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We are proud of the journey we have travelled so far, but we're not finished yet. We have a lot more ideas to help the Ostomate community and we're working hard to make them a reality.


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Home/Entertainment/Ash-Abhishek's marriage didn't happen so easily! How did the actress become the daughter-in-law of the Bachchan family?
Ash-Abhishek's marriage didn't happen so easily! How did the actress become the daughter-in-law of the Bachchan family?
Today Aishwarya Rai Bachchan is celebrating her birthday. On this special occasion, we will tell you how the career of Miss World, who completed 49 years, started and how she became the daughter-in-law of the Bachchan family.
TV9 Bharatvarsh | Edited By: Shraddha Srivastava
Updated on: Nov 01, 2022, 7:52 AM IST
Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, one of the most beautiful actresses of Bollywood, has spread her style all over the world. Today the actress is celebrating her 49th birthday.
People think that the life of such a beautiful actress must have been very cool. But, like everyone else, Ash too has achieved this position after many failures.
Not only this, marriage with Abhishek Bachchan also took place after a lot of difficulties. It is said that to become the daughter-in-law of the Bachchan family, Ash had to give many tests, this journey was not easy either.
In the year 2007, as much as there was a craze among the fans about the marriage of Ash and Abhishek, there were as many obstacles in this marriage. Let us tell you that the marriage of the couple was done in a private way.
The two tied the knot on 20 April 2007. There have always been rumors about their marriage that Aishwarya Rai was married to a tree before marriage.
It has been claimed many times that Aishwarya Rai married a tree before marrying Abhishek Bachchan due to being Manglik. So that, they can get rid of Mangal Dosha.
But, in the year 2008, in one of his interviews to NDTV, Ash had expressed his displeasure over this, calling these things completely rumours.
Even people had raised rumors that this marriage would not last long due to Mangal Dosha. However, now 15 years have passed since their marriage.
The two met for the first time in the year 1997 in Switzerland. Where, Aishwarya was shooting for the film 'Aur Pyaar Ho Gaya'. Both had dinner together there.
After this, for the first time in the year 2000, Abhishek-Aishwarya worked together in the film 'Dhai Akshar Prem Ke'. Then in 2003, once again both got a chance to work together in 'Kuch Na Kaho'.
Reports say that both of them started liking each other during the film 'Bunty Aur Babli'. After this, both worked together in the films Umrao Jaan, Guru and Dhoom 2.
Their film 'Guru' was released on 12 January 2007, but before that both were in New York for the premiere of the film and here Abhi expressed his love for Ash.
This proposal of Abhishek was very special. During this, he proposed Aishwarya not from any ring but from a prop of the film and Aishwarya also said yes to him.
After this, on 14 January 2007, both of them got engaged in the bungalow Jalsa in Mumbai. Then on 20 April 2007, both got married.
Today this power couple of Bollywood also has a lovely daughter named Aaradhya. Aaradhya is often spotted with her parents.
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Manja Varmakkalai
Varmakkalai
Nokkuvarmam
An Ancient Tamil Martial Art
Varmakkalai History
India is a land of various arts, most of them have disappeared over time. Varmakkalai, the mother of all martial arts which originated in Tamil Nadu is one among them which is slowly disappearing. All the other martial arts are direct or indirect descendants of varmakkalai. Tamil Sage Agasthiyar is the founder of varmakkalai who lived in the south-pothigai mountains (Kutraalam) which is in the southern part of Tamil Nadu ruled by Pandiya kings. His period is said to be before "Sangam Literature". This art existed in the spoken-form and he formulated and gave a written-form by writing in the palm leaves (manuscripts). after him other sages (siddhar) like Theraiyar, Pogar, Pulipani etc… have written other manuscripts. Following song is one of the evidence stating the origin.
Nokkuvarmam History
Tamil Sage Agasthiyar is the founder of varmakkalai who lived in the south-pothigai mountains (Kutralam) which is in the southern part of Tamil Nadu ruled by Pandiya kings. His period is said to be before "Sangam Literature". He is also the founder of secret art called Nokkuvarmam and Meitheendakkalai. There is temple for Agasthiyar in Ambasamudram in Tamil Nadu, also still the stone on which he meditated is in the same temple. As per a stanza from a song written by Siddhar (Sage) Agasthiyar which indicates who are all the fake masters.
Aasaan Rajendran
"One good teacher is equal to million books"
Master (Aasaan) Rajendran has been practicing this art for more than 50 years since his childhood and he is a great exponent in this divine art. He is the one who taught this art to the Legendary actor Kamal Hassan in the "INDIAN" in Tamil & "Hindustani" in Hindi directed by Shankar, which became a blockbuster. He has been teaching this many of the students in Madurai (Southern District of Tamilnadu), this art is such divine art which has the capability to cure several diseases. "One good teacher is equal to millions of books", he is such kind of a man.
Manja Varmakkalai Martial Art Academy has been teaching this ancient art for more than 45 years.
varmakkalai@yahoo.com
Copyright © 2018 Manja Varmakkalai. All rights are reserved


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from __future__ import unicode_literals

from django.db import migrations, models

class Migration(migrations.Migration):

    dependencies = [
        ('company', '0011_remove_job_required_data_fields'),
    ]

    operations = [
        migrations.AddField(
            model_name='branch',
            name='readable_degree',
            field=models.CharField(blank=True, max_length=255, null=True),
        ),
        migrations.AddField(
            model_name='branch',
            name='readable_name',
            field=models.CharField(blank=True, max_length=255, null=True),
        ),
    ]

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


It's not uncommon for Dan Krueger to arrive at work before 5 a.m. He has pridefully been immersed in the parts business since the age of 10, when his father helped run a NAPA store.
So, these days, Krueger keeps a watchful eye over his dealership parts department with Tubbs Brothers Inc., in Sandusky, Mich.
"I take pride in it. I work my tail off," says Krueger, who along with his day job as parts manager, serves as the president of the Metro Detroit Ford Lincoln Parts Managers Club.
Krueger happily notes that, in nearly 17 years as a parts manager with Tubbs Brothers, he has never endured a month in the red. That said, he also knows his bosses expect him to continue to produce.
year, Krueger doesn't do so hastily.
"I want to make sure that the new guy is on board with keeping it the same way that we [typically] do things," Krueger explains.
Of course, even the best-laid plans go awry on occasion—a fact Krueger was reminded of last winter.
Virtually throughout his tenure with Tubbs Brothers, Krueger has possessed a hard-working, efficient staff. By early 2018, however, Krueger noticed an outlier in his staff of five full timers.
A backroom clerk was doing subpar work.
Over time, the clerk had become far more enamored with his cell phone than with work assignments. By late 2017, the employee's faults were many. Namely, he displayed a lack of efficiency, productivity, and drive.
By February 2018, the backroom clerk's time was up in Sandusky.
Krueger tries to be a somewhat lenient boss, but he could look the other way no longer. The main quality he demands in his employees is a respectable work ethic, and he was no longer witnessing it in the backroom clerk. So, he severed ties.
"I look for people that pay attention to detail, are concerned about taking initiative," Krueger says.
The ordeal earlier this year prompted Krueger to refine the manner with which he seeks new hires.
For starters, last winter proved to the parts manager that he needs to take staff chemistry into account when making new hires. Since the majority of his staff exhibits exemplary attention to detail, Krueger was reminded that it's unfair to ask for anything less from new hires, even if they're rather inexperienced.
When his parts employees talk to a prospective customer on the phone, for instance, Krueger expects them to take detailed notes about contact information, VIN, or how much they were quoted, for future reference. Anything less opens up the possibilities for inefficiencies later.
Keep an Open Mind. In Krueger's opinion, you can unearth a solid, prospective parts staffer outside the auto industry. In fact, not long ago he ended up hiring an energetic, ambitious worker that he had noticed toiling at a local golf course. To Krueger, keeping an open mind when hiring is every bit as important as networking with colleagues.
Study Resumes and Applications Closely. Certain elements of a resume wave obvious red flags (think job-hopping, or a lack of education). Similarly, certain notes on an application can sound alarms, like an admission of a past criminal act. But Krueger looks even deeper when scanning such documents, and pays particular attention to how applicants fill out paperwork.
"I ask them to fill out a job application, and one of the major things that I check is grammar, and penmanship," he says, explaining that sloppy handwriting hints at a lackadaisical approach to work.
Utilize a Trial Period. In Krueger's mind, a new hire must prove themselves for the better part of a year before he considers a recently vacated staff role 100 percent filled. After making a new hire, he monitors their work at length, and seeks feedback about the recent staff addition.
In recent weeks, anxieties have been eased in Tubbs Brothers' parts department, which has over $250,000 in inventory. Krueger still logs well over 40 hours per week, but he won't lose any sleep over his staffing. His handful of parts department employees are all fully invested in their work.
And, Krueger is confident that, the next time he needs a new parts staffer, he'll have a more streamlined process for quickly pinpointing an ideal job prospect. In fact, the parts manager has even refined his sales pitch to upper management with regard to budgeting for a new hire, pointing out financial figures like his department's typical net profit, and sales per parts department employee.


