I can't recall when it happened exactly, but sometime last century I first heard the word "counterintuitive" and I was instantly smitten.
It's a word you don't hear every day, that sometimes elicits a quizzical look from people. A "fifty cent" word.
So today I wanted to blog about some of my favourite counterintuitive ideas.
Let's begin with something that people who live in cities can all relate to, traffic.
When you expect that there will be lots of traffic, your first inclination might be to leave early to get where you're going.
It may seem counterintuitive to leave late, but once the traffic has let up, you'll have a less stressful drive and arrive in a better mental state.
I don't know if it's just me, or my choice of Internet service providers, but sometimes my hard-wired cable is pretty unreliable and inconsistent.
We couldn't get cable at the cottage, so we had to "settle" for satellite instead. I worried about reliability because I need to be able to work from there too.
I do plenty of meetings over Skype and Zoom and was worried that there would be glitches.
Counterintuitively, I cannot recall a single glitch in any call I've had with anyone from there, while my cable calls from both my home and office are often sub-optimal (another favourite word!).
Many years ago there were some home break-ins in our neighbourhood that concerned me.
I called in a security expert to see what we could do to fortify our home. I was told that one of our patio doors was a risk. It's a steel door containing a large window.
I assumed that the glass was the weak point.
Nope. It was the steel.
The steel is so thin that anyone with a sledgehammer could smash it, but the window is apparently virtually indestructible.
Of course I now need to share a few examples from my professional world too.
There are many times when I suggest that people Zig when everyone else is suggesting that they Zag.
There is a propensity for people to think that more money is always better than less, and that therefore, making the proverbial pie bigger should always be the goal.
But for a family, there are other forms of wealth besides financial.
Families who concentrate solely on making more money, under the assumption that everything else will work itself out, are fooling themselves.
It may seem counterintuitive, but it's true.
There comes a time in every family's life cycle when the focus should switch from how to make the pie bigger, to how the pie will be shared and maintained in the future.
On a related note, many of those who create a lot of monetary wealth also like to control everything (and everyone) they can.
When it comes to family members, I will always maintain that holding on with a very tight grip is not a recipe for success.
You probably know people who are guilty of this, even if you have not thought about it in the same terms as my metaphor.
When anyone tries to exert complete control over others, it will eventually backfire.
Kudos to those who recognize this and choose a looser grip.
As I wrote in Going Far? Go Together, I believe that family business and family wealth are much more about "going together" than they are about "going fast".
If you are concerned with doing things quickly, then going alone, or doing things by yourself, can make perfect sense.
But family wealth eventually reaches a stage where it becomes more about how those who will be on the receiving end of the transition are able to function together as a group.
This ability to work together is rarely something that they're all born with, and as such, it takes time for it all to come together.
You really shouldn't rush the process.
In fact, there is only one thing you should rush here.
Hurry up and get started, so that you can then slow down and take your time getting it right.
Certain topics come up over and over again in the world of family business.
Today we'll be looking at two of them, although when you get right down to it, maybe it's really just one, because they're often wound pretty tightly together.
As you may've already gathered from the title, I'm talking about a changing of the guard at the top.
As I wrote in my Quick Start Guide on this subject, Sticky Baton Syndrome(Ask Prince Charles) there are plenty of cases where the person at the top of a family business is just not ready to leave.
There are all sorts of excuses that are typically mentioned as to why they must remain in place.
Some of them are even true, and some of them are actually good reasons. Many, however, are just excuses, given by people who are simply scared to face certain realities.
In September I was in Niagara-on-the-Lake for the annual Family Enterprise eXchange (FEX) symposium, featuring John A. Davis as one of the keynote speakers.
If you don't know who Davis is, he's one of the co-creators of the Three Circle Model, of which I am a big fan.
He regaled the crowd with a presentation about the "Future of Leadership" and then led a discussion with Philippe DeSerres that was also very well received.
But my take-home message from his talk was something he only mentioned briefly in passing, right near the end, which was the inspiration for this post.
He was talking about getting the timing right when it comes to transitioning the leadership of a family business.
He noted that more and more these days, and from his decades of experience as a leader in consulting to this field, there is one factor that trumps the other.
Notably, he took the time to spell it out, i.e. "lead, l-e-a-d" and "leave, l-e-a-v-e", just to be sure we all understood him.
At the outset of this blog, I noted that these two topics are often connected.
The biggest way this happens is that the current leaders will sometimes subconsciously hold back on giving the rising generation the opportunities to show what they can do.
And one of the major reasons that they do this is because of their own desire to remain important.
So many business leaders attach so much of their identity to their role as the leader of their business.
I like to think that this might just be too narrow a viewpoint.
Let me explain. The key to this lies in the Three Circle Model.
Note that the Business circle is only one of the three systems that intersect, and that the "big picture" also includes Family, and Ownership.
If the leader of the "business" steps back and looks at the whole picture, including the Family and Ownership systems as well as the Business system with which they are already intimately familiar, they will see many other, greater, opportunities.
If the business is a huge success, yet the family falls apart and the owners end up in a dispute that has various family members "lawyering up" against each other, then just how important will the business success have been in retrospect?
Three Circle = Three Systems = Three Leaders?
If you're trying to create a true multi-generational family business, you cannot neglect any of the circles.
Each circle ultimately needs its own governance structure, and likely its own leader, or leaders. Someone needs to foresee all of this and line up and prepare those future leaders.
So you built a great business, congratulations.
If you want it to continue to survive as a family enterprise for generations, you've still got more important work to do.
Start working ON your business family.
A few weeks ago, in From Family Business to Family Office, I mentioned that I'd start writing more about the family office world. Being a man of my word, here we are again.
I had a bit of an issue choosing my blog title, though.
I began by thinking about the idea of "Strategy" versus "Tactics" in the family office space.
But my bias is to try to stay away from "jargon" terms and use the simplest possible words, at least most of the time.
Of course when it came time to select a photo to go with this post, terms like "strategy" and "tactics" garnered more interesting search results from Shutterstock than "what" and "how".
At the end of the proverbial day, though, whether we use the simple questions or the business jargon terms, we're talking about the same issues.
that strategy's goals (the "how").
If you get nothing else out of reading this, my Dad would've been pleased. What does he have to do with this, you ask?
It has now been 10 years since he lost his final battle with cancer, and I cannot count the number of times his wise words have been summoned to the front burner of my brain.
The employees of the family office should be working for the benefit of the family, and so they should be concentrating on the tactics, the "how", and be less involved in the strategy.
Ideally, the strategy will have been worked out by the family, before the family office people get too far down the road of implementing the best tactics.
I used the term "ideally" because I know that this is often not the way it works in the real world.
But that typically isn't the fault of those who work for the family office.
Much like the ideas I wrote about in FamBiz: Management vs. Governance, different groups of people have different roles that they should be playing.
When the people who are supposed to play those roles don't play them, then others will invariably step in and assume those roles.
Families that have a family office (FO), or who are clients of a multi-family office (MFO), have set up this relationship so that the FO or MFO can serve the needs of the family.
The decision to go this route may have occurred last year or last century, and it may have been decided by this generation of family leaders or by their parents or grandparents.
The fact remains that it was done for the benefit of the family members.
And as we all know, with benefits come responsibilities.
I'm going to take a guess and say that most readers are fine with what I'm saying here, but that they may be wondering what my point is.
So here's where I'm going.
I think that relationships between families and their family offices tend to be out of balance, or off-kilter.
My anecdotal evidence suggests that family office employees often control not just the tactics, but much of the strategy too.
This can be mitigated when the FO includes family employees, but that can also make things worse.
As I stated above, this is not typically the "fault" of the family office, but usually that of the family.
They need to intentionally work at getting the entire family aligned together, in order to make the decisions that the family office should then be executing.
The WHAT, the HOW, and the WHO!
Getting a family aligned so that they can effectively drive the strategy of their family office does not just "happen", all of a sudden, or all by itself.
It begins with the recognition that it is necessary for the long term good of the family and its legacy.
It's been over a year since I wrote about Family Vision specifically, so I think I'm due.
There are of course more than five things that anyone could say about every subject, and family vision is one that I think should be discussed more broadly, more deeply and more frequently.
But first I'd like to go back to the first keyword in the title that I decided to put on this post, i.e. "Importance".
A natural place to begin would be to ask "why" family vision is important.
But since this is my blog and I make the rules here, I'm going to "zag" instead of "zigging" and answer a few different questions instead.
I hope that no one thinks I'm acting like a politician when I answer a different question than the one that was asked.
My Dad used to say "You can do whatever you want, but don't become a politician, because then even your friends will think you're an a**hole".
– For Whom is Family Vision Important?
Making sure there's a clear family vision isn't an important consideration for every family.
In fact, I'd bet that most families have never even thought about this at all, and that's OK.
But I don't write these blogs for most families. I'm reminded of something my Aunt said to my Mom after she read my book, SHIFT your Family Business. "Oh, that's a book for rich people".
Well that isn't the word that I would've used, but she isn't wrong either. Most of what I write is geared towards "the 1%".
I like to think that my ideas are just as valid, generally, for all families, but realistically, the higher up the wealth spectrum the family is, the more likely my thoughts will resonate with them.
– When Is Family Vision Important?
Just as family vision is not necessarily important for every family, neither is it important at all times.
Years and even decades can pass during which it never becomes salient. So when is it likely to become important?
Essentially, as soon as more than one generation of adults is involved, I believe that it is high time to think about working on a family vision.
As soon as the wealth that has been created goes from being the wealth of its creator to the wealth of the creator's family, having a family vision becomes important.
When the wealth creator goes from thinking about "my wealth", to "our wealth", the paradigm has shifted.
– Where is Family Vision Important?
So assuming that a family is actually one for whom family vision is important, and that they are now at a point where the wealth is considered to be "family wealth", where does the vision actually fit into things?
Discussions about family vision usually begin in the context of a family meeting.
If a family fits the profile based on the first two questions ("for whom" and "when") but still hasn't begun to have regularly scheduled family meetings, then that's the most logical place to begin.
When starting out, I always suggest that families identify the smallest logical group of people to convene, usually the parents and their adult children. In-laws and children can be added later.
When I say, "regularly scheduled", that doesn't necessarily mean frequent.
Having a regular annual meeting will often suffice, and that's preferable to having a few ad-hoc meetings over a few months and then not getting together again for three years.
– What is Family Vision Anyway?
Just what goes into a family vision will vary from one family to the next. No two families will go about figuring theirs out the same way, either.
The actual "content" or result of the vision is less important than the process the family goes through to define it.
If the family can answer the question "Where are we all hoping to go together?" I think that they're well on their way.
Is it a family credo or motto? Yes, possibly. Is it a mission statement? Yeah, maybe that too.
Is it carved in stone? Well, maybe, eventually, but I'd suggest writing it down in pencil first, just in case.
So when's the next family meeting?
When I was in Denver a few weeks ago for the annual Rendez-Vous of the Purposeful Planning Institute, I met a bunch of interesting people, as usual.
Having been there the past five years, I'm starting to see many familiar faces each time I return, which is great, of course.
And I always meet interesting new people every year as well.
Attendees come from a whole bunch of different backgrounds and professions, and occasionally I meet folks from areas where I've had no contact or experience.
Such was the case with the young women I met from Koplin Consulting.
Koplin offers in-home counselling, treatment and recovery services for those working through addictions.
I'm fortunate to not have ever been in the market for those services for my family or for client families – yet (?).
I ended up at the same table over meals with all three of their representatives at the conference and I found them very refreshing.
During one of these discussions, it was mentioned that the key to successful recovery usually involves people finding strength in three places: Purpose, Passion and Community.
When I hear about something that works in one area of life, I'm compelled to see if it could also apply elsewhere.
So today I want to look at those three elements from the perspective of families who are hoping to transition their wealth down through the generations.
I just searched each of those words on my website to confirm that I have actually addressed them all in this space over the years, several times, but not yet in the same post.
For a family to be successful in passing down their wealth to the rising generation, it's really helpful if they have some sort of shared purpose.
When a family undertakes the work necessary to figure this stuff out, they often start by trying to analyze everyone's values first.
From individual values, they typically try to identify a handful of common values that everyone in the family can agree on.
Finding a common purpose becomes easier once you've decided on those shared values.
Just like everyone has their own set of values, each individual will have their own passions.
But unlike the values, where we hope to find a few in common, to help lay out a clear family purpose, the individual passions should be looked at for each person separately.
Everyone has different things that make them tick, talents that they exhibit that set them apart, and activities that they do so well that when they're doing them, it doesn't ever feel like work.
The special talents, skills and passions that each person possesses are part of the family's "human capital", and ways should be found to leverage each person's individual strengths.
Families that are able to harness the best from every member of the family will have a much easier time keeping their family wealth together for coming generations.
family members actually spend together.
And while that isn't something that you'd measure with a stopwatch, there really is no substitute for "face time" in the old sense of the word.
Technology has made it much easier for people who are physically separated to be in regular contact, and that's great, but to be successful at keeping their wealth in the family over generations, some regular contact is a prerequisite.
As I work with various families, it's pretty easy to see which ones have got the community aspect figured out and which ones never will.
In many ways, it has more to do with wanting to spend time together, and looking forward to lots of interaction than it does with the amount of time they actually spend as a group.
Families wanting to benefit from the Purpose-Passion-Community idea can do so by spending time together working on their common values to drive a shared purpose.
They should allow each member to work their own passions within that, though, and not try to make everyone the same.
There's no substitute to spending time together, with everyone bringing their best self. Good luck.
When it comes to "Family Governance", there aren't many bigger fans than me.
That exclamation –ugh- makes it seem like I don't like governance, but in the book's context, it's clear that I do.
For any family to have a realistic chance of their wealth surviving over generations, they'll absolutely require some form of governance.
The form and structure of that governance, as well as how it evolves over time, is where all the many important questions and decisions come into play, of course.
My advice is to always start small and take it slowly.
You're looking for a durable "solution" to last generations, so there should be no reason to rush something through in weeks or even months.
begin is with the writing of a family constitution.
And that's especially true if it's one dictated by the wealth creator and patriarch, by himself, without consulting any other family members.
One of the peer groups in which I participate with other family business and wealth advisors recently tackled such a case.
Here's a bit of the background provided by a colleague I'll call Nelly.
A family patriarch, "Jack", who was also the wealth creator, was approaching his 80th birthday, and one of his financial advisors had spoken to him about succession and transition planning.
Somehow the idea of a "family constitution" came up and Jack loved it. He then sat down and began to draft it by himself.
As Jack shared his progress with family members, he began to become concerned with their lack of enthusiasm.
The financial advisor who initially mentioned the idea of the constitution was way out of his league to be of use to Jack now, but thankfully, he called in Nelly's firm for help.
As Nelly shared with our peer group, she was slowly encouraging him to involve other family members in the creation of their constitution.
After several repeated suggestions, he actually started to warm up to the idea.
As Nelly shared with us, there was a light bulb going off from time to time, maybe with only "one or two filaments flashing", but she was starting to get through to him.
Of course, a couple of filaments do provide some light, which is better than complete darkness.
But it's 2018, and those bulbs harken back to Thomas Edison and aren't exactly "current" anymore.
I pointed out that perhaps what they needed here was some LED lighting, not more filaments.
Jack was preparing to leave his wealth to his children and grandchildren, but he was missing out on the opportunity to have them involved at this key stage of planning.
I'm not sure what became of Nelly's work with Jack and his family, although I suspect it's ongoing.
I'm not saying that involving the family is simple or easy, because it's not.
worth the effort when done right.
Jack created the wealth, so he can technically do what he wants with it, and even give it all away to charity.
But he has expressed a desire to pass it on to his family. So what he's actually trying to do is transform his personal wealth into family wealth.
The best way to do that, is to create some form of governance, for the family, by the family.
And What IF He Does It "His" Way?
If Jack rejects Nelly's ideas and simply ploughs ahead with authoring the constitution himself, I predict one of two results will occur after Jack dies.
If the family gets along and the wealth is structured rather flexibly, the family will make whatever changes they see fit, using his constitution as a mere guideline, which will fade away over time.
Or, more likely, if the family does not get along well, or if the structures are very rigid, the family squabbles will begin right after Jack's funeral.
Jack has a choice, but I sure hope he listens to Nelly.
Grandpa's filaments won't be quite as useful in his grandkids' world of LED's.


