAILABILITY OF THE DRAFT ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT FOR THE OFFSITE HOUSING OF THE Y-12 DEVELOPMENT … [Read More...]
UPF construction could cost more, take longer
Y-12 celebrates new fire station, emergency operations center
One person seriously injured in Wednesday crash
Oak Ridge EM prepared for cold weather to prevent failures
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We'll start off with some basic steps, promenade, sevens, threes, rise and grind, house.
Continuing with the 40 Bar Finish practice dance to get everyone used to those steps.
Next up will be the Siege of Carrick.
We'll finish the workshop with the Derrada Set.


text:
Man Body Slammed by Chicago Police Officer to Remain in Jail
Published on December 5, 2019 at 10:24 am
A man charged with assault and resisting police appeared briefly in court Thursday, remaining jailed one week after a Chicago police officer body slammed him to the ground during his arrest, a confrontation that was captured on video and spread widely on social media.
Bernard Kersh, 29, was charged with one felony count of aggravated battery, one count of resisting police, and one count of simple assault after the confrontation with authorities on Thursday, according to police.
His attorney said after court that prosecutors planned to indict Kersh, changing his appearance Thursday from a preliminary hearing and instead moving the next hearing to Jan. 15, at which point he expected Kersh to have been indicted.
"Today we appeared before the judge for what could have been preliminary hearing. The state elected not to do that," Kersh's attorney Sami Azhari said.
"They got a date to go to the grand jury and indict Mr. Kersh, so the next court date presumably they will have already indicted him," he continued. "There's going to be a true bill of indictment that's issued and at that point he's going to be arraigned at a future date."
Chicago police said that on Nov. 28, Kersh was seen drinking alcohol at a bus stop near the intersection of 79th Street and Cottage Grove. Officers began to write him a ticket for drinking in public, according to police, who said that when he was confronted, Kersh spat on an officer and licked his face.
Video of the arrest was posted to social media, showing the officer then picking Kersh up and slamming him to the pavement before taking him into custody.
Kersh's bond was set at $5,000 in the case, an amount Rev. Jesse Jackson and the Rainbow PUSH Coalition said Sunday that they would pay, calling the charges "excessive" and calling for a full investigation into the case.
"He had no weapon, no gun, no knife. He had a cup in one hand and a telephone in the other," Jackson said Thursday. "The man who threw him down, the policeman, is a legitimate professional martial artist. He used him as an example of what he can do. He pressed his head against the sidewalk."
"Bernard's head still hurts. He should be in the hospital not in a jail cell," Jackson added.
When they arrived to post the bond Sunday, Jackson said the group was told that a hold had been placed on Kersh's release, and he would remain in jail.
"While [the officer] is under investigation, he is still running free," Jackson said at the time. "The man who is hurt is still in jail and should be home free. Now that we've paid the bail, and based on the judge's evaluation yesterday, they put up another road block."
According to the Illinois Department of Corrections, Kersh's case was under review "to determine whether he will be served with a parole violation." Kersh was already on parole for a 2018 conviction, court documents show.
Jackson said Thursday that Kersh was due for parole in two days, but it was revoked because of the incident. He and Kersh's mother also noted that they believed he needed to be released from jail for medical treatment.
"I spoke with him last night and he is still complaining about really bad headaches," Kersh's mother Keshia Johnson said. "His head is still hurting. His head has been hurting him since it happened and they're just giving him ibuprofen. I think there's something wrong."
Kersh is blind in one eye and suffers from schizophrenia, according to his family, who said he needs both mental health treatment as well as medical treatment from injuries he may have suffered during the arrest.
At least two of the officers seen in the video were relieved of their police powers pending a full investigation by the Civilian Office of Police Accountability, according to police.
COPA recommended that two of the officers be relieved of their powers, a finding with which interim Supt. Charlie Beck concurred, relieving both, the department announced Wednesday.
Johnson said she was "glad that the officers are relieved of their duties so they're not out there hurting or killing somebody else's son, child, daughter" but that she didn't think it was enough.
"They are still working. They are getting paid, they are just behind a desk," she continued. "My son could have been killed. I think more needs to be done. This is like a slap on the wrist."
Chicago PoliceChicago Police DepartmentBernard Kershbody slammed


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If you notice students are rushing through ThinkCERCA's Writing Lessons, we have developed a graphic organizer that you can use in your classroom. This checklist allows students to monitor their progress and meet the expectations for each step within the process.
How can you use this checklist?
This downloadable checklist includes our suggested tips for each step, but feel free to make edits based on your classroom's needs. As the year progresses, we recommend adjusting expectations based on student readiness.