November 25, 2015 Posted in Curio Collection, Hotel, Photo, The Americas.
We sent Hollywood Florida local and photographer extraordinaire, Tola Osokoya to Diplomat Resort & Spa Hollywood, Curio Collection by Hilton to experience the beautiful property, shoot some awesome photos, and create a Curio Local Guide for Hollywood, Florida, full of tips and local secrets just for you.
What is the best thing about South Florida? It has such a rich history and culture. Whether you come for the sunshine, the white sandy beaches with crystal clear water, the incredible food, or the notorious nightlife, South Florida is the place to get away and enjoy the vacation you will not soon forget.
Can you sum up Hollywood, FL? It is vibrant, has a great atmosphere and has very relaxing vibes. Nestled on the East coast between Miami and Ft Lauderdale it is centrally located giving you access to all South Florida has to offer. Right in the middle of it all is Diplomat Resort & Spa Hollywood. South Florida seems to be alive at any time of day or night, enticing you with its atmosphere that is unlike any other in the country. It is warm, inviting and alluring with an ambiance of attainable luxury at your fingertips. South Florida is that friend you need. The one who is always ready for adventure, day or night, and all the while gives you that feeling that anything is possible at any moment.
What are the people like in Hollywood, FL? The majority of people are warm and welcoming. The locals will tell you Hollywood is Florida's best beach town. It's a melting pot of rich culture.
What is a perfect day on Hollywood, FL? A long stroll on the boardwalk with no rain in sight. The weather would be a perfect 75 degrees with a cool summer evening breeze.
What was your impression of Diplomat Resort & Spa Hollywood, Curio Collection by Hilton? Elegant. Grand. Luxurious. Upon entering the hotel, you are immediately greeted by a grand lobby – complete with beautiful fountains, palm trees and soaring windows looking out onto the Atlantic Ocean.
What was your experience like staying at The Diplomat Resort & Spa Hollywood, Curio Collection by Hilton? From the moment you arrive it is easy to appreciate the outstanding service and attention to detail provided by a friendly and welcoming team who will ensure your stay a seamless retreat. Miles of golden sand and turquoise water of the Atlantic Ocean and striking views of the Intercostal Waterway confirm you are in the middle of a paradise. There is a myriad of activities that cater to all. You can simply relax on the beach or poolside, or plan an entire day filled with fun activities and delicious meals. This includes everything from on-property jet ski rentals to enjoying a massage at Diplomat Spa to enjoying a culinary adventure at Diplomat Prime – the resort's AAA Four Diamond restaurant featuring award-winning steak and seafood menu. Water sports, golf and fishing are all at your fingertips during your stay. The hotel also boasts a one-of-a-kind, infinity-edge pool featuring a porthole with two waterfalls overflowing into a 240-foot lagoon pool. Just lay back and enjoy the view from a poolside cabana while enjoying refreshing libations from the Splash Poolside Grille & Bar.
Please describe a perfect day in Hollywood for someone staying at Diplomat Resort & Spa Hollywood? Why not head out and explore a bit of Hollywood, Florida? This historic beach town has one of the country's best boardwalks. Enjoy a stroll beachside or cool down with a delicious ice cream while you shop for the perfect souvenir – all just steps from the resort. After the boardwalk, make sure to visit the Arts Park at Young Circle featuring interactive fountains designed by internationally acclaimed public artist Ritsuko Taho of Japan. Stay and enjoy a variety of cultural events at any time of the year. Continue your way through this lively town and head over to Aventura Mall for a great shopping experience. If you're in search of a more high-end shopping experience there are the Shops at Bal Harbour. Enjoy a delectable meal at Makoto, one South Florida's premier Japanese restaurants.
Now you are ready for a night out! Spend the night out on the town in one of the city's best places for gaming and entertainment. The Village at Gulfstream Park is just three miles from Diplomat Resort & Spa Hollywood. Shop, dine, catch a live show or just try your luck on the races. Gulfstream Park will quickly become one of your favorite entertainment destinations in South Florida.
Never assume. The area is a melting pot of all cultures. The locals are friendly for the most part and always willing to give a helping hand. If all else fails you will always have the beach.


Beach, Please is a deep burgundy coral with a bronze sheen.
Mini Jar (With Sifter): .75 tsp in a 10 gram jar.
Ingredients: Mica, Iron Oxide, Talc, Zinc Stearate, Titanium Dioxide, Bismuth Oxychloride, Tin Oxide.
Approved For: face, eyes, lips & nails.


Health officials in Wales have started a "methodical" investigation into an outbreak of E.coli.
Seven people have so far been struck down by food poisoning, with three of them taken to hospital. Their condition has been described as "stable".
Public Health Wales, which is part of an outbreak control team to look into the incident, has admitted that they are expecting further cases to emerge "as people can be slow to go to the doctor".
Control team chair Dr Gwen Lowe, consultant in communicable disease control at Public Health Wales, has reassured the public that officials are treating the incident "very seriously".
She added: "Behind the scenes there is an awful lot of follow-up investigation, methodical sifting through evidence, looking at the situation to find out exactly what may have gone on."
Adonis Kebab House on City Road, Cardiff, has been closed by the local authority as a precaution while an investigation into the outbreak is carried out.