Julian was born in Oxfordshire, in the Thames valley, that separates the rolling hills of the Berkshire downs from the Cotswolds.
From an early age he showed an above average artistic and athletic ability. These two attributes would influence the course of his life. His passion was, and still is, cycling. Barely in to his teens, he would set off on long forays in to the beautiful local countryside from his home near Oxford. This passion eventually led to competing in road races, where he excelled. Deciding that the only way to find out if he had the ability to become a professional cyclist, he moved to Brittany in France. Despite not making the grade to become a full time professional, he did succeed in making a decent living as an amateur.
Feeling wander lust, and having stopped competitive racing at the age of 28, he spent the following 11 years travelling. Having always cycled, it seemed natural to him that the best way to travel was on a bicycle. He would work 5-6 months of the year, so as to finance his travels to such far flung places as the Rocky mountains of America, and Alaska. He has always been drawn towards the remote, wild and rugged landscapes that have not been touched by the hands of man.
It was during his years of travelling that he started to sketch and paint. What you might call a natural instinct to put on paper the scenes that he saw.
On returning home after a 6 month, 12,000 mile, cycling tour to Alaska, he decided to try and make a living as a professional Artist. Being an unknown artist, it was unlikely that he would be able to make a living from solely painting pictures and selling them, unless he was prepared to promote himself. This was when the idea of setting up a greeting card business first came to mind. For the following 10 years he painted wildlife pictures of animals and scenes, which he used to turn into greeting cards. This business was so successful that he built up a client base of 400 outlets. The public loved his work, which in turn brought him numerous commissions. His work became so popular that it was difficult for him to find time to paint commissions and run the greeting card business.
In 1999, Julian found a small property in the Correze region of south west France, where he now lives. He briefly continued to run his greeting card business from his French home, but he is now able to make a living painting full time. He is affiliated to the "Maison des Artistes" in Paris.