I'm having trouble copying files to an SSG-550 (ScreenOS 6.3.0r12.0) series firewall using SCP.
SCP: Admin user 'joe' requested unknown file 'fwconfig'.
ssh and scp are enabled on the device.
SCP works fine the other direction.


text:
The EU reveals its true nature with its duplicitous manoeuvres on Northern Ireland
Hugh Bennett
Hugh Bennett is Deputy Editor at BrexitCentral
"Magical thinking" was on full display in Brussels yesterday as the EU published the draft legal text for the UK's Withdrawal Treaty, remarkably including an entire protocol which would require Northern Ireland to remain permanently in the EU Customs Union if triggered.
To say this has proved controversial in the UK is somewhat of an understatement, Theresa May gave the proposals short shrift, saying at Prime Minister's Questions in no uncertain terms that they would "undermine the UK common market" and "threaten the constitutional integrity of the UK" – something she said "no UK Prime Minister could ever agree to."
Even the usual Remainer suspects have not come to the EU's defence on this occasion, perhaps recognising for once just how extraordinary the proposals were. Meanwhile the DUP's Westminster Leader, Nigel Dodds, expressed his "amazement" that the EU had even proposed such a solution, as well taking aim at the EU's demand for the ongoing jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice in the whole of the UK – something which also has reared its ugly head once more in this document – describing the EU's propositions as "in some ways quite offensive." DUP leader, Arlene Foster, labelled the plan "constitutionally unacceptable" and "economically catastrophic" for Northern Ireland.
Northern Ireland trades more with the rest of the UK than it does with the Republic of Ireland, the rest of the EU and the rest of the world put together. 60% of Northern Ireland's total sales are with Great Britain, compared to only 14.7% with the Republic of Ireland.
The "fallback" option set out in the draft text not only calls for Northern Ireland to "be considered to be part of the customs territory of the Union" but also calls for a "common regulatory area" with Northern Ireland to continue to apply EU laws in the areas of "environment, health, agriculture, transport, education and tourism, as well as energy, telecommunications, broadcasting, inland fisheries, justice and security, higher education and sport" and state aid.
The EU's inflammatory demands are a stark demonstration that they have little interest in conducting the negotiations in good faith. The EU is well aware of the political sensitivities in Northern Ireland – hence why it took the decision to make it one of three priority areas in the negotiations. Its latest needlessly aggressive proposals have less upset those political sensibilities than driven a steamroller over them.
Far from trying to negotiate constructively towards a sensible compromise, the EU has acted with pure cynicism, putting a hugely contentious proposition on the table which it knows the UK could never possibly accept. Any claims the EU could have had to be acting in the best interests of preserving the delicate political balance in Northern Ireland have been revealed as completely hollow; this episode has shown the EU to be interested only in ruthlessly trying to exploit the Northern Ireland issue to push its own political objectives for Brexit.
The EU has been sticking to two main lines about the proposals. The first is Michel Barnier's claim that nothing in the text should "be a surprise" but it simply translates the joint commitments of the EU and the UK made in the December agreement, subsequently parroted by Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney and others.
This is demonstrably untrue. The EU's "fallback" option derives from the final sentence of paragraph 49 of the UK-EU December agreement, which states:
The United Kingdom remains committed to protecting North-South cooperation and to its guarantee of avoiding a hard border. Any future arrangements must be compatible with these overarching requirements. The United Kingdom's intention is to achieve these objectives through the overall EU-UK relationship. Should this not be possible, the United Kingdom will propose specific solutions to address the unique circumstances of the island of Ireland. In the absence of agreed solutions, the United Kingdom will maintain full alignment with those rules of the Internal Market and the Customs Union which, now or in the future, support North-South cooperation, the all-island economy and the protection of the 1998 Agreement.
What the EU has omitted entirely from its proposal is any consideration of the following paragraph 50, which states:
In the absence of agreed solutions, as set out in the previous paragraph, the United Kingdom will ensure that no new regulatory barriers develop between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom, unless, consistent with the 1998 Agreement, the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly agree that distinct arrangements are appropriate for Northern Ireland. In all circumstances, the United Kingdom will continue to ensure the same unfettered access for Northern Ireland's businesses to the whole of the United Kingdom internal market.