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Democrats Drift Far Left of Obama
By Daily Editorials
A late 2018 Gallup poll determined the most popular couple in the United States. The honor goes to former President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle. The former president has a 95% approval rating among Democrats. By every measure, Obama is the Democratic Party's most beloved and successful figure since John F. Kennedy.
If the Democratic Party were in touch with ordinary Americans, its mainstream candidates for president would honor Obama's legacy. They would promise more of what he did. That did not happen during Wednesday's 10-person debate.
Incredibly, they threw Obama under the bus. He is just too far right for this bunch.
The Obama bashing came during an immigration spat about open borders and children in border cages built by the Obama administration. And, yes, that claim is true. Ask the left-leaning fact-check site, Snopes:
"Claim: The Obama administration, not the Trump administration, built the cages that hold many immigrant children at the U.S.-Mexico border."
Rating: "True"
Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet, a long-time friend of The Gazette's editorial board, stood up to hard-left candidates who want to decriminalize illegal border crossings. Bennet said he opposes open borders, but supports a pathway to citizenship and deferred action for childhood arrivals (DACA).
Soon thereafter, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio went straight after Obama. He repeatedly tried to corner Joe Biden, Obama's vice president, with the former president's immigration policies. Did Biden, de Blasio demanded, try to stop Obama from enacting millions of deportations that outnumber those under Trump's watch.
"Did you use your power to stop those deportations?" de Blasio asked. "Did you say they're a good idea or is this a mistake and we shouldn't do it?"
Biden declined to reveal what he said to Obama in private.
Few Americans, even in New York, take de Blasio seriously. If it were just him, no big thing. It wasn't. New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker quickly piled on at Obama's expense.
"Mr. vice president, you can't have it both ways. You invoke Obama more than anyone in this campaign," Booker said to Biden.
Other Democrats stayed quiet, leaving Obama as a target of derision second only to Trump. It highlights for all Americans the radical nature of the majority of primary candidates. It tells them this is not the party of Obama.
The debate consisted of Bennet; New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand; Former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julian Castro, of Texas; Booker; Biden; Harris; New York entrepreneur Andrew Yang; Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard; Washington Gov. Jay Inslee; and de Blasio.
The schism between mainstream Democrats and the radical left emerged first during Wednesday's health care segment, when Biden and Bennet challenged the viability of a health care giveaway proposed by Harris.
"It doesn't make sense to take insurance from people in this room and raise taxes on" the middle class, Bennet said.
Harris told Bennet her plan takes no individual's insurance. It merely separates health care from the employer, she explained, liberating Americans from jobs they don't like.
Bennet and Biden continued reminding Harris her plan would cost $30 trillion to implement, imposing a substantial tax increase on the middle class.
Other far-left platforms included Yang's pandering promise to give each American $1,000 a month for life if they make him president. Candidates promised to eliminate fossil fuels immediately to stop global warming. Even Biden promised to eliminate fossil fuels by phasing them out during his presidency.
Inslee balked at Biden's pledge, declaring we have no time to phase them out. Visualize life without fossil fuels immediately after the 2020 election. No one could charge electric cars.
Post-debate polls may show a bump for Bennet, who hadn't topped 1% in the polls before the debate. He had a breakout moment, leading to robust applause, when he spoke about education — a neglected topic Americans care about.
"This is the fourth debate and the second time that we have been debating 50 years ago with busing when our schools are as segregated today as they were 50 years ago," said Bennet, the former superintendent of Denver public schools. "We need a conversation about what's happening now. And when there's a group of kids in this country that doesn't get preschool through no fault of their own and another group does, equal is not equal.
"And we've got a group of K-12 schools that are good because families can spend a million bucks. And you've got the Detroit public schools that are as segregated as they were, equal is not equal.
"And let me tell you something else ... I believe you can draw a straight line from slavery through Jim Crow through the banking to the redlining to the mass incarceration we were talking about on this stage a few minutes ago. But you know what other line I can draw? Eighty-eight percent of the people in our prisons dropped out of high school. Let's fix our school system and maybe we can fix the prison pipeline that we have."
Bennet distinguished himself throughout the debate as a voice of reason and reality in a bastion of socialists gone rad.
It is hard to imagine the Democratic Party moving so far left of Obama, former President Bill Clinton and FDR. It is harder to imagine average Americans electing any of the party's leading, socialistic candidates. They are too extreme and doctrinaire.
REPRINTED FROM THE COLORADO SPRINGS GAZETTE
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The Confraternity of Catholic Clergy relies on the prayers and financial support of faithful Roman Catholics who want to help their orthodox clergy (i.e., those loyal to the Pope and Magisterium) continue their ongoing spiritual, theological and pastoral formation in a fraternal setting. Many Catholic priests, deacons and seminarians are unable to attend our annual convocations due to the expenses of travel; many are unable even to pay their annual dues. Your free-will contribution will help us keep costs down and if we get enough sponsors we can even offer scholarships to clergy who are on a very low fixed income yet who want to participate fully in our organization. Our very modest dues barely cover the expense of printing and mailing a quarterly journal let alone pay for the annual convocation.
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Simply click the PAYPAL button below to be sent to our PayPal account where you then follow the instructions.
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The partnerships puff
Where does our growing drive to work in partnership come from? And is it anything more than a way of sweetening the bitter pill of funding cuts? Dr James Doeser shares his thoughts.
metropilot (CC BY 2.0)
You may have read about a new report published by King's College London here in ArtsProfessional two weeks ago. The report looked at partnerships in the arts, and the bulk of the report was based upon a detailed survey of organisations up and down the country who took the time to reflect on how they go about the business of partnering. As part of the project I was asked to look at the history of partnerships in the UK, and to try and answer the question: how did we get here?
As a researcher, answering the question was not an easy task. 'Partnership' is hard to define. It's something that appears in various guises in the literature, and it's something that people are only keen to document when it succeeds.
I turned first to the Annual Reports of Arts Council England, and landmark documents like John Maynard Keynes' 1945 article for 'The Listener', Jennie Lee's 1965 'Policy for the Arts', John Redcliffe-Maud's 1974 report for the Gulbenkian Foundation, along with a handful of material documenting the launch of grand projects like the National Lottery and Creative Partnerships. It was an opportunity for me to take another look at the material I used to inform 'Step by Step' (an earlier King's Cultural Enquiry that examined the evolution of policy on the arts and young people).
I was able to identify four general phases in how partnership has been conceived of, in cultural policy terms. These are outlined in the report under the headings: (Re-)Building an infrastructure: 1945–65; Working better together: 1966–90; The obligation partner: 1991–2001; and Partnership abounds: 2002–15.
the growing impetus to partner has grown out of an increasing complexity in the UK's cultural infrastructure, ongoing scarcity of resources, and a desire to formalise and professionalise the sector.
What became clear as I worked through the historical material was how the growing impetus to partner has grown out of an increasing complexity in the UK's cultural infrastructure, ongoing scarcity of resources, and a desire to formalise and professionalise the sector. There were also moments in the research where I was left thinking the more things change, the more they stay the same.
For example, there was one such moment when I stumbled across the announcement of this appointment in an old Arts Council Annual Report: "Mrs. Freda McLean, who took up her duties on April 1st, 1949, and became responsible for the increasing programme of collaboration with Local Authorities' concentrating'on new regional experiments, particularly those sponsored by Local Authorities, and to this end to co-operate closely with Regional Directors and with arts clubs, arts centres, and similar bodies in all parts of the country'." I am informed that this pretty much resembles the job description of Paul Bristow, the current Director of Strategic Partnerships at the Arts Council.
Throughout the decades, and especially from the 1970s onwards, the recommendation to partner has featured in sector-wide reviews, suggesting that 'partnership' rhetoric is outpacing the reality. In 1974 Redcliffe-Maud was highly skeptical that the partnerships puff was making any real difference on the ground. He recommended that the Regional Arts Associations and the Arts Council "convert their existing partnership into much more of a reality than it has yet become".
So where are we left today? The cultural sector we inhabit is an inheritance. This is what gives it strength and weakness: strength that derives from buildings and artistic traditions that enrich our country, but also weakness insofar as this heritage can be a burden for those whose instincts are to reform or innovate. Policymakers are not presented with a blank slate. Thankfully, we do not live in 1945. This means that much of the leverage that policymakers and funders have is used to try and make the system work better, to be more efficient and more effective. Consider the Cultural Education Challenge from earlier in the month. This isn't about new institutions or new money – the core of the policy is about partnership and co-ordination.
But remember not to confuse rhetoric with reality. The cultural sector can be a factional and competitive place. And politicians and policymakers have looked to partnership as a means to sweeten the bitter pill of funding cuts. If the sector is being asked to do more with less then inevitably this means doing things in partnership. The history of the sector suggests that partnerships will always be with us, but so will the urge to partner more. Does this mean we've yet to get it right?
Dr James Doeser is Research Associate, Culture at King's College London.
www.kcl.ac.uk
Comment from Deborah Bull:
Our third Cultural Enquiry was inspired by what appeared to us to be an increased focus on partnership in the cultural sector – both from policy makers, who seemed to be promoting partnership as a way of maximizing ever-scarcer resources; and by artists and arts organisations, who seemed to be embracing partnership in order to realise ambitious ideas and connect with new audiences.
The Enquiry has brought together the views of almost 100 organisations across the country; it benefited from the expertise of 16 advisers; and listened to voices from every sector – from museums, through performance to community arts.
It is, almost certainly, the most comprehensive and up to date survey of partnership working in the UK's cultural sector today – and I very much hope that its rich insights and thoughtful considerations help us all towards a deeper understanding of the nature, practice and complexities that make partnering, at its best, an art.
Deborah Bull is Director of Culture, King's College London
The art of partnering is the final report of a Cultural Enquiry in collaboration with the BBC that explores the role partnership plays in enabling publicly funded cultural institutions to enhance the quality and diversity of their work across the UK. Read the report - including the Enquiry's findings, the history of the term 'partnership' within cultural policy and detailed case studies - here.
James Doeser
A move towards self-determination
Awareness versus engagement
Looking at Londoners
Partnerships a mixed blessing, research finds
Robin Cantrill-Fenwick on why individual emotional resilience will also be essential to seeing out the pandemic… t.co/djrhAcU5J3


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Геномная ДНК — ДНК, являющаяся частью генома, в противопоставление внехромосомным ДНК наподобие плазмид. Геномную ДНК часто сокращают как gDNA (gДНК).

Геном организма содержит информацию о наследственности, и передает такую информацию из поколения в поколение. Геном транскрибируется в РНК, которые необходимы для жизни организма. Некоторые РНК подвергаются процессингу, сплайсингу (при этом вырезаются интроны и образуется зрелая мРНК). Зрелая мРНК далее транслируется на рибосомах в белки.

Примечание

ДНК

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


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You are here: Home / Issues / Women Absent as Republican Leaders of the House in Incoming Congress
Women Absent as Republican Leaders of the House in Incoming Congress
November 29, 2012 By Latinovations Staff
Following a day of closed meetings, the House Republican Steering Committee elected a committee of chairs consisting of all male lawmakers for the incoming 113th Congress.
On Tuesday, House Speaker John Boehner announced the 19 House GOP committee chairs. Of the 19 members, none were women or minorities. However, Politico explains that there is the possibility that a woman could be chosen as the chair for either the House Ethics Committee or the House Administration Committee.
"Disappointed to see House committee chairmanships in the 113th Congress will not include a single woman. –PM," tweeted Senator Patty Murray (D-Wash.) shortly after the announcement.
Huffington Post writer Jennifer Bendery notes that House committee chairs are elected based on seniority, and most Republican committees do not have women or minorities in senior level positions. In comparison, of the 19 major Democratic House committees, nine of the Democrats are expected to be a woman or a minority.
"One would think House Republicans would learn from their mistakes. But they have elected a roster of committee chairs that represent their ranks: old white men," says a senior Democratic aide.
Once the 113th Congress gets underway in January 2013, the House Republicans will have a total of 20 women representatives; while there will be 61 women on the House Democrat side.
"The GOP needs appeal to Latinos, African Americans, women, and all other minorities if they are ever to aspire to be a majority party again. Not having any women included in leadership position in the GOP-led House of Representatives is certainly not a good start to the kind of massive brand overhaul the Republican Party needs," says Maria Cardona, Principal at The Dewey Square Group and CNN Contributor.
UPDATE: As of 11/30/2012, Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) announced that Representative Candice Miller (R-Mich) will be leading the House Administration Committee, in what several experts have called a direct response to the negative backlash Republicans received for not appointing any women or minorities in their original announcement.
Filed Under: Issues, Politics, Today's Feature Tagged With: Capitol Hill, Congress, Democratic, GOP, House, House Committee, House of Representatives, Republican