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Tahanto is growing in both size and students
By Ken Cleveland BANNER CORRESPONDENT
The Tahanto Regional Middle/High School is growing. That�s not just the physical building next door to the current school.
The new school may also be impacting enrollment.
Student numbers are up to 444 as of Oct. 1, Superintendent Nadine Ekstrom said Tuesday night. That is up over last year�s total of 429.
School choice students increased from 79 to 85, while students choicing out of the local schools remained at 14.
�I�m happy to see the increase in Berlin and Boylston students,� Chairman Rebecca Dono Healy said. �That�s fantastic. That�s one of the things we were counting on with the new building, keeping more of the home-grown students.�
�The excitement in the building for the new environment they are going to be experiencing in January is overwhelming,� Ekstrom said. �The kids are getting excited about it.�
The new building will be the star attraction when tours are held early next year for fifth- and sixth-graders and their parents. The hope is that the new building�s amenities will also encourage more parents to keep their children in the local schools.
Next summer will bring an official ribbon cutting, planned for Aug. 30, 2013.
The new building will be occupied in January when students and staff move from the current 50-year-old school, but that is phase one of the project. By August, everything should be complete, with the old building razed and grass, pavement and fields all in place.
The School Committee is still pondering the fate of items, including possible mementos that will be left behind in the existing building when the move is made in January.
�Whatever is left in the building will be demolished,� Ekstrom said.
At issue is any resale of items.
Principal Diane Tucceri said items that are no longer needed could go to other departments. The School Committee approved a disposable policy that details the procedure for disposing of unneeded items, giving first option to town schools.
But the key is that there is a short timeframe to remove the items, after the Dec. 21 move starts and before Jan. 10, when the contractor takes over the old building and begins demolition.
The concern is �our liability if we let people into the building to dismantle things,� including lockers and chairs people have expressed interest in having, Ekstrom said.
The committee will have to determine the process, if there will be any auction and how items built into the structure would be safely removed.
Berlin member Chris Keefe informed the committee that the builder, CTA, is providing a five-year warranty for the auditorium, extended to eight years if problems persist. That issue involved the pouring of concrete for the base that was out of line with the contour needed for chairs. The building committee will be holding back $25,000 until a viable solution is found for the floors, she said, with another $10,000 held back for the company dying the floor.
In other business
�Ekstrom told the School Committee that budget formats for next year will look different.
The budgets will include an overview process that includes revolving accounts, grants and other funding resources, �so you get a full picture.� The shift of the sixth grades to Tahanto from the elementary schools will alter the budgets as well.
�Karen Molnar, director of pupil personnel services, reported the schools� emergency plans were updated in accordance with Michael�s Law requirements. School nurses and emergency personnel in the towns worked on the plan.
�The numbers were good again this year, as teachers presented their analysis of the MCAS scores.
With Tahanto scores well above state averages, it was noted there is considerable improvement being shown.
One blip is the eighth-grade scores, where numbers are not as strong.
Teacher Francene Gleason attributed that to the fact that those students are actually more advanced than their peers statewide, and are further along on many of the items being tested.
Another factor, teacher Peter Doherty said, is that after sixth grade, the students attending Tahanto have to get onto the same page. Moving the sixth grades together could result in �a more aligned curriculum,� he said.
That bounce is seen in the 10th-grade results, where the students, compared class-to-class, do far better than state averages.
In addition, Doherty said, the results can be analyzed �student by student� to determine if many students had trouble with specific questions, for example.
�We have to cater to the children to get the most out of them,� Doherty said, noting the fluctuations between different classes over the years.
Lisa Sequeira noted �steady progress� as she detailed science test results.
The middle school program is progressing.
Tucceri clarified that high school programs would not be changed by the adjusted middle school curriculum, although some of the teachers would change.
Tucceri said she was committed to keeping any world language students who were already in the program through the culmination of their study, so no student loses their preferred language midway, especially since world language proficiency is an important college entrance consideration.
Healy noted some students start languages earlier through after-school programs.
Larry Brenner asked about the budget issues if a course is ending.
�Then we need to get creative,� Tucceri said. �Which we�re able to do in such a small school.�
Solutions can include options such as virtual high school.
�We need to be very aware, we�re dealing with the children�s future,� Tucceri said.
�The School Committee approved four courses that have less than the minimum target for enrollment.
Tucceri said some instances occur because classes that initially had enough students drop during the period in which students can make changes, leaving low enrollment. The courses the board approved were creative writing (three students), AP biology (four students), computer assisted drafting (CAD, two students) and Honors music theory (three students).

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Thank you! You're always welcome!
What a fine combination of tastes !. Well experienced chef Jordi, never seems to fail, and always finds the perfect taste complements. Also, excellent value for money with seasonal dishes made from local fresh produce.
Renovated traditional house in tiny village. Delicious set lunch menu. Excellent value, good service, good wine list. No outdoor terrace.
Impressive and well defined combination of tastes in a cosy atmosphere. Have been going there for some time now, and am constantly pleasantly surprised. Excellent quality / value for money.
Had a truly excellent lunch here again yesterday. We have the menu del dia, excellent cooking and value, beautiful presentation, first class service.
Get quick answers from La Rectoria staff and past visitors.
Hello. Is this restaurant still open. I have tried several times to book a table in July by email over the last month and have not had a reply.
Hello Andrew, yes, it's still open. Please excuse the inconvenience. By what date you want to book a table, and for how many people?


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Tag Archives: Decameron
John William Waterhouse and John Keats – Isabella and the Pot of Basil
John William Waterhouse's portrayal of John Keats's poem "Isabella; or, The Pot of Basil", is dreamy, which is typical for his oeuvre, and, following the tradition of the Pre-Raphaelites, it is rich in details, but the seemingly innocent scene hides a darker theme. In this painting, Waterhouse beautifully unites the Medieval macabre imagination of Boccaccio with the sensuous imagery created by Keats in his poem.
John William Waterhouse (1849-1917) Isabella and the Pot of Basil, 1907
In a secluded spot of a beautiful garden somewhere in Florence, a damsel known by the name of Isabella is kneeling beside a pot of basil, embracing it with her gentle white arms and "gazing amorously upon it with all her desire". The air is warm and fragrant, but laced with sadness. The spot seems secretive and the path that leads to it is rarely used. With no living soul around her, she must have whispered the woes of her heart to the greenery around her: the grass, the ivy, the hedge, have all become friends. The fragile red poppy that grew next to her white gown, along with a skull on the pedestal of the basil pot, could be interpreted as signs of the other world. Poppy is a flower connected to dreams, sleep and death. She is dressed in a long white gown that touches the ground with intricate Medieval-style sleeves. Her auburn hair falls on her back as she tilts her head and sighs at the inequity of her destiny. How can a maiden so young and so pretty be so sad?
Ahh, but poor Isabella is ill from sadness. In a feverish state her gaze turned blurry from tears, and yet, with wild perseverance she wraps her weak arms around the pot, pining and weeping, day upon day, night after night. Her heart aches for something she can never have, and not even a thousand tears would bring the dear face of Lorenzo back to life; the anguish that sits on her chest is heavier than a stone, and yet her face shows longing rather than pain, as if her devotion, her pining and daydreaming upon that pot of fragrant basil bring her serenity. For, what else can she do but weep her days away?
John Keats's narrative poem "Isabella" is adapted from a story in Boccaccio's Decameron (IV day, 5th story) which tells the tale of Lisabetta and Lorenzo. (A note: Keats changed the setting of the story from Messina to Florence, and the name from Lisbetta to Isabella.) In Decameron, Lisbetta is a fair and well-manered maiden who lives in the town of Messina with her three brothers who want her to marry a rich and respectable man, but Lisbetta falls in love with Lorenzo, the dashing young employee of her brothers. After enjoying the delights of each other's company, the young lovers are discovered and the brothers decide to take things into their hands. On day they take Lorenzo into the deepest darkest forest and murder him. Lisbetta, not hearing from Lorenzo for so long, grows impatient and worried until one night he appears in her dream and tells her what had happened and where his body lies. After that "she awoke and giving faith to the vision, wept bitterly." Lisbetta finds his body in the forest, and despite her woes remains cool-headed and knowing that she can't take the whole body, she cuts his head off and wraps it in a napkin and:
"…returned home, where, shutting herself in her chamber with her lover's head, she bewept it long and bitterly, insomuch that she bathed it all with her tears, and kissed it a thousand times in every part. Then, taking a great and goodly pot, of those wherein they plant marjoram or sweet basil, she set the head therein, folded in a fair linen cloth, and covered it with earth, in which she planted sundry heads of right fair basil of Salerno; nor did she ever water these with other water than that of her tears or rose or orange-flower water. Moreover she took wont to sit still near the pot and to gaze amorously upon it with all her desire, as upon that which held her Lorenzo hid; and after she had a great while looked thereon, she would bend over it and fall to weeping so sore and so long that her tears bathed all the basil, which, by dint of long and assiduous tending, as well as by reason of the fatness of the earth, proceeding from the rotting head that was therein, waxed passing fair and very sweet of savour."
To rest your eyes from Waterhouse, here is another version: Arthur Nowell, Isabella and the Pot of Basil, 1904
She sits and weeps over that pot of basil with mad devotion, adoringly wrapping her arms around it, as is she was enchanted or cursed like the Lady of Shalott. It arises suspicion in her brothers and one day they turn out the pot and find a head, not yet rotten, of Lorenzo. In fear that things might get revealed, they move to Naples and Lisbetta is once again separated from her lover, or this time, from his head. It is indeed a pity that they moved Lorenzo's rotting head because it fertilised the soil in the pot and the basil grew ever so lush and fragrant. Every good gardener knows this is the secret to a healthy plant!
Lisbetta eventually dies from sadness: "The damsel, ceasing never from lamenting and still demanding her pot, died, weeping; and so her ill-fortuned love had end."
Poor, poor Isabella! Waterhouse must have thought that too, when he chose to portray the scene of a sad tale of love first written by Boccaccio and later sang by Keats whose eloquence and melancholic disposition added the lyrical and sensuous dimension. Who knew better than Keats the ache of wanting so desperately something you cannot have? Did he not yearn for the sweet nectar of life, and was denied to taste the very drink? Having died so young from consumption, did he not feel on his own skin the transience of everything which hurts like knives piercing your chest, and therefore nurtured beauty in his verses. Her is what his beautiful poetic vision tells us of Isabella and Lorenzo falling in love:
"They could not in the self-same mansion dwell
Without some stir of heart, some malady;
They could not sit at meals but feel how well
It soothed each to be the other by;
They could not, sure, beneath the same roof sleep
But to each other dream, and nightly weep.
With every morn their love grew tenderer,
With every eve deeper and tenderer still…"
John William Waterhouse (1849-1917) was not a member of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood but he, like many other artists, accepted their style and subject matter. He too dipped his paint brush into the paint of dreams, and painted scenes from mythology, Medieval romances, love and longing. Pre-Raphaelites drew inspiration from poetry and even though for Rossetti Dante was God, we could rightfully say that John Keats was placed on a pedestal. Out of all English poets of Romanticism, Keats was the most lyrical, the one who emphasised the greatness of beauty. This ideal brought him together with the Pre-Raphaelites. It is very likely that Waterhouse had Keats's and not Boccaccio's version of the story in mind when he painted this painting. A tale of sad love was perfect for a Pre-Raphaelite canvas; before Waterhouse, both Rossetti with his infatuations with Dante's Beatrice and her death, and Millais' with his paintings such as 'A Huguenot' tackled the subject.
Keats's poem "Isabella" is absolutely beautiful, but these verses are perhaps my favourite and tell us about the growing love between Isabella and Lorenzo:
"Parting they seem'd to tread upon the air,
Twin roses by the zephyr blown apart
Only to meet again more close, and share
The inward fragrance of each other's heart.
She, to her chamber gone, a ditty fair
Sang, of delicious love and honey'd dart…"
Keats's verses and the Pre-Raphaelite canvases both possess sensuality in abundance: Keats's rich, delicate yet passionate descriptions match perfectly with the vibrantly coloured, richly textured and emotionally charged paintings of the Pre-Raphaelites.
Out of all the stories I've read from "Decameron" this one is my favourite because underneath the sad tale of love scenario, which always appeals my romantic whimsy, it has a strong dark and macabre mood. I mean, the girl weeps and adoringly gazes at the pot of basil, knowing that the head of her lover is buried in it. Can you imagine the head which used to belong to a beautiful man she loved slowly rotting in the pot, his hair mingling with the roots of basil… It's eerie and kind of revolting, and I say this with a creepy smile on my face because it appeals to me at the same time. John Keats, on the other hand, focused on the sensuality of the story and its melancholy, veiling it in beauty: rose petals, zephyrs, soft lips and sad gazes, everything is ripe, warmth, fragrant, in bloom. And this is how he ends the poem:
"And so she pined, and so she died forlorn,
Imploring for her Basil to the last.
No heart was there in Florence but did mourn
In pity of her love, so overcast.
And a sad ditty of this story born
From mouth to mouth through all the country pass'd:
Still is the burthen sung—"O cruelty,
"To steal my Basil-pot away from me!"
So, happy birthday, John Keats!
Tags: 1907., art, basil, Boccaccio, dark imagination, Decameron, Dreamy, English Romanticism, Halloween, imagination, Isabella and Lorenzo, Isabella and the pot of basil, Italy, John Keats, John William Waterhouse, Keats, love, Macabre, Painting, Poetry, Pre-Raphaelites, rotting head, sad, sad love
Categories Art, Literature, Pre-Raphaelites, Romanticism, Victorian era
Dante Gabriel Rossetti – Bocca Baciata
Dante Gabriel Rossetti spent 1850s in a mood of indolence and love; he was infatuated with Elizabeth Siddal, the beautiful red-haired Pre-Raphaelite model who famously posed for Millais' Ophelia, and he mainly painted pencil drawings of Siddal and watercolours of idealised Medieval scenes. He wasn't as productive in the early years of Pre-Raphaelite as he was in his later years when he filled his canvases with seductive, dreamy women with luscious full lips and voluminous hair; "Bocca Baciata" is the painting that started it all.
Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Bocca Baciata, 1859
The half-length portrait shows a woman dressed in an unbuttoned black garment with gold details, while the white undergarments coyly peek through. Her neck is long and strong, her head slightly tilted, lips full and closed, eyes heavy-lidded and gazing in the distance. On her left is an apple, and she's holding a small pot marigold in her hand. She is full, voluptuous, strong, possessing none of Siddal's delicate, melancholic, laudanum-chic beauty, but one thing they have in common: beautiful hair. Model for the painting was Fanny Cornforth who was described as having "harvest yellow" hair colour, but here Rossetti painted it as a warm, rich coppery colour which goes beautifully with the orange marigolds and gold jewellery around her neck and in her hair. Rossetti must have borrowed the brush of Veronese himself when he painted those masses of lascivious wild hair that flows and flows, seemingly endless, ready to wrap itself around the neck of its victims. Gazing at Pre-Raphaelite paintings has taught me that the famous Victorian saying which goes: "hair is the crown of woman's beauty" is wrong. Hair is not the crown, but the weapon, ready to seduce a man, ready to suffocate him in a matter of seconds.
What lures me about this painting are the beautiful autumnal colours and pot marigolds that grace the background; they are the flowers which fascinate me the most at the moment. They are the birth flowers for October, appropriate because their orange colour matched that of the falling leaves, and in the Victorian language of flowers they are seen as the symbols of love and jealousy, pain and grief, but this symbolism saddens me. Why bestow such a negative meaning to such an innocent, bright, whimsical flower? Marigolds are known as "summer brides" because they love the sun and I love them; they are so modest and unassuming, you'd fail to notice them in the company of extroverted roses and overwhelming sunflowers, but they hide so much beauty in their small orange petals.
The white rose in her hair symbolises innocence, and this portrait, although sensual, is indeed innocent compared to those which followed. As if the long, flowing fiery hair wasn't enough, the title, Bocca Baciata, meaning "the mouth that has been kissed", gives off a sensual mood. The beautiful expression comes from an Italian proverb from Boccaccio's Decameron which Rossetti wrote on the back of the painting: "The mouth that has been kissed does not lose its savour, indeed it renews itself just as the moon does." The line is a reference to a story from Decameron told on the second day, about a Saracen princess who, despite having numerous lovers, managed to persuade the King of Algarve that she was a virgin bride.
"Bocca Baciata" is both stylistically and technically a transitional work. It is Rossetti's first oil painting in years, the previous one being "Ecce Ancilla Domini" from 1850. The luxurious, sensuous mood is a reference to High Italian Renaissance, more specifically, the art of Titian and Veronese and their long-haired women. The main characteristic of Venetian art is the beautiful colour; space, volume is built with colour, not with line, and Rossetti used this principle hear, using soft shadings on the skin of her neck and in building the hair, stroke by stroke. Also, inspired by Titian, he used red colour as a base of his canvas, not the usual white. "Bocca Baciata" is not just a beautiful harmony of warm colours, but it also set a pattern of a style of painting typical for the art of late Pre-Raphaelite Movement and Symbolism, where a beautiful woman occupies a canvas, exuding sensuality, vanity and indolence, dressed in luxurious fabrics and surrounded by other objects of beauty such as flowers, mirrors, fans and jewellery. These types of paintings are not portraits with individual characteristics of a person, but a never ending series of visual representations of female sexual allure.
Tags: 1850s, 1859, art, autumn mood, Beauty, Bocca Baciata, Boccaccio, calendula, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Decameron, Fanny Cornforth, flowers, High Renaissance, long hair, marigold, orange, Painting, Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, Pre-Raphaelites, red hair, Romantic, Rossetti, sexual allure, The mouth that has been kissed, Titian, Veronese, victorian art, Victorian era, warm colours
Categories Art, Pre-Raphaelites, Victorian era