The EU's proposal would directly violate this in multiple parts. Forgetting such a crucial paragraph as this is a curious error indeed for an organisation which prides itself on its opposition to "cherry-picking", hence leading to the second EU line attempting to justify why paragraph 50 has been ignored: because it is an "internal matter for the UK".
This claim is also demonstrably false. The EU has committed to protecting the Good Friday Agreement – it made it one of its key priorities for phase one of the negotiations and it is restated multiple times in this document as well. This proposal as presented by the EU would drastically alter the constitutional order of the UK, undermining one of the central features of the Good Friday Agreement. Lord Trimble, one of the architects of the Good Friday Agreement, suggested that changes of this magnitude would need to be approved by a separate referendum in Northern Ireland.
Brussels knows exactly what it is doing. It knows that the UK could not allow this to happen, and hence the only way of the UK avoiding new barriers between Northern Ireland and Great Britain would be for the whole of the UK to accept remaining in the Customs Union and aligned with vast swathes of single market regulations.
The fact that it is using the Irish border issue as leverage to try to force this outcome by stealth, while wrapping it up in emotive rhetoric around preserving peace and respecting the constitutional settlement in Northern Ireland, reveals the EU to be a deeply devious and underhand organisation which has few inhibitions over how ruthless and unscrupulous it is prepared to be to secure its own way in the negotiations. Suggestions that Barnier and Labour's Keir Starmer have been working "in tandem" only add to the growing indications that the EU is being Machiavellian, rather than candid, over the issue.
By the same token, the UK negotiators should consider throwing back the EU's logic on them. If the UK's constitutional order and preservation of the Good Friday Agreement are to be dismissed by the EU as "internal UK issues", then the UK should similarly dismiss the EU's concerns over the "integrity of the internal [single] market and Customs Union" as "internal EU issues".
If the EU's idea of a constructive approach to the negotiations is to offer the UK a completely unworkable offer and then say "stuff you, go deal with the consequences yourself", then the UK should simply make a unilateral guarantee that it will not erect border controls on the Irish border and then leave the EU to decide for itself whether it is going to force the Republic of Ireland to erect any. EU minds might then be given the incentive to actually start focusing on a solution to the problem rather than thinking of new legal mechanisms to ambush the UK with rogue demands.
It is worth stepping back for a minute to consider why an Irish border solution is even necessary at all. The UK and the Republic of Ireland could simply make unilateral decisions to maintain an open border even in the absence of any agreed solution for the border.
The practical consequences of this would principally be a small loss of customs revenue and a minor increase in the risk of goods circulating which had been deemed legal in one jurisdiction but not in the other, for whatever reason. That is ultimately all that the "integrity of the single market and customs union" amounts to. Northern Ireland exports to the Republic are worth £3.4 billion a year, which is equivalent to less than 0.1% of the EU's annual external trade of £3.5 trillion.
The EU's idea of a proportionate response to these largely negligible problems has been to propose to undermine the constitutional order of the UK as set out by the Good Friday Agreement.
Moreover, the EU's entire logic for including this solution was that it was meant to be a "fallback" in case nothing else was agreed. But when Barnier was challenged in the press conference as to what the point of a "backstop" protocol was that the UK would never accept, he failed to answer the question, instead pretending not to understand.
Barnier is no fool, but neither are those watching him. If he is indeed trying to play the game of 'bouncing' the UK back into the Customs Union by proxy, this latest proposal will ultimately go down as a major mis-step in his plan. It increasingly looks like the European Commission has attempted to weaponise the Irish border issue while failing to understand the sensitivities and depth of feeling around it themselves. It has backfired in their faces and exposed their cynical game playing for what it is.
Tags: Arlene Foster, Customs Union, DUP, Good Friday Agreement, Ireland, Irish border, Lord Trimble, Michel Barnier, Nigel Dodds, Northern Ireland, Simon Coveney, Single Market, trade


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Hey folks! In episode 1 I take a look at the current issues surrounding SAG AFTRA and the voice actors strike. Also on the table for discussion is the current price structure for video games, and how I feel it should be raised for this current generation, as unpopular an opinion as that may be. In the Quick Hits, we talk about a few games I've been playing, including Calvino Noir, Rainbow Six Siege Beta, WWE Supercard, and Dragon Age Inquisition.
Hope you enjoy the show, and if you have any suggestions for future episodes hit me up on Twitter @KnightofOA.
5. Gametyrant 4 Tykes Extra Life Team is Live!