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Virtual workshop: Observing and Measuring Chinese Influence: Managing Risk and Reaction
Online workshop via Zoom.
Political activities of the People's Republic of China (PRC) and its supporters have led to heightened concern about threats to national security in various parts of the world. Covert and overt overseas attempts to increase its influence are in the Chinese Communist Party's DNA, and have been intensifying under Xi Jinping. Beijing has been advancing its views with increasing confidence and vigour, and various international economic actors share extensive overlapping interests with the Chinese party-state. While there is growing evidence of attempts of the PRC to influence the internal affairs of other countries, it is typically harder to observe influence effects. How to understand and measure the influence activities of the PRC and what are their domestic political implications? How to design effective policy responses to these well-founded security concerns, while at the same time avoid inflammatory public discourse and a rushed legislature response?
Alastair Iain Johnston is the Professor of China in World Affairs at Harvard University. Iain Johnston's research and teaching interests include socialization in international institutions, the analysis of identity in the social sciences, and ideational sources of strategic choice, mostly with reference to China and East Asia.
Björn Jerdén is the Head of Asia Programme at the Swedish Institute of International Affairs. Björn's research focuses on the international relations of China, Japan and the United States. He has a PhD in political science from Stockholm University and has been a visiting fellow at National Chengchi University, National Taiwan University and Harvard University.
Andrew Chubb is a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow at Lancaster University. A graduate of the University of Western Australia, his work examines the linkages between Chinese domestic politics and international relations. More broadly, Andrew's interests include maritime and territorial disputes, strategic communication, political propaganda, and Chinese Communist Party history.
Anastas Vangeli is a doctoral researcher at the Polish Academy of Sciences (PAN) where he recently completed his PhD dissertation titled "Symbolic Power and Principle-Diffusion Through China's Belt and Road Initiative." Anastas is also an affiliate of the Cross-Regional Research and Training Program (CONSIRT) at PAN and the Ohio State University, a non-resident researcher at the Turin World Affairs Institute.


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Sylvain Reynard on Gabriel's Inferno, The Raven, and E.L. James
by AC Rose · November 4, 2015
By A.C. Rose
Like many readers, I first discovered Gabriel's Inferno, by Sylvain Reynard, right after reading Fifty Shades of Grey.
While still in a stupor from the Christian Grey book hangover so many of us endured, I noticed everyone was talking about a new brilliant, gorgeous, hot, sexy alpha named Professor Gabriel Emerson. On Facebook, fans were posting photos of British model David Gandy as their fantasy image of the sensuous professor and proclaiming the book was a must read.
British model David Gandy
So I got the book, sat down in my reading chair one Saturday, and did not emerge until the wee hours of Sunday morning. It was a unique and memorable love story that offered readers a surprising history lesson as it evoked the relationship of Beatrice and Dante in Dante Alighieri's Inferno.
A well-respected Dante expert by day and hedonistic explorer by night, Professor Emmerson was commanding, controlling, and difficult. He was especially rude—mean– to his graduate student, Julia Mitchell. But love would change him, and he would transform into one of the most loving, devoted, and sexually patient men on the planet. Seriously patient!
Christian Grey was stunned to learn of Ana Steele's virginity and said, "We're going to rectify the situation right now." Gabriel Emmerson, however, committed to a long, slow foreplay and getting-to- know-you that was like a never ending soul kiss. He savored Julia's maidenhead, taking her slowly.
Gabriel's Inferno, and the second book, Gabriel's Rapture, were published by a small publishing company and — soon after landing on the New York Times best seller list –they were scooped up by Berkley. Eventually, Gabriel's Redemption, was published to complete the trilogy.
One of the great mysteries of the work of Sylvain Reynard is, well, Sylvain Reynard. Pseudonyms are common in romance writing, and no one ever questions them, yet people are curious about this author because they have never seen a photo. Contact is always through representatives. We know this author hails from Canada, and many accounts tell us that Reynard identifies as a male. But you get the sense that Reynard could be a real life Dante expert or a professor, because you come away from the books a little smarter.
Some reports say that Inferno, like Fifty Shades, began as fanfiction. As it turns out, Reynard is pals with E.L. James and, not only do they share some of the same readers, they wrote something together this year. In 2015 Reynard also published The Prince: A Gabriel's Inferno/Florentine Series Novella and The Raven (Florentine Series Book 1). Look for book two in the series, The Shadow, in February 2016. It is available for pre-order now.
The author was kind enough to grant us an e-mail interview and we must say the conversation was very polite. "Thank you for the invitation to join you and your readers" the author begins. "It's a pleasure to be with you."
A.C. Rose: What made you select Dante as Professor Emerson's expertise, and Julia's interest as well?
Sylvain Reynard: The story of Dante and Beatrice is beautiful but it isn't widely known. I wanted to introduce the tale to a wider audience and hopefully inspire an interest in Dante, Florence, and Italian art and culture.
Professor Emerson has become a beloved, iconic fictional alpha male. What do you think made him stand out and gives him staying power with fans?
Thank you. I think part of his appeal is his old-fashioned approach to courting Julia. He has very strong ideas about how to treat a woman and I think those ideas were attractive to many readers.
Gabriel's Inferno and Gabriel's Rapture were originally published by a small press. How did you go from being with a small publisher to a famous franchise with a major publisher?
The success of The Gabriel Series is due to the readers. They liked the novels and told their friends and family about them. Word spread and both books hit the New York Times Bestseller list. After that, I was approached by a couple of major publishers and chose to go with Berkley, which is a division of Penguin. [Penguin has since merged with Random House].
Your books were among the very first to gain popularity right after the huge surge of interest in Fifty Shades of Grey. I remember everyone was reading them and talking about them. But interestingly, Inferno is like a long, slow, kiss. It's sensual foreplay, not wild sex.
In keeping with the story of Dante and Beatrice, in "Gabriel's Inferno," I focused on the building of the relationship between Julia and Gabriel. Desire, attraction, and slow seduction were part of that.
How do you think readers came to associate it with the more graphic and penetrative sex in Fifty Shades?
Part of it has to do with my friendship with EL James. We've been friends for several years and have always shared readers, although her readership is much larger. Part of it has to do with the strong nature of the male leads in both our series.
Women were uttering the name Professor Emerson in the same sentence as Christian Grey. Do you see any similarities?
Both characters are strong, damaged, and in need of redemption. And I'd argue both characters search for that redemption partially through their romantic relationships.
Why do you think that approach was so gratifying to readers who were hungry for hot love stories? Was it because Gabriel's delicate treatment of Julia's virginity showed us how deeply he loved her?
That's what readers have said to me, yes. They enjoyed the way Gabriel both admired and loved Julia and how she and he balanced one another out.
And how was it writing that book, without rushing them into sex, and then finally consummating and building the sexual love, along with the relationship, in the series?
My goal in writing the novel was to tell a story of redemption, love, and sex. Since it was modeled on the relationship between Dante and Beatrice sex wasn't the main focus. Eventually it becomes part of the narrative but by that point the characters have already built a strong connection.
Since the release of Gabriel's Inferno and Gabriel's Rapture, the series has grown. For new readers, can you give us the order, including upcoming books and any novellas?
The Gabriel Trilogy has three novels: Gabriel's Inferno,, Gabriel's Rapture, and Gabriel's Redemption. While it's possible I'll add to this at the moment the series is closed. However, readers will find some of the characters (Including the Professor and Julia) in my newest series, The Florentine Trilogy.
We heard you have created a fun project with E.L. James. Can you reveal what it is, where to find it, and how it came about?
E.L.James and I have been friends for some time. She's smart, she's witty, and she's very creative. We've bantered online before and so she and I decided to co-author a short work simply for fun. You can read our story on her website. Here's the link: http://blog.eljamesauthor.com/?p=1088
Tell us about your lates book, The Raven, book one in The Florentine Series? It came out in February.
The Raven is a paranormal romance set in contemporary Florence. Raven Wood is an art restorer who works at the famous Uffizi Gallery. One night, a tragic event occurs. She wakes up with no memory of the event or the days following it. When she returns to work, she discovers that the Uffizi has sustained one of the largest robberies in its history – a priceless set of Botticelli illustrations has been stolen. And she is shocked to discover she is a person of interest.
In order to clear her name, Raven seeks out a mysterious man who is associated with the Gallery. Their confrontation introduces Raven to the dark, secret underworld of the city and a society of beings who are not human.
Wow! Is there a sexy hero we will want to get to know in The Raven?
Yes. The male lead of The Raven is the Prince of Florence, who rules the supernatural underworld. He is introduced to readers in the prequel to The Raven, which is entitled, The Prince. Both books are now available.
And when can we look forward to your next book?
The Shadow will be out from Berkley on Feb 2, 2016. Raven Wood's vampyre prince returns, pledging his love and promising justice for every wrong done to her. In the wake of their reunion, Raven is faced with a terrible decision—allow the Prince to wreak vengeance against the demons of her past, or persuade him to stay his hand. But there is far more at stake than Raven's heart.
Wow, cannot wait to read it! Back to one our favorite topics…Many of your fans think model David Gandy could play Professor Emerson. If you could select the dream cast for a movie, who would you choose?
I've tried not to comment because I want to keep an open mind. Certainly, David Gandy has been recommended by many readers but so has Henry Cavill.
Where does the magic happen? Do you write in a home office or on the road, or both?
I write daily, usually in my home office. But when I'm doing research for a book, I write wherever my research takes me. When I was working on The Raven, for example, I wrote in Florence. It was a great experience.
And the question we ask all authors: Why do you think erotic romances are good for readers?
For me, the eroticism of a tale is diminished if there isn't a connection between the characters. That connection, perhaps, is what all human beings are looking for – desire, attraction, love, respect, and transcendence. So perhaps it's the case that erotic love stories expose what humanity wants and desperately needs, but rarely finds.
Visit Sylvain Reynard's website.
Follow Sylvain Reynard on Facebook.
Tags: ac roseerotic romance novelsthe three tomatoes
Maya Rodale on Romance, Rogues, and Lady Bridget's Diary
10 Reasons We Fell for Mr. Christian Grey
Hot n' Sexy for a Cure
AC Rose
A.C. Rose is a sex and love journalist. She also writes very steamy romance books.
She is former editor of an iconic women's magazine and has written extensively on sexuality, relationships, female desire, hot men, and the "kissing book" industry.
As our HOT ROMANCE columnist, she regularly interviews today's most popular authors and experts about books, women's fantasies, handsome Alpha heroes, and penning passionate love stories.
She is a member of the Romance Writers of America (RWA), Passionate Ink (PI), and the Author's Guild (AG).
Find A.C. Rose's latest books here: A.C. Rose books
Visit with A.C. Rose here:
A.C. Rose