text:
#include "image_processing/scan_image.h"
#include "image_processing/scan_image_pyramid.h"
#include "image_processing/detection_template_tools.h"
#include "image_processing/object_detector.h"
#include "image_processing/box_overlap_testing.h"
#include "image_processing/scan_image_pyramid_tools.h"
#include "image_processing/setup_hashed_features.h"
#include "image_processing/scan_image_boxes.h"
#include "image_processing/scan_image_custom.h"
#include "image_processing/remove_unobtainable_rectangles.h"
#include "image_processing/scan_fhog_pyramid.h"
#include "image_processing/shape_predictor.h"
#include "image_processing/correlation_tracker.h"

#endif // DLIB_IMAGE_PROCESSInG_H_h_

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Aman Bhar has had considerable experience in business process and security posture transformation within the Government, Banking, Process Manufacturing, OEM Manufacturing, Pharmaceutical, Large Scale Printing, Healthcare, Tourism, Engineering, Transportation, Large Infrastructure Management and the IT industries for the last 25 years with an initial career launch in the Electronic Commerce arena.
Aman Bhar's speaking and teaching engagements are primarily in the European Union, North America and the Middle East where he assists some of the world's largest organizations in assuring their highly complex processes.
Aman Bhar is passionate and believes in excellence.
Aman has consulted with Heads of State, Boards of Directors and Industry Captains in the various roles he has played. He has designed cutting-edge training programs, delivered consulting & training services, designed secure business models, developed national e-commerce communities and continuous improvement models, and managed teams over a rewarding 25 period.
Aman -- The Information Security Professional. Aman is constantly engaged in helping businesses optimize their information security vision as part of a wider continuous improvement initiative. He is acknowledged as an expert consultant and trainer serving large organizations with cutting edge information security. His wide range of product experience has helped to develop his overall systems security knowledge.
A highly decorated police department captain with over twenty years of progressively responsible positions. I am a resourceful expert on governmental affairs and operations, coordinated the Mayor's Office "emergency response team". Because of my leadership position with the FBI's InfraGard Program in NYC I became an influential presenter in a multitude of situations, with strong emphasis on crisis management.
Mr. Hoffman is a Senior Technical Security Countermeasures (TSCM) professional who provides support towards the implementation and management of protecting companies Intellectual Property, Privacy and maintaining Product Integrity & Risk Managment.
Mr. Hoffman has personally constructed, installed, maintained and removed hundreds of wiretaps, video surveillance and eavesdrops for State, County and Federal Agencies, Mr. Hoffman is a unique TSCM professionals who has "Hands On" experience which includes being declared an "Expert Witness in Electronic Surveillance" by the courts.
Mr. Hoffman possesses a Bachelor's Degree in Criminal Justice with 30+ years of police investigative experience which included conducting TSCM police investigations throughout New Jersey. The New Jersey State Police (NJSP) has the sole responsibility in New Jersey for investigating illegal wiretapping and eavesdropping as well as performing TSCM sweeps for NJ facilities and State VIP's.
Mr. Hoffman currently retains a Top Secret Security (TS) Clearance (TS/SSBI) and is (TS/SCI) - eligible.
Information Security Associates (ISA) Training certification in conducting Technical Surveillance Countermeasures (TSCM). Pennsylvania State Police (PSP) Training certification, Class B in Wiretapping & Electronics Surveillance (Restricted to Law Enforcement Officers) (LEO's). Technical Surveillance Specialist (TSS) certification (Restricted to LEO's). Video Surveillance Specialist, (TSS) certification (Restricted to LEO's). Video Surveillance Operations, Middle Atlantic Great Lakes Organized Crime Law Enforcement Network (MAGLOCLEN) certification (Restricted to LEO's).
Mr. Hoffman has provided TSCM and security enhancement consultation for Facility Security Officers (FSO) at Department of Defense(DoD) contractor locations.
Mr. Hoffman now conducts TSCM services and security consulting for Murray Associates throughout the United States and abroad.


Chicago, IL—Diabetes is known to confer approximately a 2-fold increased risk for vascular disease, independent of other cardiovascular (CV) risk factors. The topic was discussed in a session at the 2013 American Diabetes Association (ADA) annual meeting. The presence of diabetes is equivalent in risk to a history of coronary heart disease.
High mortality rate (70%-75% of all deaths in diabetes result from CV disease).
The ability of glucose-lowering drugs to reduce CV risk in type 2 diabetes continues to be debated. Mechanistic studies have indicated that dipeptidyl peptidase (DPP)-4 inhibitors may have nonglycemic CV benefits, including lowering of blood pressure and triglycerides; improving endothelial and left-ventricular function; and the reduction of myocardial infarct size, inflammation and oxidative stress, and atherosclerotic plaque volume.
In one recent study, CV events and all-cause mortality were reduced with a DPP-4 inhibitor compared with an active comparator in an independent meta-analysis of 70 trials with nearly 42,000 patients and a mean 44-week follow-up (Monami M, et al. Diabetes Obes Metab. 2013;15:112-120).
The reduction in myocardial infarction (MI) with the DPP-4 inhibitor was greater than would be predicted based on traditional risk factors, suggesting a role for other mechanisms, stated the investigators. The Mantel-Haenszel odds ratio was 0.71 for major adverse coronary events.
The CV safety of the DPP-4 inhibitor linagliptin was evaluated by comparing the incidence of CV events and mortality in type 2 diabetes with other glucose-lowering drugs. At the ADA meeting, Odd Erik Johansen, MD, PhD, Senior Clinical Program Leader, Boehringer Ingelheim, Norway.
Dr Johansen presented the updated pooled analysis of 9569 patients in 19 multicenter, double-blind, parallel-group studies in which patients were randomized to linagliptin (N = 5847) or to a comparator (N = 3612). The comparator was placebo (N = 2675), glimepiride (N = 775), or voglibose (N = 162). The length of the trials ranged from 12 weeks to 2 years.
A 22% reduction in the primary end point of combined CV death, MI, stroke, and hospitalization for unstable angina was seen with linagliptin versus the combined comparator (hazard ratio [HR], 0.78; 95% confidence interval, 0.55-1.12). The incidence rate of the primary end point was 13.4 per 1000 patient-years in the linagliptin group and 18.9 in the comparator group.
The secondary CV end point of CV death, stroke, or MI was reduced by 26% with linagliptin, and all adjudicated CV events by 18% with linagliptin versus the combined comparators for both end points. The incidence rates per 1000 patient-years were 9.3 and 14.0 for the secondary CV end point, and 21.5 and 29.1 for all adjudicated CV events for the linagliptin and comparator groups, respectively. A blinded independent expert committee prospectively adjudicated the CV events.
The HRs for the tertiary CV end points were 1.04 for CV death, 0.86 for nonfatal MI, 0.34 for nonfatal stroke, 0.09 for transient ischemic stroke, and 1.08 for hospitalization for unstable angina.
The mean age of the patients was 59 years, 45% were women, and approximately 60% were white. Approximately 55% of the population had diabetes for >5 years, and the mean hemoglobin A1c was 8.1%. Nearly 11% of the patients receiving linagliptin and 12% of the patients receiving a comparator had moderate-to-severe renal insufficiency. Approximately 73% of the linagliptin group and 76% of the comparator group received CV drugs for primary and secondary prevention.
In a representative cohort of patients with type 2 diabetes and a diverse background of CV risk (from low to high) and concomitant treatment (treatment naïve to insulin), linagliptin was not associated with an increased risk of CV events, said Dr Johansen.
CARMELINA, a CV and renal outcomes study, and CAROLINA, a CV outcomes study, will more fully investigate the CV safety of linagliptin.


LNG is dirty, plain and simple, charges former longtime Lions Bay Mayor Brenda Broughton. She slams both the Trudeau and Clark governments for jeopardizing Canada's climate commitments by ignoring or cherry-picking the science, and maintains the industry won't benefit taxpayers at all.
The post Longtime Lions Bay Mayor: LNG is plain dirty, violates Canada's climate commitments appeared first on The Common Sense Canadian.
A new, short video illustrates in vivid detail the dangers posed by plans to run LNG tankers through narrow, densely populated coastal waterways in places like Howe Sound, Saanich Inlet, Prince Rupert and Kitimat.
The post New video shows serious dangers posed by LNG tankers appeared first on The Common Sense Canadian.
BC Hydro is being used to funnel tens of billions in public dollars through construction contracts to Liberal friends, says Norm Farrell after reviewing the utility's financial data.
The post BC Hydro being used to funnel tens of billions to Liberal friends appeared first on The Common Sense Canadian.
From "clean coal" to "ethical oil", a new book by Yale Professor Jason Stanley shows that propaganda is far more complex and problematic than simply lying about the facts.
The post From 'Clean Coal' to 'Ethical Oil': How propaganda (actually) works appeared first on The Common Sense Canadian.
David Suzuki and Grand Chief Stewart Phillip will be at the BC Supreme Court in downtown Vancouver Monday morning to speak to media and support the Treaty 8 Stewards of the Land as they face an injunction application by BC Hydro to forcibly remove them from their Peace Valley protest camp against Site C Dam.
The post Suzuki, Phillip lead support for Peace Valley land defenders as Hydro seeks injuction appeared first on The Common Sense Canadian.
Former BC Hydro CEO Marc Eliesen has slammed the organization's push to evict farmers and First Nations from Site C protest camp in a court affidavit. Rather than costing Hydro, a delay in construction will only save taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars, he's told the BC Supreme Court. Hydro's injunction application will be heard Monday.
The post Ex-Hydro CEO: Injunction vs. Site C campers "Fundamentally flawed" appeared first on The Common Sense Canadian.
The Common Sense Canadian: Trudeau promises climate test for LNG…now will he stick to his word?
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has promised a climate test for LNG plants like Petronas's controversial one on Lelu Island. Now, the question is will he follow through?
The post Trudeau promises climate test for LNG…now will he stick to his word? appeared first on The Common Sense Canadian.


text:
XIAMEN RED DRAGON YACHT BUILDING
août 6th, 2010 Posted in CITIES, SPORT, TRAVEL, XIAMEN
Commentaires fermés sur XIAMEN RED DRAGON YACHT BUILDING
David Winter the founder of Red Dragon whose advice is still very much sought after.
The Scandinavian dory 18 built for Scandinavian cruisers.
Ms Liu Hongyan has an eye for details. "Quality has always been our primary concern" says Ms Liu.
Fiberglass tooling are made by Red Dragon fiberglass fabricators who've been with the company since the beginning.
The D5.9 succeeded the D5.8, the first Red Dragon creation with Xiamen cityscape in the background.
Red Dragon employees add the finishing touch to the Scandinavian Cruiser 20, a very Nicely Made in China boat.
Most parts of a boat are made on site. "Our carpenters are the best you can find" says Ms Liu.
The 20ft family power boat with a 140hp Suzuki engine by Red Dragon Yacht Building.
It's summer, and to get away from the heat in Beijing, Nicely Made in China felt like dipping a toe in the sea. That's how NMiC landed in Xiamen, Fujian province, to interview Ms Liu Hongyan, Red Dragon Yacht Building general manager, to discuss sails, carbon fiber rudders and the new Chinese consumers who are boosting the recreational marine economy.
Ms Liu, when was the company created?
The company was created in 2003 by Mr David Winter who had long experience in the marine industry working for Taiwanese shipyards. When he arrived in Xiamen in 2001 he was surprised to see no recreational boats at all. That's why he decided to build a small sailing boat for the Chinese market. A few months later the D5.8 – a reference to the boat's length – was born. He found a shipyard to build it and when that shipyard did not want to build it anymore, David decided to make it himself, creating Red Dragon Yacht Building. We are today what is called a contract builder or an OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer). Clients from all over the world, like Scandinavian Cruisers, come to us with their design and we build the boats.
outdoor, XIAMEN


#524908 Hex Color, Includes conversions, schemes, html color codes and much more.
This page lists many detailed information about the hex color #524908. Its Hexadecimal code is 524908. In a RGB color space, which is consist of 32.16% red, 28.63% green and 3.14% blue, and that corresponding RGB values are 82, 73, 8. In a CMYK color space, it is consist of 0% cyan, 11% magenta, 90.2% yellow and 67.8% black, whereas that corresponding CMYK values are 0, 0.11, 0.9, 0.68. Other more information such as degree, lightness, saturation, please browses the following content.