ECC Chiang Mai Project 1 is of the intention to build a new shopping in the Tha Sala region of Chiang Mai.
A 3 stories shopping center, consisting of a shopping mall and entertainment facilities 80,000 – 100,000 m² over three floors including of semi-basement parking for 2200 cars (excluding the works details in the tenants area).
External Works: The parking area for customers, service trucks operations, drainage system, all constructions that facilitate M&E works and the entire perimeter fence.
For the implementation of the project C-RH acting as the consulting engineer, is responsible for design, project / construction management & construction supervision and quantity survey for tendering.


In need of Minburn Bail Bonds? Numerous Minburn bail bonds agents can bail you (or another person) out anytime of the day or night in Minburn. Bail Bonds Network makes it easy to find and get in touch with a licensed bail bonds agent in Minburn, Iowa. At your request, many bail bonds companies will come pick you up privately. Payment plans are usually available depending on each case.
Upon arrest anywhere in Dallas county, a person must be processed at the Dallas county jail. To be released from Dallas jail, several steps must occur, including being booked and posting bail. Once the bail bond amount is decided, a bail bond agent is sent to post the bond at the local jail. Now the jail release process starts and typically can take anywhere from 1-2 hours to complete. Even though cash bonds are acceptable, it is normally not a common practice due to financial limitations.


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Música, Cine, Teatro
Cine: General, obra de referencia
Lorena Velázquez
Portada del libro de Lorena Velázquez
Beauty Pageant, Teresa Velázquez, Miss Universe, Miss Mexico
Chrono Press (2011-10-31 )
Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Lorena Velázquez (born December 15, 1937) is a Mexican actress and former beauty pageant titleholder. Born María de la Concepción Lorena Villar Dondé in Mexico City, Velázquez debuted in 1955. She competed in Miss Mexico in 1958 and placed second. Afterwards she was appointed Miss Mexico 1960, although she refused to represent Mexico in the Miss Universe pageant. Velázquez played varied roles in the 60's, from a vedette, to a cowgirl and even as the queen of vampires. She also played two antagonic roles in a film, as queen of a far away planet and her twin (picture). In the 70's, she made the transition to television. Since then, she has alternated between the large and small screens.
Chrono Press
http://www.alphascript-publishing.com
Pollux Évariste Kjeld
television, Film, Series, Actor, role, Filmanalyse, Actors, Roles


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Lo stadio comunale Giovanni Bruccoleri è un impianto sportivo polifunzionale di Favara (AG), localizzato nella periferia settentrionale del comune.
Prende il nome da Giovanni Bruccoleri, sportivo ed insegnante di Educazione Fisica, allenatore di calcio che ha militato anche nell'Akragas della serie C1, scomparso prematuramente. Bruccoleri persona conosciuta e amata soprattutto dai giovani si è speso per la diffusione del calcio e della trasmissione di sani valori.
Negli anni 80/90, periodo del dilagare delle droghe pesanti, ha fondato una scuola calcio totalmente gratuita, aperta a tutti i giovani, distraendoli dai pericoli provenienti dalla strada, mirando alla formazione dell'uomo e del cittadino prima ancora che dell'atleta calciatore.
Dopo la scomparsa avvenuta nel settembre del 1991, vi è stata la proposta, del consigliere comunale Angelo Caramanno, accolta dalla giunta del sindaco Airò, di intitolare lo stadio comunale al compianto Giovanni Bruccoleri.

Caratteristiche tecniche
Lo stadio Bruccoleri dispone di 3.500 posti così suddivisi:

Le dimensioni di gioco sono di 110 x 60 m, e il terreno di gioco è in erba sintetica di 3ª generazione.

Lo stadio Bruccoleri dispone inoltre, ai lati della tribuna centrale, di un campo da pallacanestro (attualmente non praticabile) e di uno da tennis entrambi all'aperto e provvisti di una piccola gradinata.

Cronologia lavori
Realizzato per sostituire il vecchio campo del Seminario Vescovile Giovanile, venne inaugurato nel 1971, e con il passare degli anni vennero costruiti Gradinata e Curva.

Fino alla fine degli anni '90 la gradinata disponeva di una copertura che venne rimossa per ottenere l'agibilità ad ospitare partite del Campionato Nazionale Dilettanti.

Nell'estate 2007 lo Stadio "Bruccoleri" è stato interessato da lavori, conclusi nel dicembre dello stesso anno, che oltre ad alcune piccole migliorie, lo hanno dotato di erba sintetica di 3ª generazione (tra i primi ad averlo su tutto il panorama nazionale).

Nei primi mesi del 2010 è stata sostituita la copertura della tribuna centrale.
Sono previsti ulteriori lavori per il potenziamento dell'impianto di illuminazione attualmente insufficiente e non a norma.

Nell'estate del 2020 sono stati effettuati interventi di tinteggiatura degli spogliatoi, della curva nord e della gradinata.
Sono previsti ulteriori lavori di riqualificazione da effettuare mediante un finanziamento di 700.000 euro ricevuto dal Ministero dello Sport grazie alla partecipazione al bando "Sport e Periferie 2020"

Beneficiari
Beneficiaria dello stadio è la squadra di calcio della città: la Pro Favara 1984 che milita nel Girone A del Campionato Regionale di Eccellenza.

Galleria d'immagini

Note

Altri progetti

Impianti sportivi del libero consorzio comunale di Agrigento
Architetture di Favara
Sport a Favara


Malbec is the stuff of wine legend: Once, the yeoman grape of southwest France; uniformly ripped from its roots in the 1950s with complaints of vineyard disease and susceptibility to frost; replaced by more glamorous varieties including Cabernet. Spared from oblivion only by cuttings brought to Argentina in the 1850s but again, generally ripped up in favor of (then) more glamorous grapes including Bonarda.
Fortune changed for Malbec in the 1990s. By then, the vine had adapted to Argentina's vineyards, transforming France's weedy Malbec flavors to something velvet, juicy and imminently enjoyable. Canny winegrowers, campaigning for international investment in Argentina's (then) stable economy, gambled on Malbec as a unique product in a crowded international wine market. They won. Today, Argentine Malbec is a star, with worldwide shipments -- as well as backing from the wine world's biggest bank accounts -- soaring. Now, with the world awash in excellent to not-so-good Malbec, producer Santiago Achaval-Ferrer (Ah-CHA-val fair-AIR) is betting that wine drinkers want Malbec of profound character, structure and complexity, and are willing to pay for it.
A bright beam of acidity highlights texturous flavors of plump blackberry and raspberry fruit with green tobacco accents, silky tannin and a long, satisfying finish. Low yields, meticulous vineyard management and hands-off winemaking (including no filtration) make this Malbec a delicious red wine cocktail and complement to light or rich meats, including Steak Tartare, Carpaccio, Steak Salad and lamb chops, as served by Michael Jordan's Steak House, Chicago.
Since 1999, Achaval-Ferrer has set the bar for Argentine winemaking, beginning with a 5-star rating from Decanter, (the self-described "best wine magazine in the world") for his first release, the single-vineyard Finca Altamira.
In 2012, Achaval-Ferrer claimed the #10 spot of the Wine Spectator's "Top 100 Wines" with the Finca Bella Vista, 2010.
This is hands-off winemaking. Vineyards up to 120 years old are planted on original, pre-phylloxera rootstock at 2,400 to 3,400 feet into the Andes. In the desert-like climate, vines are watered by pristine snow melt, grapes ripen in the purest sunshine.
Other producers protect high-elevation vineyards from birds and hail with netting, but Achaval-Ferrer refuses to sacrifice even one wavelength of sun to the shadow of nets. "We have lost whole vintages to hail, but sunlight is fundamental to the finest grain of tannin." He adds with his mischievous grin, "My investors think I'm crazy, but I'm fascinated by how something that is aesthetically pleasing also sells."
With single vineyards, Achaval-Ferrer allows Malbec to be profoundly expressive of place; in "Quimera", he explores winemaking creativity in blending.
"Quimera" reflects the historic Bordeaux blend of Malbec, Cabernet Franc, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Petit Verdot. The 2010 vintage is perfumous and dense, with finely-woven tannin wrapped around flavors of ripe fruit, herbs, licorice and exotic spice ($36.) Achaval-Ferrer recommends patience for 10 years of maturation, then three hours of decanting.
Even Achaval-Ferrer's entry-level Malbec (see Ross's Choice) is a textbook example of what wine should be: distinctive, very drinkable and refreshing.
He found Malbec's refreshing acidity by accident. "Fifteen years ago, we began pruning vineyards, culling less-than-perfect fruit to increase complexity. We found that vines adapted by ripening early, retaining natural acidity in grape."
Between rising labor and land costs and overproduction, the days of decent under-$10 Malbec are over but -- at least for Achaval-Ferrer -- business is booming. His happy importer reports, "We sold out the previous vintage; the new vintage isn't bottled but we already have full commitments."
Santiago Achaval-Ferrer bet on the world's wine drinker taste for quality and he's won.
• Write to Advanced Sommelier and Certified Wine Educator Mary Ross at food@dailyherald.com.