text:
Tag: John Gray
A Better Deal for Newham's Taxpayers
Newham Green Party are thrilled to see action following our 2 year campaign against Newham's LOBO loans
We are thrilled by Newham Council's announcement that Barclays are turning 55% of its Lender Option Borrower Option, or LOBO, loans (worth £248 million) into a normal fixed-rate loan. It is estimated that this deal will save Newham Council £1.6 million this coming year!
The move follows years of campaigning by our team, alongside Debt Resistance UK and members of the public who uncovered the toxic debt, totaling 90% of the council's debt portfolio. The interest payments alone equal 80% of Council tax paid from 2014 to 2015.
Debt Resistance UK's profile of Newham
We are excited to finally see positive movement on this issue. This should rescue us from over a million pounds of cuts to local services and jobs this year. Newham taxpayers' deserve to see their money spent on local services, not bank debts from mis-sold financial products.
However, we are concerned that the other 45% of the council's LOBO loans remain unchallenged, and that full details of this new deal with Barclays have not been released. We can't be sure that this announcement isn't just a rewording of last year's changes initiated by Barclays for all of their LOBOs contracts in the UK.
Rachel Collinson, Membership Officer of Newham Green Party, and Elisabeth Whitebread, the Green Party candidate in the 2016 Forest Gate North by-election, have worked closely with Debt Resistance UK since investigations started in 2014.
Speaking on behalf of Newham Green Party, Rachel Collinson said "This is a brilliant first step to reduce Newham's debt problems. However, we will continue to campaign for further action to reduce debt expenditure from the LOBO investments with RBS.
Residents, local businesses and Council workers should not be penalised for these banks mis-selling loans to councils."
Newham Green Party's campaign started in 2014, following discussions with Joel Benjamin of Debt Resistance about investigating Newham's LOBO loans.
In 2015 Ms Collinson submitted letters to Newham Council regarding the LOBO loan debt, with little in the way of constructive response. This was followed with a request to the auditors to take the Council to court over illegal spending.
In 2016 Green Party and Debt Resistance activists attended various Council meetings; providing investigation reports, and offers of no win, no fee legal advice to provide the council with a low cost solution.
In addition to the nearly 900 people who signed our petition, we would like to thank all our volunteers, members and supporters, and Newham Councillors Rokhsana Fiaz, John Gray and John Whitworth for their input and questions at some of the Council and audit meetings – often against strong resistance from other Newham Councillors.
In an email to their supporters, Ludovica Rogers of Debt Resistance UK said:
We hope this deal goes beyond a simple PR stunt for Barclays and Newham council and that risk and high costs for taxpayers associated with LOBO loans are being effectively removed. Until Newham Council put the terms of this deal negotiated in secret into the public realm, we can't comment, in particular on loan breakage costs, interest rates and loan restructuring fees.
Debt Resistance UK would like to thank the hundreds of Newham residents who have signed the LOBOs petition and kept up public pressure on Robin Wales administration, alongside efforts of Newham LOBO loan objector Rachel Collinson
They join us in our disappointment at the poor conduct of Finance Director Lester Hudson and Mayor Robin Wales – "whose financial competence must now be called into direct question."
Cllr Hudson speaks at Council Meeting, July 2016. Photo by Debt Resistance UK
We will continue to work with the brilliant Debt Resistance UK team on monitoring the council's new deal and how the savings are put to use.
Please get in touch if you'd like to join this campaign, and sign the petition to continue the pressure on the remaining RBS loans.
Author HKLPosted on March 1, 2017 March 1, 2017 Categories Local news, Newham Council, Our CampaignsTags audit, Barclays, Council spending, Councillors, debt, Debt Resistance UK, Economics, Elisabeth Whitebread, finances, John Gray, John Whitworth, Lester Hudson, loans, LOBO loans, LOBOs, Newham, Newham Council, Rachel Collinson, Robin Wales, Rokhsana Fiaz, RSBLeave a comment on A Better Deal for Newham's Taxpayers
Leader Knows Best
Newham Green Party Chair, Rachel Collinson, reports back from Newham Council's August meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee to follow up on concerns around recent council budget decisions.
"I know how this vote is going to go. If the motion was 'the earth is flat' councillors Rokhsana, Seyi, Kay and Susan would vote 4-2 for it," thunders Lester Hudson, as he eyes the Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting.
I'm so offended and shocked by this that I can't help snorting, despite being in the public gallery.
Hudson continues as though nothing has happened. "If the motion was 'Geoffrey Boycott is useless at cricket' they would vote 4-2 for it." Nobody's laughing this time. His tirade continues: "I sincerely hope this time, common sense will prevail, but I doubt it."
There is general uproar, and the female councillors who have been the subject of these personal attacks are rightly livid. (Later on I realise that John Gray – also a member of the rebellion against the Robin Wales regime – is spared the vitriol. Could it be that the Y chromosome is a safeguard?)
A chap to my left passes me a sheet of lined A4 notepaper, with "Attendance Sheet" scrawled at the top. There is a name and one signature on it so far. I pass it on without signing.
A few minutes later, an unnamed lady shouts "Has everybody signed the attendance sheet?"
"I've never been asked this before as a member of the public in a council meeting," I say, annoyed. "It doesn't say on it how the data will be used, so I didn't."
"I just need to know who is here," she replies.
Well, that much is obvious.
This meeting has been called because Newham Council's Cabinet have seemingly approved a dubious investment proposal without oversight of the Investment and Accounts Committee. Councillors heard about it in passing and were horrified. They have decided to ask the Mayor to reconsider spending £500,000 without due process.
Council Officers will not let members of the public (or even certain councillors) see more details of what's proposed. All we know so far is that the Cabinet are attempting to reduce payments to the council's pension fund – which already has a £238 million deficit – using a 'Special Purpose Vehicle'. We understand that the council is using some of their buildings as security on a risky investment. How do we know it's risky? Because their financial advisors are warning them against it.
It seems common sense to me that if the proposal were common sense, then the Cabinet would not resort to bending the rules to avoid scrutiny.
What I am seeing in action here is the Labour belief that Leader Knows Best, and democracy is merely a frustrating blot on the master plan. The belief that the people ought to shut up and take their medicine. The belief that is shown up at its worst in the Executive Mayoral system.
This is further confirmed when a member of the public stands up and questions whether the chair should be asking loaded questions of his own committee. The offender, Anthony McAlmont, says that members of the public are not allowed to speak, despite having allowed an earlier question. For some reason this breach of meeting protocol goes unnoticed by the Legal advisor present.
I hear the words 'p&%$-up' and 'brewery' emanate loudly from elsewhere in the public gallery.
With dogged persistence, the female Councillors draft a resolution that no more money should be spent until the investment and accounts committee has had a chance to review the proposal in more detail. In the end, the meeting vote is 5-1 for this motion.
Hudson warns this is a waste of time. What does he know that we don't?
During this fiasco, I am reminded of the botched Labour leadership elections. You can vote for anything, as long as it's the right choice.
As if to reinforce this, the Mayor rejects the motion day after.
It would be easy to despair right now. But I'm seeing a new movement emerging amongst the people of Newham. I see it in the snowballing, hopeful tweets about Jeremy Corbyn. I see it in the growing bravery of left-wing councillors against their bullying leaders. I see it in the swelling numbers of Newham Green Party.
And it's almost reassuring to observe some councillors in utter denial of this growing trend. It means we will win, and soon.
If you're interested in helping the Green Party challenge Labour's one party state in Newham, do sign up here. (NB: We have a No Purge Promise™)
This post originally appeared as a guest post on ForestGate.net on August 27th 2015.
Author HKLPosted on November 18, 2015 July 5, 2016 Categories Local news, Newham Council, Political CommentaryTags budget, Democracy, finances, John Gray, Kay Scoresby, Lester Hudson, Newham, Newham Council, Newham Labour, Overview and Scrutiny committee, Rachel Collinson, Rokhsana Fiaz, Seyi Akiwowo, Susan MastersLeave a comment on Leader Knows Best


Aqua, Glycerin, Cocamidopropyl Betaine, Hamamelis Virginiana (Witch Hazel) Leaf Extract, *CO Glycerin, **Squalane, *CO Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Juice, *CO Aesculus Hippocastanum (Horse Chestnut) Seed Extract, *CO Prunus Armeniaca (Apricot) Fruit Extract, *CO Rosa Centifolia (Rose) Flower Extract, *CO Rosmarinus Ocinalis (Rosemary) Leaf Extract, *CO Carum Petroselinum (Parsley) Extract, *CO Centella Asiatica Leaf Extract, *CO Cucumis Sativus (Cucumber) Seed Extract, *CO Daucus Carota Sativa (Carrot) Root Extract, *CO Euphrasia Ocinalis Extract, Citric Acid, Lactic Acid, Malic Acid, Gluconic Acid, Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C), Glycolic Acid, Tartaric Acid, Salicylic Acid, Benzyl Alcohol, Ethylhexylglycerin, Tocopherol. *Certified Organic **From Sugarcane.
Using a cotton pad, apply Micellar Water onto face. Gently glide aver eyes and lips to remove makeup and impurities.


Published at Thursday, April 18th, 2019 - 5:15 PM. 4 Wiring Diagram. By Lindsey S. Sexton.
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text:
from celery.task import Task
from django.conf import settings
from django.contrib.auth import get_user_model

from documents.models import Document

User = get_user_model()

class DeleteDocumentTask(Task):

    def run(self, *args, **kwargs):
        self.document = Document.objects.get(pk=args[0])
        user = User.objects.get(pk=args[1])
        if not self.document.can_manage(user):
            # TODO: Log this
            return
        manager = settings.PLATFORM_MANAGER()
        manager.delete_document(self.document)

    def on_success(self, retval, task_id, args, kwargs):
        self.document.delete()

    def on_failure(self, exc, task_id, args, kwargs, einfo):
        # TODO: Log this
        return


This is the first gallery of this website. This is the first gallery of this website. This is the first gallery of this website. This is the first gallery of this website. This is the first gallery of this website. This is the first gallery of this website. This is the first gallery of this website.


That's why our progressive approach tailors recreational opportunities to what residents like—and what they need to be well. Recreation therapy staff facilitate more than just leisure; they facilitate well-being, independence and, most importantly, value.
We believe it's our job to learn about residents' lives—and connect that to the recreation and leisure opportunities we provide, building self-esteem and a sense of purpose along the way.


text:
Effect on World Peace
Research on other pages has shown that temporary peace-creating groups have reduced crime, warfare and terrorism, and that large groups (7,000-9,000) have measurably reduced conflict and terrorism worldwide. In all cases, unfortunately, when the peace-creating groups have had to disband, levels of violence have increased once again.
A natural question: What would happen if a group of 9,000 peace-creating experts were maintained permanently? Ideally, such a group would not just reduce fighting quickly but, in the longer run, end major conflict altogether.
This possibility has been tested, as well. For three years, from 1988 to 1990, at a location just outside New Delhi, in India, a single philanthropist supported a group of 8,000 experts in the Transcendental Meditation technique and the advanced TM-Sidhi program, including Yogic Flying). Over those three years, every major conflict in the world peacefully resolved. First, a war of seven years between Iraq and Iran that had claimed millions of lives finally came to an end. Then, after five years, the Soviet Union's brutal invasion of Afghanistan was called to a halt. Most encouraging, in 1989 the Berlin Wall fell, the Soviet Union dissolved, and forty years of Cold War simply melted away.
In the view of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, this was a glimpse of what life can be like with the world pervaded by an influence of peace. Based on research and experience, Maharishi's goal is to gather large peace-creating groups permanently, to create an indomitable influence of harmony and coherence that will purify the collective consciousness of the entire world, and create a permanent state of world peace (click here for What's the plan?).
"From one spot in the world we can create that beautiful influence of coherence and harmony which radiates around the world. From one spot we can create invincibility for every nation."
Mahesh Yogi


Why does my FLAIR highchair look shorter now compared to the past?
Thanks for purchasing a FLAIR highchair! Recently, the testing standards for highchairs changed, requiring us to reduce the adjustability of our chair. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.
I ordered a FLAIR highchair and it arrived with warning labels on the seat. Why?
The safety standard for High Chairs (ASTM F404) requires that the warning statement must be placed in a location that is visible by the caregiver while placing the occupant into the high chair.
What age baby is the Close & Secure sleeper for?
The First Years Close & Secure Sleeper is designed to be used with newborns and infants. We recommend that parents discontinue using the product with babies who are able to roll over or push themselves up on their forearms.
Is it ok to use another person's breast pump?
The First Years breast pump is a single user product which cannot be autoclaved or sterilized without destroying the product.
Use by more than one person may present a health risk and will void the warranty.


The bad news for grocery chains is that they have become a cauldron of consolidation. The past few years have seen major grocery chains buying smaller competitors to forestall the Walmart takeover of the industry.
Kroger's buys Harris Teeter and Roundy's. Albertson's buys Safeway and Haggen. ACME Markets, a subsidiary of Albertson's, buys a bankrupt A&P. On and on.
The consolidations hints at several trends for the grocery industry, even if the largest grocery chains (such as Kroger, Publix and Albertson's) are seeing this as way to fight the retail behemoths of Walmart, Target, Costco and others. By increasing distribution, those chains are hoping to out-large those big boxes so they can overtake market leadership.
For all those groceries, this is not a good trend. Walmart isn't going anywhere. It is already the market leader and some reports say more than half of its earnings come from grocery. It has even been able to win with its private label brand, Great Value, leading the way. If anything, Walmart will increase its emphasis on grocery.
The problem is that, now that Walmart has entered the fray, that tactic is not as effective. Walmart's brand, encapsulated in its theme of "Save Money. Live Better," is so embedded in the minds of consumers that consumers who shop on price shop there.
Walmart beat grocers at the price game because low prices were never part of their brands. They were only marketing messages while Walmart means low prices.
In our corner of the world in North Carolina, a once-thriving Food Lion was doomed the instant the nearby Walmart added a grocery. The Food Lion location closed months later and has sat empty ever since.
Then there are the shifting eating trends. Consumers want healthier options, which have led most groceries to increase their organic offerings. Whole Foods is the organic food leader, but it will never be the market leader because organic foods are expensive. It remains only part of the equation.
So how do you approach the changing food environment (with its higher prices) with a large segment of shoppers buying based on price?
Grocery shoppers have preferences but a majority of them will buy groceries from more than one place. You can buy the basics at Walmart (where price supersedes quality), a prime choice of meat at Fresh Market and have the occasional trip to Harris Teeter, Publix or Kroger on the way home.
Even more, those messages are just promoted as just that. Messages. They are do not firmly affix to the brand the way Walmart affixes its theme to the brand. When that happens, even if the message is differentiating (and most are not), they are not believed because they just sound like marketing.
Albertson's has used "You're in for something fresh," which sounds like it was written by an ad agency and does nothing to distinguish the chain from the competition.
Instead, grocery chains must define who their customers are when they use your brand. That's how preference is created. If your brand is a true reflection of the target audience, then consumers will be incapable of choosing anyone else because it would be going against their own emotional natures.
Originally published by Supermarket News.


text:
require "finer_struct/version"
require "finer_struct/immutable"
require "finer_struct/mutable"


text:
Chhatrapur is a Vidhan Sabha constituency of Ganjam district, Odisha.

This constituency includes Chhatrapur, Ganjam, Rambha, Chhatrapur block and Ganjam block.

Elected Members

Sixteen elections were held between 1951 and 2019.
Elected members from the Chhatrapur constituency are:
2019: (127): Subash Chandra Behera (BJD)
2014: (127): Priyanshu Pradhan (BJD)
2009: (127): Adikanda Sethi (CPI)
2004: (72): Nagireddy Narayan Reddy (CPI)
2000: (72): Rama Chandra Panda (BJP)
1995: (72): Daitari Behera  (Congress)
1990: (72): Parsuram Panda (CPI)
1985: (72): Ashok Kumar Choudhury (Congress)
1980: (72): Biswanath Sahu (CPI)
1977: (72): Biswanath Sahu (CPI)
1974: (72): Daitari Behera (Utkal Congress)
1971: (68): Lakshman Mahapatra (CPI)
1967: (68): Lakshman Mahapatra (CPI)
1961: (20):  Lakshman Mahapatra (CPI)
1957: (15): Yatiraj Proharaj (Congress)
1951: (102): V . Sitaramaya (Independent)

2019 Election Result

2014 Election Result
In 2014 election,  Biju Janata Dal candidate Priyanshu Pradhan defeated Communist Party of India candidate Krushna Chandra Nayak by a margin of 22,019 votes.

Summary of results of the 2009 Election
In 2009 election, Communist Party of India candidate Adikanda Sethi defeated Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Bhagaban Behera by a margin of 16,557 votes.