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Pictures Of Nuristan And Northern Laghman
To Prove A Lie; But Why?
Citizen Soldier; The "Peacetime" Mission
Origins Of A Deployment, Origins Of A Blog
It's A Marathon, Not A Sprint; Fisher House
The French Scoop US MSM Again
Hear Ye, Hear Ye
The latest post, below and made only early this morning, is significant news. It is news from a small valley in Afghanistan which is both a microcosm of the Global War on Terror and a crucial battle in establishing a secure, democratic, and independent Afghanistan.
The Tag Ab Valley is relatively close to Kabul. It follows a generally north-south axis starting near the town of Surobi (sometimes spelled "Sarobi,") and runs north to Nijrab. The districts of Kapisa Province north of the Nijrab District are peaceful and contrast strongly with the southern districts of Nijrab, Tag Ab, and Ala Say (sometimes spelled "Ala Sai" or Alah Say.")
In the spring of 2007, the Tag Ab Valley was an area that experienced occasional encroachments by American Special Forces and Afghan National Army troops. The major operations that had been conducted in the valley to that point had been clearing operations followed by an absence of any stay-behind forces, save for a Special Forces camp at what was known at the time as Firebase Nijrab. An ANA force in approximately company strength could also be found at Firebase Nijrab, now known as Firebase Morales-Frazier.
The Taliban and HiG controlled the southern half of the Nijrab District, nearly all of Tag Ab District and all of Ala Say District. The only island of IRoA (Islamic Republic of Afghanistan) control in Tag Ag was a tiny area around the District Center. The Taliban would occasionally surround the District Center and besiege the local ANP for an entire day, just to show them who was boss. In May of 2007, the Taliban publicly hung an Afghan official in the town square. He was an official in the Afghan intelligence agency.
The Tag Ab Valley, with its large HiG (larger, in fact, than the Taliban) presence, was full of opium. It is an historic smuggling route, circumventing passage through Kabul by bypassing to the north at Surobi.
Surobi is a lovely little town on the Naghlu Reservoir. Nestled into the rising terrain south of the reservoir and straddling the strategic J-bad Highway which connects Kabul and Jalalabad, Surobi seems almost Mediterranean in its charm. It is also the site of last month's ambush on French forces that left 10 dead and 21 wounded.
It's a beautiful, strategic, dangerous little town anchoring the southern end of this historic smuggling route.
Surobi is also a key link in another kind of smuggling; the smuggling of suicide bombers into Kabul.
Suicide bombers, either wearing explosive vests or driving VBIED's (Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Devices,) are the biggest threat to security in Kabul. Tag Ab has been a traditional staging area for such attacks. It has been a place where attacks on Kabul can be planned, organized, and the forces marshaled.
Tag Ab is a key valley. It is the closest hardcore Taliban stronghold to Kabul, and the terminus for the infiltration of weapons, explosives, foreign fighters and money.
It is not the only key valley in Afghanistan, but it one with which I am personally intimate. To me, right now, it is the symbol of how woefully ignorant our own press is; and by extension, the American people, of the situation on the ground in Afghanistan.
Confirmation was released by CJTF 101 just a couple of days ago that one of the key Taliban commanders in Tag Ab was killed on August 5th near the town of Tag Ab in this strategic valley. Qari Nejat was a key thorn in our side for the entire time I was in Afghanistan. He was the most effective and active Taliban commander in the valley.
We didn't even know what he looked like. This guy was like Pancho Villa, Geronimo, and Osama bin Ladin all wrapped up into one. He was ethereal; a vicious ghost who glided through the valley and was always a step ahead of us. Evidence of his actions against the coalition, IRoA forces (both ANA and ANP,) and the local populace was as consistent as the tides; from ambushes to burning Police checkpoints to summary beheadings, Qari Nejat was credited with a lot of violence.
He was a key player in a key battle in a key valley; and the only Americans who ever heard his name were either there or read this blog. That is patently ridiculous. I'm sure that this isn't the only instance of this. Beyond sure, I am absolutely positive. This is part of what I wrote about in my post called "Information Operations."
Since my return home, I've been stunned by the lack of knowledge, concern, and investment that many, the greatest perecentage actually, of my fellow citizens have towards the war. Because of its nature, and because the privations of the war are only acutely felt by service members, it is easy for the average Joe and Jane to continue their daily lives as if we weren't in any kind of serious struggle. The delusion of incontrovertible safety, apparently cracked but not shattered by 9/11, has once again settled on the Land of the Free.
The war has become a bother, and it has finally caused pain for the average American, who several years in the past howled for vengeance for 9/11, demanded that the government fulfill its mandate to provide for the common defense, and cried out in near unison for the blood of not just Osama but of Saddam Hussein as well. Revise your personal history if you will, but I lived those days here in the States, surrounded by my fellow citizens, and I heard the cries and received the emails full of belligerent jokes and vitriolic cartoons. I watched in slow motion as the nation whipped itself into a frenzy and the UN agreed that Saddam had a deadline to completely submit or face action.
Now it has hurt the economy. Now it has driven (among such factors as a surging Chinese middle class with a new found ability to operate vehicles with internal combustion engines) the price of oil up. Now it has reversed the trend and piled up a significant debt.
Wars are expensive. The war became tedious on television news and the sensationalization of the American death toll became a daily litany that constantly reminded the American public that we were decisively engaged in a protracted effort. The initial love affair between the press and the military, expressed through embedded reporting, was brief. The reporting, of dubious quality in many cases, trickled off; and there were altercations. Reporters don't like OPSEC.
What was supposed to be, in the minds of the public whose minds had been informed by their press, a brief and surgical beheading of the government of Iraq followed by a joyous resurgence of democratic principles became an insurgency. Roadside bombings fed with the artillery shells we had left laying around in our blitz to Baghdad became daily fair in the news as the soldiers struggled to stay on top of the new gun/armor spiral.
Concurrently, in Afghanistan, we began to train a new Afghan National Army. Afghanistan held their first elections and successfully negotiated the forming of a new Constitution. The Taliban and their ilk, still reeling from the loss, were still making a game of it.
The American press retired to the Green Zone and to Kabul. They hired local stringers and reported only on death and destruction. Of particular interest were the wrongs that inevitably become part of the landscape of war. Abu Ghraib, dead civilians, the overreactions of young soldiers and Marines in stressful situations all grabbed headlines.
If it bleeds, it leads. If it stinks, it's ink.
Americans were hungry to understand what was occurring. As the most clearly articulated reason for the invasion, WMD's, were not discovered America sat shocked and felt lied to. The hugest failure of the American government was in not backing up their reasoning with the stated policy that governments who sponsored terror were subject to being held accountable to the point of regime change; but that policy was not cited until well afterwards and weakly at that.
The efforts in Afghanistan languished in near-obscurity while the national interest was drawn to the spectacle in Iraq, and news of both amounted primarily to journalists citing stringers and editorializing on what was being presented to them.
There were rare instances of journalists who actually did their jobs. Many, like Michael Yon and Scott Kesterson were independents. Some, like Michael, had military backgrounds and reported what they saw fairly and through the glasses of understanding the military from the inside. While not sugar-coating the war or those who were fighting it, neither did he sensationalize the image of a brutal occupation of some "peace-loving country" by a bunch of jack-booted thugs or paint our soldiers as pitiful victims of imperialist desires gone horribly awry.
Some did.
Michael Yon and Scott Kesterson were not published widely in mainstream outlets.
Our media has not done their job in this war. They have not been the "go-to" source for information on what has been happening, on what has been done. While they have learned to spell the word "insurgency," and later to spell "counterinsurgency," they have not educated themselves to any degree in what these actually are. They couldn't recognize a decent counterinsurgent if they sat on his lap. They have had no grip on the flow of fighting nor have they had, on other than a very simplistic level, an idea of what was and was not strategically important.
All the while, they've been informing the average American. It would be more accurate to say that they have been misinforming, disinforming, and uninforming the average American, who has a tendency to trust powerhouses like the major networks, CNN, and the major print outlets to actually do their jobs.
It's been pretty hit or miss. I would contend, and I will cite the example of Tag Ab, that it's been more miss than hit. I would also contend that Americans do not understand the truth about the investment that they have been making in national security, and that perhaps if they had a feeling of sacrifice for something they could understand, the massive resentment that is currently felt would be somewhat ameliorated.
It's not that the information isn't available. It is. The truest picture of what's going on in the two theaters of this war is not available on the US MSM, though. It's not likely to be the person who reads this post who is woefully ill-informed as a citizen of the United States; it's the millions who don't even know it exists.
As much as I celebrate those who surf the blogosphere in search of enlightenment, I don't blame Joe Sixpack for not doing so. Joe's got a life, a job, a family, and concerns. He may only have time for his nightly shot of news on the MSM outlet of his choice.
I shouldn't be a source of news. I should be where some interesting stories are told; some additional information shared. The added touch.
As near as I can tell, there are only four "outlets" in the United States who have reported on the (above detailed as significant) death of Qari Nejat. One is me and the others are The Long War Journal, Battlefield Tourist, and The Thunder Run. Four blogs.
And that, my friends, is ridiculous.
A reporter should know what is significant in the country in which he is stationed; period. For the MSM reporters in Afghanistan to not understand the significance of Tag Ab, and for them to therefore be ignorant of the significance of the death of one such as Nejat is inexcusable. It shouldn't have necessarily been front-page news, but it should have been newsworthy.
It's in a near-vacuum of real information that our nation's citizens are asked to sacrifice economically to follow this effort through to completion. We view ourselves as being an information-driven nation, but Joe is being treated like a mushroom.
He's being kept in the dark and fed shit.
Is it any surprise that the number one concern of Americans is to bring home the troops within one year? Joe doesn't even really know what has been going on over there. What's worse is that he thinks he does. It's not like it doesn't get mention; but that mention paints nothing of the real picture. Tag Ab is a perfect example.
Guess what? The French media may actually be doing their jobs. Dig this:
US-led Coalition forces in Afghanistan have killed five Taliban subcommanders in recent weeks, including a bomb-maker and two behind the August 18 attack that left 10 French soldiers dead, they said.
"Coalition forces have positively identified five Taliban subcommanders killed during operations over the past month in Kapisa province," the Coalition said in a statement from Bagram Air Field in Afghanistan, and released in Washington.
Among the five were Ahmad Shah and Mullah Rohoullah, killed with six others by airstrikes in Nijrab district on August 30 after coalition forces ran into armed resistance while searching a compound.
Both were heavily involved in helping move weapons and foreign fighters into Afghanistan, the statement said, as well as facilitating Taliban operations, including the August 18 ambush on the French patrol.
Ten French soldiers were killed and another 21 injured in the attack by about 100 Taliban in Sarobi, 50 kilometres (30 miles) east of Kabul.
It was the deadliest ground battle for international soldiers in the country since they toppled the Taliban regime in 2001.
Coalition forces said that on August 23 they killed subcommanders Khairullah Nezami and Qari Ezmarai in Tag Ab district.
Nezami, they said, helped to arrange the making and planting of bombs and coordinated the movement of suicide bombers in the Taliban network.
A fifth subcommander, Qari Nejat, was killed together with four additional insurgents in an operation in Nijrab district on August 5.
The Coalition linked Nejat with the July 21 suicide bombing in the Tag Ab bazaar that injured six Afghans, the July 16 kidnapping of three Afghan policemen in Jalokhel, and the torture and beheading of an Afghan on June 30.
It's not just about killing Taliban. There is so much more being done than killing. There is a deeper story behind the killing of Nejat that speaks volumes to the efficacy of what we're doing in Afghanistan and by extension in Iraq. I'll address this soon, as it's a topic in its own right.
The worst thing that could possibly happen to the people of Afghanistan would be if we killed Osama bin Laden tomorrow. Joe Sixpack, thinking that this whole effort has been simply to hunt down Osama, will suddenly start wondering what the hell we're doing in Afghanistan and in the information vacuum that is our MSM will come to the conclusion that its not much. He in his millions will demand the immediate cessation of all efforts and return to within our borders.
And the fledgling dream that is Afghanistan will surely die.
On August 5th, 2008, the people of the very strategic Tag Ab Valley in Kapisa Province got a present; their own little Osama personified in Qari Nejat went to meet his maker. On September 4th, the news of positive identification was released to all media by CJTF 101, and on September 5th it was widely reported in the French media and even the Chinese media; and by four blogs in the United States.
Posted by Bill and Bob's Excellent Adventure at 7:59 AM
Labels: Afghanistan, France 24, Kapisa, Michael Yon, MSM, Qari Nejat, Scott Kesterson, Surobi, Tag Ab, Tagab
Anonymous September 8, 2008 at 4:21:00 AM GMT+4:30
thanks for pointing this out-i linked it on my blog at http://longislandgirl.vox.com
Jean September 8, 2008 at 5:36:00 AM GMT+4:30
I went to milblogging.com and submitted your blog to be approved for inclusion in their milbogs listing. (I forgot to see if you are already there...duh)
Hopefully, it will bring more readers so you can get this info out even more.
(If I did a bad thing, let me know.)
I like your blog. I don't cotton to some of the language you use.
In my search for information, I found your blog some time ago. I enjoyed the dissertation on Chai, it was an excellent peek into Afghan culture.
I don't watch that wasteland called television so I don't really know what the MSM present. I get my news from the internet and blogs like yours. Its much better information and I can cross-check to sort out truth from opinion.
BTW, I am retired USAF/ANG. I am also a student of history so understand where the following comment comes from:
Until the Afghans can read the likes of Locke and Blackstone and the Bible freely, don't expect them to progress much beyond where they are now.
Afghanistan is a rough row to hoe.
watimebeing September 8, 2008 at 10:27:00 AM GMT+4:30
Your frustrations are well founded, but I think the French with troops in the AO and the Ambush are more attuned right now to the situation in Tag Ab. While we in America feed by corporate news outlets get the best of the worst and only a sampling of the rest. Hurricanes and two Major party conventions do not make for slow news, but the meaning of what is behind the rash of enemy leader's deaths is stuff that says to me at least the tactics are working.
Questions will soon be about the long term viability of this progress and about hopes for the long slow clime to prosperity for Afghans.
David M September 8, 2008 at 11:10:00 PM GMT+4:30
Cannoneer No. 4 September 9, 2008 at 9:28:00 PM GMT+4:30
Did you hear what President Bush had to say about the Afghan tribes this morning?
Cliff September 10, 2008 at 5:17:00 AM GMT+4:30
Speaking as a civilian, I see a general agreement that Afghanistan is worth the effort to rebuild it, for a variety of reasons. At most, there's some discussion on how much military force we should use, versus other methods. And not much of that.
I hadn't considered what the reaction would be, though, if we did catch bin Laden. It could be like you predict.
Also, I like the blog. Thanks for trying to educate us about the conflict and conditions over there.


text:
Congressman Who Thought Guam Might 'Tip Over and Capsize' From Overpopulation Says Trump Supporters 'Less Educated'
Peter D'Abrosca |
File this in the "cannot be made up" category.
A Democratic Congressman from Georgia who worried in 2010 that the island of Guam would tip over and capsize due to overpopulation called Trump supporters "less educated," among a litany of other condescension on Tuesday.
"The Jewish people understand tyranny. Charismatic and a good public speaker, deceptive and cunning, Adolf Hitler rose to power to lead Germany in 1932 after Democratic elections. He rode a wave of nationalism and anti-Semitism to power. Replace anti-Semitism with Latinos crossing our borders – rapists drug dealers and murderers. Does that sound familiar?" said Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) at the Atlanta NAACP 2019 Jubilee celebration.
"The same trend towards authoritarian rule, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, is playing out right here at home. Americans elected an authoritarian, anti-immigrant, racist strong-man to the nation's highest office," he continued.
The beginning part of Johnson's speech is confusing. For the past three years, Americans have been told by the mainstream press and their friends in the Democratic Party that Trump is uncharismatic, a horrible public speaker and too stupid to hold the office of President. But Johnson completely flipped that narrative to make a Trump/Hitler comparison befitting of the simpletons who have been electing him for years.
"Donald Trump and his Make America Great Again followers who want to return America back to a time when white men and white privilege were unchallenged, and where minorities and women were in their place. These folks now control the highest office of the land," he said.
And then, the whopper.
"Donald Trump supporters are older, less educated, less prosperous, and they are dying early. Their life spans are decreasing, and many are dying from alcoholism, drug overdoses, liver disease, or simply a broken heart caused by economic despair," he claimed without providing evidence.
Gratuitous, factually unprovable insults aside, what did Johnson mean by "less educated?" Less educated than whom, exactly? Than Hank Johnson? The congressman who, in 2010, worried that the island of Guam would physically tip over and capsize from overpopulation, apparently failing to understand the concept of… land?
That actually happened during a House Armed Services Committee hearing.
"In a discussion regarding a planned military buildup on the Pacific island, Johnson expressed some concerns about the plans to Adm. Robert Willard, head of the U.S. Pacific fleet," CBS said at the time.
He expressed his concerns thusly:
Johnson: This is a [sic], uh, island, that at its widest level is what, 12 miles from shore to shore, and at its smallest level, or smallest, uh, uh, uh, location, it's uh, seven miles, uh between one shore and the other, is that correct?
Willard: I don't have the exact, uh, dimensions, but to your point, I think, sir, Guam is a small island.
Johnson: Very small island – and about 24 miles, if I recall, long – so 24 miles long, about seven miles wide at the least widest, uh place on the island and about 20, about 12 miles wide, uh, uh, on the widest part of the island. And um, I don't know how many square miles that that is, do you happen to know?
Willard: I don't have that figure with me sir. I can certainly supply it to you if you'd like.
Johnson: "Yeah. My fear is, uh, that, uh, the whole island will become so overly populated that it will tip over and capsize."
Willard: "We don't anticipate that."
Kudos to the Admiral for not bursting out in laughter at Johnson's stupidity. But Johnson as the audacity to call Trump supporters stupid? To intimate that somehow he is more enlightened than them? And not just some of them – but all of them?
His ignorance is a symptom of a larger problem of D.C. politics. Our institutions that put people like Johnson in power are meritocracies that do not require any merit at all. Simply the correct scripted talking points and enough donor cash to the do the bidding of the real people running the show behind the scenes will get the job done.
Case in point? Rep. Hank Johnson.
Follow Peter D'Abrosca on Twitter: @pdabrosca
Like Peter D'Abrosca on Facebook: facebook.com/peterdabrosca


text:
Reverence Books
London in Maps Philippa Glanville
London in Maps by Philippa Glanville
Publisher: The Connoisseur, London, 1972 1st Edition. Folio. 212pp. Hardcover housed in Very Good, age toned slipcase Size: 14.5" x 8.5" (370mm x 215mm). Hard cover. Condition: Good. Dust Jacket Condition: Good, some fray to edges, small tear.
Reproductions of nearly seventy contemporary maps, over a third of them in colour, illustrate dramatically the evolving topography of London since Roman times.
Social change and political history, the limitations imposed by geography, the influence of climate and prevailing winds-all these are reflected in the present-day face of the capital. The Thames acted as the original highway and for a time the city walls restricted growth. Then they were breached and Overrun-the surge westwards being given impetus by the Great Fire. Later speculators and developers built the squares that begin to dominate the eighteenth-century maps. First the canals and new wide roads, then railways and trams, next Tube lines, and now motorways have contributed to the dismemberment of London, both uniting and absorbing the surrounding villages and creating the Greater London seen in today's maps.
The superb reproductions of both manuscript and printed maps, many of them hand-coloured, show all these facets of London's life in a fascinating way; they are explained and supplemented by Philippa Glanville's authoritative text, making a book that is both decorative and instructive.
Philippa Glanville is an Assistant Keeper at the London Museum, with a special interest in topography, and she describes vividly the eventful history of London's growth and development, as well as explaining, with numerous illustrations, the achievements of the great map-makers, such as Ogilby, Rocque, Morgan and Stanford.
The map reproduced on the jacket is a hand-coloured copy of the 1574 edition of the map Londinum Feracissimi Angliae Regni Metropolis published in the atlas Civitates Orbis Terrarum by G. Braun & F. Hogenberg, 1572.


text:
What Is The Most Expensive Cake In The World
December 25, 2022 by savorystyle
The most expensive cake in the world is the Wedding Cake, which was created by British designer Debbie Wingham. The cake is made from white chocolate and vanilla sponge, with a filling of raspberry jam and buttercream. It is covered in edible diamonds and gold leaf, and costs an estimated $1 million.
The most expensive cake in the world is a wedding cake that was created by Cake Studio and costs $1.3 million. The cake is made with edible gold leaf, Champagne-soaked strawberries, and a diamond-encrusted bodice. It also features a seven-tier design with each tier being made from a different kind of luxurious material including marble, onyx, and even mother of pearl.
Credit: www.cnbc.com
What is the Number 1 Cake in the World?
What is the Most Expensive Type of Cake?
Most Expensive Cake in the World 2022
Most Expensive Birthday Cake in the World
Most Expensive Cake Flavor
Most Expensive Cake Brand
There is no one definitive answer to this question as everyone's favorite cake will be different. However, some popular choices for the best cake in the world include chocolate cake, cheesecake, carrot cake, and red velvet cake.
Read moreHow Many Calories in a Chicken Chimichanga
There are a few contenders for the most expensive cake in the world. A wedding cake made by Cake Avenue in Malaysia was reported to be worth $35,000. Another contender is a diamond-encrusted cake made by British bakery Bling H2O for a whopping $130,000.
Finally, there is the Absurdity Cake, made by Japan's Naftali Harris, which costs a cool $1 million. So what makes these cakes so expensive? The Malaysian wedding cake was adorned with 2,500 Swarovski crystals and took over 200 hours to make.
The diamond-encrusted cake was covered in 1,000 diamonds and took 10 days to make. As for the Absurdity Cake, it is made with edible gold leaf and champagne caviar and takes Harris three weeks to create. While these cakes are certainly extravagant (and delicious), they are not necessarily the most expensive in the world.
That honor goes to a dessert created by chefs at New York City's Serendipity 3 restaurant – the Frrrozen Haute Chocolate ice cream sundae. This monstrous treat is made with 28 cocoas, including 14 of the world's most expensive varieties, 5 grams of 24-karat gold flakes, and served in a goblet lined with edible gold leaf. It costs a staggering $25,000!
In 2022, the most expensive cake in the world will be made by Cake boss Buddy Valastro. The cake will be a 10-foot tall wedding cake that will cost $1 million. It will have 3,000 diamonds and pearls encrusted on it.
The cake will take over 1,000 hours to make and will be displayed at Valastro's Carlo's Bakery in Hoboken, New Jersey.
The world's most expensive birthday cake was created by Cake Designer Debbie Wingham. The cake cost a whopping $1.65 million and took over 1,000 hours to create! The cake was designed to look like a replica of the dress worn by Princess Diana on her wedding day.
It is made from white chocolate and adorned with diamonds, pearls, and edible gold leaf. The cake was commissioned by an anonymous client and was presented to their daughter on her 18th birthday.
Most people think of cake as a simple dessert made with flour, sugar, eggs, and butter. But there are actually a wide variety of cake flavors out there, each with its own unique ingredients and price tag. So, which one is the most expensive?
The answer might surprise you: it's saffron cake! This luxurious confection is made with saffron threads, which are the dried stigmas of crocus flowers. They're incredibly rare and hard to come by, which makes them very pricey.
A single gram of saffron can cost anywhere from $5 to $10! So what does this costly ingredient taste like? Saffron has a distinctively bitter flavor that some say is reminiscent of hay or grass.
It also has a strong aroma that can be described as floral or spicy. When used in baking, saffron imparts a beautiful yellow hue to cakes and other desserts. If you're feeling adventurous (and flush with cash), why not give this ultra-expensive cake flavor a try?
There are many expensive cake brands out there, but which one is the most expensive? That would be hard to determine without knowing how much each cake costs. However, we can take a look at some of the most popular and well-known expensive cake brands and see how they compare.
The first brand that comes to mind is Sprinkles Cupcakes. They are known for their gourmet cupcakes, which start at $3.50 each. If you want something even more luxurious, they also offer a line of Couture cupcakes that start at $7 each.
So, if price is your only consideration, Sprinkles Cupcakes would be the most expensive option. But what about other upscale cake brands? There's Carlo's Bake Shop, known for their over-the-top cakes featured on the TV show Cake Boss.
A custom Carlo's wedding cake starts at $9 per slice – so if you had 100 guests, your total bill would be $900! And if you want an elaborately designed and decorated Carlo's cake, the sky's the limit – literally. The company has created cakes that cost upwards of $10,000!
Then there's Duff Goldman's Charm City Cakes, made famous by the TV show Ace of Cakes. Like Carlo's Bake Shop, Charm City Cakes specializes in custom cakes that can range widely in price depending on the design. A simple sheet cake from Charm City Cakes starts at around $350 – but again, if you want something over-the-top and elaborate, you could easily spend thousands of dollars.
So when it comes to determining the most expensive cake brand out there, it really depends on what you're looking for – and how much you're willing to spend!
Read moreHow Long is Homemade Cake Good for
If you thought spending $100 on a cake was excessive, think again! The most expensive cake in the world costs a whopping $1.65 million and was created by British luxury jeweler Debbie Wingham. The cake is made with edible gold leaf, diamonds, and even real rose petals.
It took over 600 hours to create and is currently the world's most expensive dessert. If you're ever in the market for an over-the-top treat, this is definitely the one to go for!
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