Notes

References

Assembly constituencies of Odisha
Politics of Ganjam district

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


text:
US Supreme Court Center > Volume 556 > Arthur Andersen LLP v. Carlisle 556 U. S. ____ 08-146 (2009) > Opinion
Arthur Andersen LLP v. Carlisle 556 U. S. ____ - 08-146 (2009)
Syllabus (pdf)
Opinion [ Justice Scalia ] (pdf)
Dissent [ Justice Souter ] (pdf)
OPINION OF THE COURT
ARTHUR ANDERSEN LLP V. CARLISLE
556 U. S. ____ (2009)
ARTHUR ANDERSEN LLP, et al., PETITIONERS v. WAYNE CARLISLE et al.
on writ of certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the sixth circuit
[May 4, 2009]
Justice Scalia delivered the opinion of the Court.
Section 3 of the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) entitles litigants in federal court to a stay of any action that is "referable to arbitration under an agreement in writing." 9 U. S. C. §3. Section 16(a)(1)(A), in turn, allows an appeal from "an order … refusing a stay of any action under section 3." We address in this case whether appellate courts have jurisdiction under §16(a) to review denials of stays requested by litigants who were not parties to the relevant arbitration agreement, and whether §3 can ever mandate a stay in such circumstances.
Respondents Wayne Carlisle, James Bushman, and Gary Strassel set out to minimize their taxes from the 1999 sale of their construction-equipment company. Arthur Andersen LLP, a firm that had long served as their company's accountant, auditor, and tax adviser, introduced them to Bricolage Capital, LLC, which in turn referred them for legal advice to Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle, LLP. According to respondents, these advisers recommended a "leveraged option strategy" tax shelter designed to create illusory losses through foreign-currency-exchange options. As a part of the scheme, respondents invested in various stock warrants through newly created limited liability corporations (LLCs), which are also respondents in this case. The respondent LLCs entered into investment-management agreements with Bricolage, specifying that "[a]ny controversy arising out of or relating to this Agreement or the br[ea]ch thereof, shall be settled by arbitration conducted in New York, New York, in accordance with the Commercial Arbitration Rules of the American Arbitration Association." App. 80–81, 99–100, 118–119.
As with all that seems too good to be true, a controversy did indeed arise. The warrants respondents purchased turned out to be almost entirely worthless, and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) determined in August 2000 that the "leveraged option strategy" scheme was an illegal tax shelter. The IRS initially offered conditional amnesty to taxpayers who had used such arrangements, but petitioners failed to inform respondents of that option. Respondents ultimately entered into a settlement program in which they paid the IRS all taxes, penalties, and interest owed.
Respondents filed this diversity suit in the Eastern District of Kentucky against Bricolage, Arthur Andersen and others[Footnote 1] (all except Bricolage and its employees hereinafter referred to as petitioners), alleging fraud, civil conspiracy, malpractice, breach of fiduciary duty, and negligence. Petitioners moved to stay the action, invoking §3 of the FAA and arguing that the principles of equitable estoppel demanded that respondents arbitrate their claims under their investment agreements with Bricolage.[Footnote 2] The District Court denied the motions.
Petitioners filed an interlocutory appeal, which the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit dismissed for want of jurisdiction. Carlisle v. Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle, LLP, 521 F. 3d 597, 602 (2008). We granted certiorari, 555 U. S. ___ (2008).
Ordinarily, courts of appeals have jurisdiction only over "final decisions" of district courts. 28 U. S. C. §1291. The FAA, however, makes an exception to that finality requirement, providing that "an appeal may be taken from … an order … refusing a stay of any action under section 3 of this title." 9 U. S. C. §16(a)(1)(A). By that provision's clear and unambiguous terms, any litigant who asks for a stay under §3 is entitled to an immediate appeal from denial of that motion—regardless of whether the litigant is in fact eligible for a stay. Because each petitioner in this case explicitly asked for a stay pursuant to §3, App. 52, 54, 63, 65, the Sixth Circuit had jurisdiction to review the District Court's denial.
The courts that have declined jurisdiction over §3 appeals of the sort at issue here have done so by conflating the jurisdictional question with the merits of the appeal. They reason that because stay motions premised on equitable estoppel seek to expand (rather than simply vindicate) agreements, they are not cognizable under §§3 and 4, and therefore the relevant motions are not actually "under" those provisions. See, in addition to the opinion below, 521 F. 3d, at 602, DSMC Inc. v. Convera Corp., 349 F. 3d 679, 682–685 (CADC 2003); In re Universal Serv. Fund Tel. Billing Practice Litigation v. Sprint Communications Co., 428 F. 3d 940, 944–945 (CA10 2005). The dissent makes this step explicit, by reading the appellate jurisdictional provision of §16 as "calling for a look-through" to the substantive provisions of §3. Post, at 2. Jurisdiction over the appeal, however, "must be determined by focusing upon the category of order appealed from, rather than upon the strength of the grounds for reversing the order." Behrens v. Pelletier, 516 U. S. 299, 311 (1996).[Footnote 3] The jurisdictional statute here unambiguously makes the underlying merits irrelevant, for even utter frivolousness of the underlying request for a §3 stay cannot turn a denial into something other than "an order … refusing a stay of any action under section 3." 9 U. S. C. §16(a).
Respondents argue that this reading of §16(a) will produce a long parade of horribles, enmeshing courts in fact-intensive jurisdictional inquiries and permitting frivolous interlocutory appeals. Even if these objections could surmount the plain language of the statute, we would not be persuaded. Determination of whether §3 was invoked in a denied stay request is immeasurably more simple and less factbound than the threshold determination respondents would replace it with: whether the litigant was a party to the contract (an especially difficult question when the written agreement is not signed). It is more appropriate to grapple with that merits question after the court has accepted jurisdiction over the case. Second, there are ways of minimizing the impact of abusive appeals. Appellate courts can streamline the disposition of meritless claims and even authorize the district court's retention of jurisdiction when an appeal is certified as frivolous. See Behrens, supra, at 310–311. And, of course, those inclined to file dilatory appeals must be given pause by courts' authority to "award just damages and single or double costs to the appellee" whenever an appeal is "frivolous." Fed. Rule App. Proc. 38.
Even if the Court of Appeals were correct that it had no jurisdiction over meritless appeals, its ground for finding this appeal meritless was in error. We take the trouble to address that alternative ground, since if the Court of Appeals is correct on the merits point we will have awarded petitioners a remarkably hollow victory. We consider, therefore, the Sixth Circuit's underlying determination that those who are not parties to a written arbitration agreement are categorically ineligible for relief.
Section 2—the FAA's substantive mandate—makes written arbitration agreements "valid, irrevocable, and enforceable, save upon such grounds as exist at law or in equity for the revocation of a contract." That provision creates substantive federal law regarding the enforceability of arbitration agreements, requiring courts "to place such agreements upon the same footing as other contracts." Volt Information Sciences, Inc. v. Board of Trustees of Leland Stanford Junior Univ., 489 U. S. 468, 478 (1989) (internal quotation marks omitted). Section 3, in turn, allows litigants already in federal court to invoke agreements made enforceable by §2. That provision requires the court, "on application of one of the parties,"[Footnote 4] to stay the action if it involves an "issue referable to arbitration under an agreement in writing." 9 U. S. C. §3.
Neither provision purports to alter background principles of state contract law regarding the scope of agreements (including the question of who is bound by them). Indeed §2 explicitly retains an external body of law governing revocation (such grounds "as exist at law or in equity").[Footnote 5] And we think §3 adds no substantive restriction to §2's enforceability mandate. "[S]tate law," therefore, is applicable to determine which contracts are binding under §2 and enforceable under §3 "if that law arose to govern issues concerning the validity, revocability, and enforceability of contracts generally." Perry v. Thomas, 482 U. S. 483, 493, n. 9 (1987). See also First Options of Chicago, Inc. v. Kaplan, 514 U. S. 938, 944 (1995). Because "traditional principles" of state law allow a contract to be enforced by or against nonparties to the contract through "assumption, piercing the corporate veil, alter ego, incorporation by reference, third-party beneficiary theories, waiver and estoppel," 21 R. Lord, Williston on Contracts §57:19, p. 183 (4th ed. 2001), the Sixth Circuit's holding that nonparties to a contract are categorically barred from §3 relief was error.
Respondents argue that, as a matter of federal law, claims to arbitration by nonparties are not "referable to arbitration under an agreement in writing," 9 U. S. C. §3 (emphasis added), because they "seek to bind a signatory to an arbitral obligation beyond that signatory's strictly contractual obligation to arbitrate," Brief for Respondents 26. Perhaps that would be true if §3 mandated stays only for disputes between parties to a written arbitration agreement. But that is not what the statute says. It says that stays are required if the claims are "referable to arbitration under an agreement in writing." If a written arbitration provision is made enforceable against (or for the benefit of) a third party under state contract law, the statute's terms are fulfilled.[Footnote 6]
Respondents' final fallback consists of reliance upon dicta in our opinions, such as the statement that "arbitration … is a way to resolve those disputes—but only those disputes—that the parties have agreed to submit to arbitration," First Options, supra, at 943, and the statement that "[i]t goes without saying that a contract cannot bind a nonparty," EEOC v. Waffle House, Inc., 534 U. S. 279, 294 (2002). The former statement pertained to issues parties agreed to arbitrate, and the latter referred to an entity (the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission) which obviously had no third-party obligations under the contract in question. Neither these nor any of our other cases have presented for decision the question whether arbitration agreements that are otherwise enforceable by (or against) third parties trigger protection under the FAA.
Respondents may be correct in saying that courts' application of equitable estoppel to impose an arbitration agreement upon strangers to the contract has been "somewhat loose." Brief for Respondents 27, n. 15. But we need not decide here whether the relevant state contract law recognizes equitable estoppel as a ground for enforcing contracts against third parties, what standard it would apply, and whether petitioners would be entitled to relief under it. These questions have not been briefed before us and can be addressed on remand. It suffices to say that no federal law bars the State from allowing petitioners to enforce the arbitration agreement against respondents and that §3 would require a stay in this case if it did.
* * *
We hold that the Sixth Circuit had jurisdiction to review the denial of petitioners' request for a §3 stay and that a litigant who was not a party to the relevant arbitration agreement may invoke §3 if the relevant state contract law allows him to enforce the agreement. The judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
Also named in the suit were two employees of Bricolage (Andrew Beer and Samyak Veera); Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle, LLP; William Bricker (the lawyer respondents worked with at the law firm); Prism Connectivity Ventures, LLC (the entity from whom the worthless warrants were purchased); Integrated Capital Associates, Inc. (a prior owner of the worthless warrants who had also been a client of the law firm); and Intercontinental Pacific Group, Inc. (a firm with the same principals as Integrated Capital Associates).
Bricolage also moved for a stay under §3, but it filed for bankruptcy while its motion was pending, and the District Court denied the motion as moot.
Federal courts lack subject-matter jurisdiction when an asserted federal claim is " 'so insubstantial, implausible, foreclosed by prior decisions of this Court, or otherwise completely devoid of merit as not to involve a federal controversy.' " Steel Co. v. Citizens for Better Environment, 523 U. S. 83, 89 (1998) (quoting Oneida Indian Nation of N. Y. v. County of Oneida, 414 U. S. 661, 666 (1974)). Respondents have not relied upon this line of cases as an alternative rationale for rejection of jurisdiction, and there are good reasons for treating subject-matter jurisdiction differently, in that respect, from the appellate jurisdiction here conferred. A frivolous federal claim, if sufficient to confer jurisdiction, would give the court power to hear related state-law claims, see 28 U. S. C. §1367; no such collateral consequences are at issue here. And while an insubstantial federal claim can be said not to "aris[e] under the Constitution, laws, or treaties of the United States," §1331, insubstantiality of the merits can hardly convert a judge's "order … refusing a stay" into an "order … refusing" something else. But we need not resolve this question today.
Respondents do not contest that the term "parties" in §3 refers to parties to the litigation rather than parties to the contract. The adjacent provision, which explicitly refers to the "subject matter of a suit arising out of the controversy between the parties," 9 U. S. C. §4, unambiguously refers to adversaries in the action, and "identical words and phrases within the same statute should normally be given the same meaning," Powerex Corp. v. Reliant Energy Services, Inc., 551 U. S. 224, 232 (2007). Even without benefit of that canon, we would not be disposed to believe that the statute allows a party to the contract who is not a party to the litigation to apply for a stay of the proceeding.
We have said many times that federal law requires that "questions of arbitrability … be addressed with a healthy regard for the federal policy favoring arbitration." Moses H. Cone Memorial Hospital v. Mercury Constr. Corp., 460 U. S. 1, 24–25 (1983). Whatever the meaning of this vague prescription, it cannot possibly require the disregard of state law permitting arbitration by or against nonparties to the written arbitration agreement.
We thus reject the dissent's contention that contract law's longstanding endorsement of third-party enforcement is "a weak premise for inferring an intent to allow third parties to obtain a §3 stay," post, at 2. It seems to us not weak at all, in light of the terms of the statute. There is no doubt that, where state law permits it, a third-party claim is "referable to arbitration under an agreement in writing." It is not our role to conform an unambiguous statute to what we think "Congress probably intended," post, at 2.
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text:
Q: Displaying data from a collect in rails I currently have models that can be described as follows:
Songs can have many setlists through Allocations
Allocations belong to songs and setlists
Setlists can have many songs in them through allocations
Songs have a title, artist, and a musical key.
Basically I'm setting up the new setlist view where a musician can select any existing songs from the library to add to a setlist. I want to  do something along these lines:

        Title
        Artist
        Root Key

      INSERT CODE HERE TO DISPLAY DATA

At the moment I'm using the following code to get the data but I don't know if there's a way to separate it out into the relevant cells in the table:
<% songs = Song.all.collect {|s| [ s.title, s.artist, s.key ] }  %>
<% songs.sort! %>

I'm not sure if this is this is the best way to go about doing this so if anyone could suggest an alternative that would be fantastic too. Thanks in advance!

A: Fetching data is controller's responsibility.
def index
  @songs = Song.select([:title, :artist, :key]).all
end

And view:

      <% @songs.each do |song| %>

          <%= song.title %>
          <%= song.artist %>
          <%= song.key %>

      <% end %>

A: I managed to solve the problem as follows:

          <% songs.each do |n| %>

              <%= n[0], '#' %>
              <%= n[1], '#' %>
              <%= n[2], '#' %>

          <% end %>

I'm still not sure whether or not this is best practice or not so if anyone know of a better way please let me know. Thanks :)

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange