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The numerous characters and multiple seasons of "DragonBall Z" make it easy to find unique and special gifts for fans of all ages.
Theme Toys
Best DragonBall Z toy
by: Sam Bramlett, BestReviews Staff
Posted: Nov 18, 2022 / 04:00 AM CST
Updated: Nov 18, 2022 / 04:17 AM CST
Which DragonBall Z toys are best?
"DragonBall Z" is one of the most popular anime television shows today. This high-octane show features Goku and his friends as they journey through space to face god-like opponents and collect the legendary DragonBalls. The fantastically choreographed fight scenes are thrilling and the engaging storyline will keep viewers of all ages hooked. "DragonBall Z" influenced pop culture and continues to be a favorite for many viewers across the globe.
The obvious gifts for a "DragonBall Z" fan are all of the DVDs and video games of the show. But if they already have those, there are plenty of other options. There's a huge market for "DragonBall Z" toys for both collectors and casual play. And whether you're shopping for a fan or you're looking for yourself, you can't go wrong with a Funko Pop Goku & Nimbus figurine. Here are some more great ideas for "DragonBall Z" toys.
Which DragonBall Z toys are the most popular?
"DragonBall Z" has been on the air since the 80s, and there are various spin-off series as well, so there's a lot of material to draw from. There's "DragonBall", "DragonBall Z", "DragonBall GT" and "DragonBall Super", plus a dozen or so movies. If you want to stick with "DragonBall Z", which is the classic show that most people will know, there are some classic storylines you can look for. Check for toys from the Saiyan arc, the Namek arc, the Cell Games arc, and the Majin Buu arc.
Goku is one of the main protagonists in "DragonBall Z" and he comes in several different versions. One of the most popular versions is the Ultra Instinct, where Goku has silver hair and bright silver eyes to match. You can also find a more classic version with Goku as a Super Saiyan. If you want a villain to match Goku, consider purchasing toys of the characters Cell, Frieza or Vegeta.
Before you make your purchase, consider the age you're buying for. Not all toys are for playing and may have small parts that are dangerous for young children. That said, there is a wide range of action figures and toys for all kinds of "DragonBall Z" fans to enjoy. Whether it's an action figure, a stuffed animal, or a board game, there's something for everyone.
What are the best DragonBall Z toys to buy?
Funko Pop Goku & Nimbus figure
What you need to know: This Funko Pop Goku sports the uniform from the original series. It shows him riding Nimbus and carrying his iconic staff.
What you'll love: This is perfect for any "DragonBall Z" fan or anyone with a Funko Pop collection.
What you should consider: It has a big head, so it's top-heavy and may knock over more easily.
S.H. Figuarts Frieza action figure
What you need to know: Frieza is a classic villain and was the first to fight against Super Saiyan Goku. His character remains a fan favorite to this day.
What you'll love: This figure comes with changeable arms, legs, energy blasts, and even expressions. It's versatile and looks great in a display case.
What you should consider: It's definitely on the more expensive side and is more of a collector's item than a children's toy.
Super Saiyan Goku figurine
What you need to know: This classic Super Saiyan Goku is from "DragonBall Super" and comes with a secondary set of attachable hands and a Shenlong dragon head.
What you'll love: This Goku is agile and has easy-articulating limbs that make posing simple. The hand and energy blast options make customization even more fun.
What you should consider: Some felt it wasn't a good choice for younger fans since there are so many parts that can fall off and get lost during play.
Puar Plushie
What you need to know: Puar is a cute, shapeshifting floating creature from the first season of "DragonBall."
What you'll love: This ultra-cute plushie is made from soft fabric and has a drawstring that creates a soft, rumbling sensation when you pull it.
What you should consider: Not everyone knows Puar since he's not a regular character. But it's a good gift for longtime fans of the series.
Final Form Cell
What you need to know: In "DragonBall Z," Cell holds a tournament to decide the fate of the world, and only the Z fighters can stop him. This Cell action figure comes with a different set of hands and stands half a foot tall.
What you'll love: The proportions and design are accurate to the source material and look very high-end considering its price point.
What you should consider: This figurine comes out in January 2022. His shoulder sockets can pop out, and his detachable wings tend to come off when posing his arms.
DragonBall Z Monopoly
What you need to know: There's nothing more fun than a game night. With the Monopoly DragonBall Z game, the "DragonBall Z" fighters fight to become the richest warrior.
What you'll love: Plenty of characters from the show make an appearance in this game, and die-hard fans will appreciate the details.
What you should consider: Even though it's the same Monopoly game, the new theme makes this a great buy for families. That said, the game may be too complicated for young fans.
Super Saiyan 2 Gohan
What you need to know: Super Saiyan 2 Gohan is an iconic character, and this figurine shows him at his peak during his fight with Cell.
What you'll love: The intricate details in this figurine's face and body look almost exactly like the show. It has 16 points of articulation for a wide variety of fighting poses.
What you should consider: The low price shows in the joints, which has limited movement in the hips and shoulders.
Sam Bramlett writes for BestReviews. BestReviews has helped millions of consumers simplify their purchasing decisions, saving them time and money.
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Monday Morning Headlines: Caldor Fire Grows to 104,000 Acres
The Caldor Fire grew to over 104,000 acres over the weekend and crossed to the north side of Highway 50 near South Lake Tahoe. The fire, now 5% contained, is burning near Kyburz, but no communities or structures were threatened as of Sunday night, according to Cal Fire. [Chronicle / KRON4]
A woman was wounded in a freeway shooting Sunday night after her car was riddled with bullets on I-80 in Vallejo. No information was available about the shooter or a possible motive. [CBS SF]
An air quality advisory has been issued for the Bay Area Monday due to lingering wildfire smoke, however the smoke is expected to stay mostly aloft and just cause hazy skies. [CBS SF]
The Pfizer vaccine has received full approval from the FDA, which is expected to set off a wave of new mandates. [New York Times]
Three teenagers required rescue by a Coast Guard helicopter Saturday night on a cliffside near Muir Beach. [ABC7]
Marin County-based organization Roots of Peace continues, so far unsuccessfully, to try to evacuate its Afghan employees from Afghanistan. [ABC7]
Nine national forests in California have now been closed by federal authorities due to spreading wildfires. [Bay City News]
North Beach poet and longtime neighborhood fixture Jack Hirschman died last week at the age of 87 after getting sick after giving a reading at Foreign Cinema. [Chronicle]
58-year-old Moraga Police Corporal Kevin Mooney, an eight-year veteran with the town police force who also served in the Marines in the Iraq War, died last week of COVID-19 complications. [East Bay Times]
At least seven people died Sunday in a panicked rush to try to enter the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan — and the Taliban are now trying to cast blame on the Americans for all of the chaos at the airport, and for casting them as "some kind of enemy." [Associated Press]
Photo by Allison Dinner/Getty Images
Suspicious Device Incident Briefly Closes Down Area Next to Dolores Park
A suspicious device was reported Monday morning in the area of Dolores Street and Cumberland Street, causing a citywide alert to be issued and part of the street to be shut down.
San Francisco Man Dies of Suspected Heatstroke in Death Valley
60-year-old Lawrence Stanback was found unconscious by park rangers at Death Valley National Park after staff received a report of someone having possibly succumbed to heatstroke; Stanback was pronounced dead on the scene — the temperature outside that day being north of 108 degrees Fahrenheit.

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Investigations · How South Africa's Black Economic Empowerment Initiative Empowered the Powerful
How South Africa's Black Economic Empowerment Initiative Empowered the Powerful
A view of Johannesburg's affluent Sandton suburb from Alexandra Township, one of the city's poorest areas. Credit: Delwyn Verasamy/Mail & Guardian
by Khadija Sharife and Mark Anderson
Regiments Capital, a boutique South African securities investment firm, earned more than 891 million rand ($58.7 million) in shares by taking advantage of a government initiative designed to mitigate the inequality of 50 years of apartheid, an OCCRP investigation reveals.
Regiments has already been implicated in several schemes that allowed the controversial Gupta family to siphon money out of state-owned entities.
The relationship between the Guptas and Regiments began in 2012 when Salim Essa, a key associate of the family, started a discussion with the investment firm on how to capture 775 million rand ($52.6 million) over a period of two months from state-owned companies.
Essa would go on to take half of Regiments' profits from the schemes. He eventually founded another firm, Trillian, where he and another Regiments director scored billions in public contracts.
The United States Treasury included Salim Essa in a sanctions order on three of the Gupta brothers that was issued on Oct. 10.
Read more OCCRP reporting about the Guptas' business activities and influence in South Africa.
Regiments may even have had the Guptas in mind when they conspired with a former executive at South Africa's state investment firm to make lucrative deals under the auspices of the country's post-apartheid Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) program.
The program was intended to reduce inequality for South Africa's disenfranchised black citizens by getting big white-owned companies to sell stakes in businesses at a massive discount to eligible black partners. Companies could gain political clout through this process, while the new investors, who often had close ties to the ruling African National Congress, acquired valuable assets at little or no cost.
On their own, neither Regiments nor its co-founder, Eric Wood, who is not black, would have easily qualified to participate in the empowerment program. So Wood forged a partnership with Tshepo Mahloele — who until recently had been a key official at the state owned Public Investment Corp (PIC) — that allowed them to form a new "Black Economic Empowerment entity": a consortium of influential political and business insiders who manipulated the initiative to buy shares in one of the country's largest banks at a secret cut-rate price.
To artificially prop up the shares' market value through a confidential deal with a public entity, the consortium obtained hundreds of millions in financing from a state investment fund that covered the difference. Then, as the market value of the shares rose, the consortium arranged to sell them to the PIC at a profit. It then tried to create yet another "empowerment entity" to buy them back for yet more profit. Altogether, Regiments holds shares worth 891 million rand ($58.7 million) from its BEE deals.
Credit: Mike Hutchings/Reuters Supporters of President Cyril Ramaphosa's ruling African National Congress (ANC) celebrate election results at a rally in Johannesburg in May. Ramaphosa campaigned on an anti-corruption platform, promising to crack down on graft within the ANC.
The PIC is Africa's largest fund, overseeing 2 trillion rand ($131 billion) in assets, and is meant to manage government investments, including the pensions of public employees. The fund owns significant stakes in many of South Africa's most valuable companies and controls over 10 percent of the market capitalization of the Johannesburg Stock Exchange. The consortium hijacked these funds for their private gain.
Last October, South Africa President Cyril Ramaphosa established a Commission of Inquiry to probe allegations of impropriety at the PIC between 2015 and 2018. The focus of its investigation is whether former and current senior officials (including Mahloele and his former boss, Jabu Moleketi), abused their power for personal gain. (A separate government inquest, the Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture, is currently probing links between the Guptas and the administration of the last president, Jacob Zuma.)
Credit: Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters Dan Matjila, the former head of South Africa's state asset manager, the Public Investment Corporation (PIC), appears at an inquiry into alleged wrongdoing and poor investment decisions during his tenure, in July.
Partly because of manoeuvers like this, South Africa's 20 years of black empowerment efforts have done little to alleviate apartheid's lingering economic imbalance. Last year, the World Bank declared South Africa one of the most unequal countries in the world.
Instead, most of the benefits of high-stakes BEE deals have accrued to politically connected people like Mahloele, who already had seats at the boardroom tables of Johannesburg's affluent Sandton suburbs.
"The monies subsidising these aspirant plutocrats were sourced from public funds in a country where over half its people live in poverty. Once again the poor are subsidizing the illicit lifestyle of an elite," said Hennie van Vuuren, the director of Open Secrets, an organization that promotes transparency in government in South Africa.
Putting The Plan Into Play
After the fall of apartheid in 1994, there was widespread demand in South Africa for financial reparations that would overturn the country's legacy of inequality and allow control of the country's wealth to spread beyond the white minority. In response, the government enacted programs like Black Economic Empowerment (BEE).
But in practice, BEE resulted in strategic investment deals that concentrated ownership in the hands of a select group of politically connected black South Africans. The deals spearheaded by Regiments and Mahloele illustrate how the country's elite hijacked BEE for their own benefit.
🔗Black Economic Empowerment
Months after the end of apartheid, the African National Congress, which has governed South Africa since, wrote of the need to pursue black economic empowerment as part of the party's efforts to develop the country.
"No political democracy can survive and flourish if the majority of its people remains in poverty, without land, without their basic needs being met, and without tangible prospects for a better life," the party wrote on Nov. 23, 1994 in an official government newspaper.
But it wasn't until 2001 that the BEE program was formalized by the government. The release of the BEE Commission report in the same year paved the way for new legislation that required South Africa's biggest companies to prove they had sufficient black ownership and met employment quotas and career development objectives.
Following outcry that the original BEE strategy didn't benefit ordinary people, a new program, Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment, was announced in 2003. The legislation forced the country's biggest companies – including Anglo-American, BHP Billiton and ABSA bank – to prove compliance with new quotas and ownership laws. Despite these efforts, in practice BEE has resulted in investment deals that concentrated ownership in the hands of a select group of black South Africans."
Mahloele's role at PIC
In testimony to the PIC Commission, Mahloele said he had resigned from the PIC that March (before Wood's April email). But he was in a position to continue making decisions afterwards: In the previous year, the PIC had appointed him to head a multi-billion-dollar infrastructure investment fund. The fund was managed by a shelf company called Harith. Once owned by the PIC, Harith was handed over to Mahloele's control in 2007.
In April 2006, Eric Wood, then a director of Regiments, sought out an email introduction to Mahloele, who had been in charge of the PIC's alternate investment arm, including a "social development fund" called Isibaya. This fund is intended to make investments for the public good, but since it is not listed on the stock exchange, decisions are often made at the discretion of managers like Mahloele with little oversight from the PIC.
Later that year, Capitec, currently South Africa's sixth-largest bank by assets and a lender that catered to the country's poor, held a BEE sale of around 12 percent of its shares, at a heavily discounted price of a penny per share. The offer appeared to be made accessible to just a handful of politically connected insiders, including Mahloele.
Regiments and Mahloele worked fast to take advantage of the sale. They set up a new consortium of BEE investors, carefully chosen to maximize political clout and qualify for BEE status. They included:
Keabetsoe Holdings, whose director and major shareholder was Mahloele, the senior PIC official (the largest shareholder at 31.85 percent);
Regiments (the second-largest shareholder at 18 percent)
the ANC's Batho Batho Trust, a financial vehicle the ruling party used to fund itself; and
Nozala Investments, which includes political heavyweights such as former President Nelson Mandela's daughter, Makaziwe Mandela, and Gugu Mtshali, former President Kgalema Motlanthe's partner.
This consortium, which they named Coral Lagoon Investments, quickly bought all 10 million "empowerment shares" issued by Capitec for a penny each, a massive discount from their market value of 30 rand per share.
The extremely low price of the deal was negotiated in secret, with media reporting that the Capitec shares had been bought at their market value.
To protect Capitec's share value — which would have plummeted if it became known that 10 million shares had been sold for so little — the Coral Lagoon consortium members obtained 285 million rand ($18.68 million) in financing from the state's Industrial Development Corp (IDC) to cover the difference. The company's share value thus reached the level the market expected.
Such usage of public funds to prop up the value of corporate shares sold through BEE schemes is not unusual in South Africa, and has contributed to public dissatisfaction with the program.
Internal documents reviewed by OCCRP show Regiments and Keabetsoe were firmly in control of the Capitec deal, with Regiments taking the lead on its financial structure and Keabetsoe appearing to handle other aspects.
According to Mahloele's testimony, he left his job at the PIC in March 2006 with the specific task of establishing a PIC-related investment fund. That year, the duo also formed a new holding company, Ash Brook Investments 15 (Pty) Ltd., and put Coral Lagoon under its control.
Credit: Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters Customers queue outside a branch of Capitec Bank in Johannesburg.
Public Money, Private Interests
The Capitec shares Coral Lagoon held were valued at 1.5 billion rand — as if they really had been bought for 30 rand each. Wood and Mahloele were already profiting from the dividends, but now they sought to cash in by selling a portion of the shares to the PIC — Mahleole's former employer. Using sophisticated hedging and vendor financing schemes, they earned a huge profit on the deal, enabling them to repay the 285 million rand they owed the IDC and make millions for themselves.
🔗Confidential Information
Regiments may have had access to helpful confidential information. The company entered into a secret non-disclosure agreement with a third party, Circle Capital, whose role, and owners, were unknown. The agreement allowed them to gain access to "certain information pertaining to a listed property company," apparently Capitec, though no name was given. No other shareholder was included.
According to another mysterious agreement that makes no obvious business sense, Ash Brook Investments owed Circle Capital 7 million rand; no reason was declared.
In February 2012, the PIC, through the Isibaya Fund, which had previously been run by Mahloele, purchased half of the shares in Capitec that Coral Lagoon held for 826 million rand ($54.5 million), or 156 rand per share. Since they had been purchased for just a penny a share, this was a massive windfall for the Coral Lagoon consortium, worth billions of rand, at the expense of the South African public.
Court records show that Regiments' share of Capitec was ultimately valued at 891 million rand ($58.7 million), a vast increase from its original stake of 9 million rand ($600,000).
Rather than becoming a shareholder, PIC simply "warehoused" the shares until they could be repurchased at a lower price by a new Black Economic Empowerment company, which Regiments assumed it would also take the lead in forming.
A February 2011 letter to Capitec from top executives of Regiments and Keabetso outlined the plan. The letter said that a "new black economic empowerment transaction" was being structured and negotiated between the PIC, Coral Lagoon, and a new BEE company that would be even better positioned to take advantage of future black empowerment deals.
Capitec's financial director, Andre du Plessis, told reporters in 2012 that the bank was "unaware of the possibility that the ANC could benefit from the transaction."
Private correspondence obtained by OCCRP indicates that Regiments may have intended the Guptas as beneficiaries of the PIC-related deals. The investment firm also tried to formalize its control over the deal, announcing that it intended to handle "all legal, secretarial and accounting functions" for Coral Lagoon.
But what Regiments didn't realize was that Mahloele's team had been working behind the scenes to get there first.
New Company, Old Faces
On May 12, 2015, Capitec suddenly announced that a new BEE company called PetraTouch (later renamed to Lebashe Investment Group) had acquired the warehoused shares at 461 rand ($30) per share. Capitec's share price plunged by 6 percent at the news, suggesting markets were not happy that the PIC had sold the shares it was holding to a new BEE group.
The sale was touted in South African media under the curious headline "Capitec wants this BEE deal to be fair," implying the previous sale had not been. The story described PetraTouch as a new company led by an unknown black investor, Warren Wheatley.
Wheatley told media that the sale was not "one of your old BEE transactions," and that PetraTouch's owners were "not big political names and are new entrants."
Regiments seemed shocked by the move, according to private correspondence obtained by OCCRP. The firm's staff frantically tried to determine how the warehoused shares had been snatched out from under them — and who exactly was behind PetraTouch, a company none of them had heard of.
They soon learned that it had very close links to somebody they had heard of: their purported business partner, Tshepo Mahloele.
PetraTouch was registered at an address that Mahloele had used on other company registration forms. Another major shareholder in PetraTouch used the same address. And Fawzia Sidwell, Mahloele's personal assistant at Harith Fund Managers, another firm he founded (and which had also received PIC funding), was copied into most emails between PetraTouch and the PIC.
Even more disturbingly, several other shareholders had close ties to the chairman of the PIC, Jabu Moleketi, a powerful figure in the ANC and former deputy finance minister. They included:
The Mbenzane Family Trust (7 percent), which Moleketi held shares in;
JFF Ventures (6 percent), owned by Moleketi's daughter Thando Moleketi;
Pazomanzi Ltd. (24.5 percent), owned by Mahloele; and
WGW Capital (7.34 percent), owned by Warren Wheatley
Regiments staff also said that Moleketi had been a shareholder in Keabetsoe Holdings, which was an original member of the Coral Lagoon consortium.
It wasn't just Regiments that was in the dark. In a response to OCCRP, Capitec confirmed that the company played no role in choosing the members of the consortium but that, in principle, it could decline shareholders. As a listed banking entity, it might have been required to publicly disclose information related to politically exposed persons.
This, in turn, would have exposed Moleketi and Mahloele as the lopsided beneficiaries of a deal meant to benefit and empower those dispossessed by the apartheid regime. And rather than being new entrants, the beneficiaries of the new sale appeared to be the exact same people who had already profited from the previous one.
The final twist of the knife for Regiments was the discovery that a former employee, Jonathan Loeb, who left to start his own business in 2014, had been providing financial services to PetraTouch. He had even revealed to them Regiments' hedging techniques, which PetraTouch used to buy the warehoused shares without spending a dime. The new deal had been touted in the press as fairer because the consortium's members were putting their own money down, but this turned out to be untrue.
PetraTouch did not stop there. The company sought to purchase more shares of the bank from Coral Lagoon. Although the Regiments side of the consortium was miffed and declined to sell, Keabetsoe and other ANC shareholders appeared to agree.
PetraTouch made the purchase with 1.5 billion rand ($101 million) loaned by the PIC's Government Employee Pension Fund, which has 1.2 million active members and more than 400,000 pensioners and beneficiaries. This amounted to nearly one percent of the PIC's total investment in private companies, according to Wheatley's testimony before the PIC Commission.
In a letter Bantu Holomisa, the leader of the opposition United Democratic Movement and a fierce government critic, reportedly sent to the Commission, he reportedly alleged that Mahloele and Moleketi had used PetraTouch as a "portal to access PIC funds." Holomisa was subsequently sued by Harith and Lebashe, and a Pretoria court has issued a gag order preventing him from repeating these allegations.
"A BEE cartel of executives had easy access to PIC coffers" and systematically looted public pension funds, Holomisa said in April.
Moleketi said the claim that he had exploited public funds was "extremely hurtful."
In an email to reporters, Capitec said: "Capitec did not select the members of the Ash Brook consortium. Directors of Petratouch was [sic] involved in the Ash Brook BEE consortium which held shares in Coral Lagoon. We knew these directors from the initial Coral Lagoon BEE consortium."
Regiments did not respond to questions sent by email.
In a response to questions from OCCRP, a representative of Petratouch (now called Lebashe) wrote, "Over time, additional investors, including Mr Moleketi became shareholders in the entity. Mr Mahloele's prior employment at the PIC provided no advantage to the transaction."
Speaking to the matter of politically exposed persons, the spokesperson said the company's techniques were necessary: "This system, called Apartheid could be classified as unfair … In order to climb out of institutionalised poverty we had to develop and utilise other resources at our disposal. Sophisticated financial engineering was used in this instance."
However, the beneficiaries of the Capitec deal, both black and white, were wealthy individuals.
Ironically, the court has ordered that the money held by Regiments in Capitec shares be used to repay Regiments' vast theft from a different pension fund (as previously reported by OCCRP). Though Regiments has agreed to the deal, Eric Wood, the company's co-founder and one of the beneficiaries of the Capitec deal, has sought to block the agreement. The case is still pending.
With billions of rand in profit being made on the back of the PIC, the Commission of Inquiry has extended its scope to investigate claims by whistleblowers around the illicit activities of former PIC officials. At stake are the pension funds of thousands of retired government employees whose futures have been invested in these dodgy deals.
Michiel le Roux, a Capitec board member and shareholder, is the founder of the Millennium Trust, a funder of the Platform for the Protection of African Whistleblowers, where Sharife is a director.
Nov. 7, 2019: After publication, Lebashe challenged some aspects of this story. A second extensive fact-check by OCCRP confirmed that the fundamental facts of the story are correct. However, the text has been updated to include several clarifications and corrections. Several events are more precisely described, a fuller response from Capitec is included, and a reference to a lawsuit against an opposition leader has been added. In addition, the timing of Mahloele and Moleketi's departure from the PIC is described more accurately, a reference to the company Keabetso has been removed from a paragraph describing the parties to the Circle Capital nondisclosure agreement, a reference to Moleketi's standing as a "member" of the Coral Lagoon Consortium now correctly describes him as a shareholder of a consortium member, and Capitec is now correctly described as South Africa's "sixth-largest" bank.
Money for Nothing: South Africa Paid a Firm Millions for Pretending to Manage Its Properties
Down the Guptas' Financial Rabbit Hole
South African Investment Firm Looted Pension Fund With Insider Information


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Williams Bay és una població dels Estats Units a l'estat de Wisconsin. Segons el cens del 2000 tenia una població de 2.415 habitants.

Demografia
Segons el cens del 2000, Williams Bay tenia 2.415 habitants, 993 habitatges, i 639 famílies. La densitat de població era de 351,9 habitants per km².

Dels 993 habitatges en un 29,6% hi vivien nens de menys de 18 anys, en un 54,1% hi vivien parelles casades, en un 6,9% dones solteres, i en un 35,6% no eren unitats familiars. En el 30,4% dels habitatges hi vivien persones soles el 12,2% de les quals corresponia a persones de 65 anys o més que vivien soles. El nombre mitjà de persones vivint en cada habitatge era de 2,35 i el nombre mitjà de persones que vivien en cada família era de 2,96.

Per edats la població es repartia de la següent manera: un 24,4% tenia menys de 18 anys, un 5% entre 18 i 24, un 26,7% entre 25 i 44, un 24,6% de 45 a 60 i un 19,3% 65 anys o més.

L'edat mediana era de 41 anys. Per cada 100 dones de 18 o més anys hi havia 88,3 homes.

La renda mediana per habitatge era de 50.450 $ i la renda mediana per família de 60.573 $. Els homes tenien una renda mediana de 45.750 $ mentre que les dones 24.875 $. La renda per capita de la població era de 26.231 $. Aproximadament el 5,3% de les famílies i el 7,2% de la població estaven per davall del llindar de pobresa.

Poblacions més properes
El següent diagrama mostra les poblacions més properes.

Referències

Entitats de població del comtat de Walworth

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


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However, you can also arrange private MRI scans if you haven't had an injury yet but you feel (or your doctor feels) that it could be beneficial to have one. They are often used by professional athletes and those training for events, as well as fitness-keen individuals. A scan can reveal how well an old injury is healing as well as the likelihood of it flaring up again, as well as problems in any joints, muscles or ligaments that could cause serious injury later on. An athlete may have been experiencing pain or discomfort when training – an MRI scan can get to the bottom of this pain and reveal what's going on before it turns into an injury which puts the person out of action for many months.
The benefit of private MRI scans is that you can often get the results back far more quickly than in an NHS hospital where a GP has referred you. Some facilities do next day MRI scans or even same day services, so that you can sit down with a specialist to discuss the results immediately. This makes it a convenient service for those who are serious about sport and exercise, and it can also help you make rapid changes to your training programme that could even prevent serious injury in the future.


Seldom does a property come to market with the flexibility of use that 93 Hunting Ridge offers. This truly is the ideal multi-generational home, if you choose. Features include hardwood floor throughout, a bedroom on the lower level with access to a full bath, a (HUGE) ensuite bedroom on the upper level with semi-private access via rear stairs, another bedroom currently used as an upper level sitting room, and much more. The mechanicals are in top shape as they are on scheduled professional maintenance. A reverse osmosis water treatment system is in place as is a full house generator! Thanks to CT Basements, the basement is dry and perfect for storing valuables. Best of all, the private driveway accessed by the only three houses there, serves as a cul de sac...uber privacy from the main road.


text:
فارسی عربي Shqip Monday, Jul 15, 2019
habilian
Twin suicide blasts in Nigeria kill at least 31
Who is the link between the Mek and the Zionists in Canada?
Manhunt in progress to capture fugitive terrorists: IRGC
MKO applauds U.S. Navy's downing of Iranian airliner
Three IRGC forces martyred in an ambush in west Iran
MKO claims responsibility for a bank robbery in Hamadan
When the MKO comes out of Its cave
The MEK Is Not a Valid Alternative
ISIL origins are geopolitical and ideological: Expert
Iran's UN Envoy: 12,000 Iranian civilians killed by the MKO
Lobbyists of Terror
Terror Victims
Terrorist Groups
A List of 17000 terror victims in Iran
Written by Xinhua
"Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) is responsible for the killing of at least 12,000 Iranian civilians and many Iraqi citizens, as well as a number of other nationalities" said Iran's ambassador to the United Nations Majid Takht Ravanchi in the Security Council's open debate on the linkage between international terrorism and organized crime.
"In the past four decades, 17,161 Iranian citizens, including almost 200 high-ranking political figures, among them one president, one prime minister, one judiciary chief, one deputy chief of armed forces and 27 members of parliament, as well as four nuclear scientists, have been martyred by foreign-backed terrorist groups," Iran's ambassador to the United Nations said.
"Iran is the victim of the activities of both terrorist groups and transnational criminals. At the same time, we are at the forefront of combating both menaces," the ambassador noted.
Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO), which is responsible for the killing of at least 12,000 Iranian civilians and many Iraqi citizens, as well as a number of other nationalities, "continues to receive funds from certain countries in the region while enjoying the support of certain states including in Europe," he reiterated.
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Mehrnews
IRGC disbands terrorist team in northwestern Iran
MKO threatens to assassinate Iran's general, judiciary chief
Iran condemns terrorist attacks in Tunisia
Iran supports right of Syrian gov. to fight terrorists
Americans describe the MeK
Tehran, Kabul stress boosting security cooperation
US terrorist policies targeting identity, sovereignty of countries: Shamkhani
Video game "Dark Summer" on MKO's reign of terror released
Copyright © 2005-2016 Habilian Association


text:
• Pope Francis Brings Up Pro-Life, Religious Freedom Concerns During Obama Meeting
• Abortion Activist Laura Levites Says Pro-Life Teen Should be Murdered
• Feminist "Comedian:" I'd Personally Like to Castrate Every Male Conservative Christian• Pro-Abortion Groups Fail Again to Get United Nations to Advance Abortion
More Pro-Life News• Pope Francis and the Catholic Church Believe The Right to Life is a Human Right, if Only Obama Agreed
• Only 5.3 Percent of Unborn Babies Diagnosed With Down Syndrome Escape Abortion
• Against Obama's Wishes, Congress Poised to Fund Abstinence Education
• Obamacare Plans Limit Access to Life-Saving Prescriptions
• Bridal Gowns Transformed Into Angel Gowns for Stillborn Babies
• "Miscarriage Management:" Planned Parenthood's Plan When Abortion is Illegal
• Planned Parenthood Opening $5 Million Abortion Clinic in San Antonio
• Texas Man Charged in Murder of His Pregnant Girlfriend, Eight-Month-Old Unborn Baby
• Indiana Gov. Mike Pence Signs Bill to Stop Insurance Coverage of Abortions
• Canadian MP Introduces Bills to Legalize Euthanasia, Assisted Suicide
• Pro-Abortion North Carolina Sen. Kay Hagan Gets Pro-Abortion Group's Support
100's of Pro-Life T-shirts – $3.99 and up
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Pope Francis Brings Up Pro-Life, Religious Freedom Concerns During Obama Meeting The details of the private meeting between Pope Francis and pro-abortion President Barack Obama are not yet available, but early indications are that the leader of the Catholic Church brought up pro-life issues with the man considered the "Abortion President" by pro-life advocates.
According to a press statement from the Vatican, the two discussed pro-life issues and religious freedom, a pressing issue given the Supreme Court hearing this week on the Hobby Lobby case to stop the HHS mandate, which forces companies and organizations to pay for abortion-causing drugs for their employees. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/pope-francis-brings-up-pro-life-religous-freedom-concerns-during-obama-meeting/
Abortion Activist Laura Levites Says Pro-Life Teen Should be Murdered The Hobby Lobby Supreme Court case has abortion activists extremely riled up. The way they carry on, you'd think that David Green was personally mandating whether or not his female employees could have sex and use birth control.
Laura-LevitesOf course, Hobby Lobby already covers 95% of prescription birth control — they're just not willing to cover abortifacients like IUDs, Ella, and Plan B. And they aren't preventing anyone from using it, either. They just don't want to pay for it. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/abortion-activist-laura-levites-says-pro-life-teen-should-be-murdered/
Feminist "Comedian:" I'd Personally Like to Castrate Every Male Conservative Christian WARNING: Graphic language… Joe Newby at The Washington Examiner has found a real doozy of a "comedian." Her name is Laura Levites – with obviously no connection to the priests of the Old Testament. (She's an atheist with a fondness for Ricky Gervais.)
"I would personally like to castrate every Male Conservative Christian so that they have NO reproductive rights," she wrote on Twitter, using the hashtag "#HobbyLobby." She certainly knows how to draw attention to herself. Newby said that's not all. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/feminist-comedian-id-personally-like-to-castrate-every-male-conservative-christian/
Pro-Abortion Groups Fail Again to Get United Nations to Advance Abortion Massive lobbying generated few returns for abortion groups who showed up in force at the annual UN Commission on the Status of Women.
Women's groups – some funded by governments – tried to intimidate delegates by wearing garish masks, crowding hallways outside the negotiating room like a fraternity hazing tunnel, and organizing a "mobilization" parade inside the UN. After marathon negotiating sessions, delegates concluded at 2:00 a.m. last Saturday morning. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/pro-abortion-groups-fail-again-to-get-united-nations-to-advance-abortion/
Pope Francis and the Catholic Church Believe The Right to Life is a Human Right, if Only Obama Agreed Pope Francis and President Obama met in Rome today, and the meeting has naturally generated commentary, both before and after the fact, including by the President himself at the National Prayer Breakfast last month.
I am confident that the meeting itself will bear good fruit. I am not so confident that the commentary about it will bear as much fruit. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/pope-francis-and-the-catholic-church-believe-the-right-to-life-is-a-human-right-if-only-obama-agreed/
Only 5.3 Percent of Unborn Babies Diagnosed With Down Syndrome Escape Abortion In Australia, much like the United States, only 5.3% of people diagnosed in the womb with Down syndrome are actually born. About 95% of people with Down syndrome are never given the chance to live their lives. That means 95% of parents who receive such a diagnosis for their child have given in to their fears and now live everyday with the pain of having ended their child's life.
News.com.au asks, "Is this the beginning of the end for Down syndrome?" And it very well could be. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/only-5-3-percent-of-unborn-babies-diagnosed-with-down-syndrome-escape-abortion/
Against Obama's Wishes, Congress Poised to Fund Abstinence Education Today, the House passed a provision to continue Sexual Risk Avoidance (SRA) abstinence education across the nation. The vote is significant because President Obama asked Congress to slash the program in the budget he recently sent to Congress. The Senate is expected to also approve the extension.
The program, the Title V Abstinence Education Program, is a state block grant that was originally signed into law by President Clinton as a part of the Welfare Reform Act in 1996. It is the largest, continuously funded abstinence program in the nation and is currently set to expire on September 30, 2014. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/against-obamas-wishes-congress-poised-to-fund-abstinence-education/
Obamacare Plans Limit Access to Life-Saving Prescriptions A new analysis out from consulting firm Avalere Health shows the denial of life-saving medication is rampant in the new Obamacare exchange plans. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/obamacare-plans-limit-access-to-life-saving-prescriptions/
Bridal Gowns Transformed Into Angel Gowns for Stillborn Babies Every day, babies are born stillborn or too premature to live. Their devastated parents will go through a variety of emotions in dealing with the loss. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/bridal-gowns-transformed-into-angel-gowns-for-stillborn-babies/
"Miscarriage Management:" Planned Parenthood's Plan When Abortion is Illegal Protocols. We had many at Planned Parenthood. Protocols on billing, customer service, client donations, medical services, counseling…you name it, we had a protocol for it. It was my job as clinic director to know them all. And, I did.. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/miscarriage-management-planned-parenthoods-plan-when-abortion-is-illegal/
Planned Parenthood Opening $5 Million Abortion Clinic in San Antonio Perhaps no one complained as loudly as Planned Parenthood when Texas passed laws requiring that abortion clinics meet minimal safety standards last year or promised such doom and gloom for the industry. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/planned-parenthood-opening-5-million-abortion-clinic-in-san-antonio/
Texas Man Charged in Murder of His Pregnant Girlfriend, Eight-Month-Old Unborn Baby Louisiana police have arrested 26-year-old Robert Atlas, who is accused of killing his girlfriend who was eight months pregnant. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/texas-man-charged-in-murder-of-his-pregnant-girlfriend-eight-month-old-unborn-baby/
Indiana Gov. Mike Pence Signs Bill to Stop Insurance Coverage of Abortions Americans United for Life President and CEO Dr. Charmaine Yoest commended Indiana Governor Mike Pence and leading pro-life legislators for enacting a measure that protects Hoosiers from forced funding of abortion-related services via their health insurance plans. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/indiana-gov-mike-pence-signs-bill-to-stop-insurance-coverage-of-abortions/
Looking for an inspiring and motivating speaker for your pro-life event in 2014? Don't have much to spend on a high-priced speaker costing thousands of dollars? Contact LifeNews at news@lifenews.com about having LifeNews Editor Steven Ertelt speak at your event.
Canadian MP Introduces Bills to Legalize Euthanasia, Assisted Suicide Steven Fletcher MP intends to introduce two private members bills to legalize euthanasia and assisted suicide. Based on the order of precedence, Mr. Fletcher's euthanasia bills will not have time to be voted-on in parliament. Mr Fletcher has introduced these bills to create a debate on the issues in Canada. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/canadian-mp-introduces-bills-to-legalize-euthanasia-assisted-suicide/
Pro-Abortion North Carolina Sen. Kay Hagan Gets Pro-Abortion Group's Support Get ready for the next round of "war on women" demagoguery. Bloomberg News reports that embattled Senator Kay Hagan (D-NC) will be receiving some more Super-PAC help soon as the pro-abortion group Emily's List has launched a political action committee here in North Carolina specifically to aid her in her reelection fight. http://www.lifenews.com/2014/03/27/pro-abortion-north-carolina-sen-kay-hagan-gets-pro-abortion-groups-support/
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text:
Two Koreas open liaison office at Kaesong Industrial Complex
Seoul says facility will serve as a "cradle for the co-prosperity" of the peninsula
Dagyum Ji
Seoul and Pyongyang on Friday began operation of a joint liaison office at the DPRK's now-shuttered Kaesong Industrial Complex (KIC).
At an opening ceremony, ROK Minister of Unification Cho Myoung-gyon said the liaison office, which will house resident representatives from Seoul and Pyongyang, would serve as a "cradle for the co-prosperity" of the two Koreas.
"I hope South and North Korean authorities and experts can discuss a variety of discussions in the field of railways, roads, forestry, and other issues, and push forward joint research on the implementation of the October 4 Declaration and new economic initiatives."
In his speech, Cho said the office will be a "channel for round-the-clock communication between the two Koreas."
"From today, South and North Korea can directly discuss issues related to the improvement of inter-Korean relations and peace and prosperity of the Korean peninsula, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year."
North and South Korea are set to use the office to exchange contacts, hold working-level consultations, and support exchanges, cooperation, and joint events in numerous fields, an inter-Korean agreement read.
The liaison office will also see both sides support exchange and cooperation projects run by private organizations, providing consultations as well as guaranteeing the convenience of people who cross the inter-Korean border.
The two Koreas held an opening ceremony on Friday | Photo: Joint Press Corps
The South Korean unification minister and Chairman of the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Country (CPRC) of the DPRK Ri Son Gwon signed an agreement on the composition and operation of the office on Friday.
Ri Son Gwon at the meeting stressed the "significance" of opening the joint liaison office just days ahead of a planned fifth inter-Korean summit, according to a joint press pool.
Both sides would be able used the facility to hold "open-minded discussions on issues raised in inter-Korean relations as soon as possible and come up with necessary solutions," he added.
"The name of the North-South joint liaison office is nice words, but it sums up our nation's ardent desire for a new turning point in the development of the North-South relations."
Ri said the liaison office would "greatly contribute to improving inter-Korean relations and opening up a new era of peace and prosperity," while also urging the South to "accelerate the implementation of the Panmunjom Declaration."
Staff accommodation within the KIC | Photo: Ministry of Unification
Friday saw chairman and vice chairman of the corporate association of the Kaesong Industrial Complex Shin Han-yong and Chung Ki-sup, as well as senior officials from the Kaesong Industrial District Foundation, visit the complex for the opening ceremony.
In an interview with pool reporters, Shin said he had not been allowed to visit factories at the site, though added that he believed the facilities are "comparatively well-managed."
Vice-chairman of the CPRC Pak Yong Il, vice-minister of land and environmental protection Pak Ho Yong, vice-minister of Physical Culture and Sports Won Kil U, and vice-chairman of the National Economic Cooperation Committee Pak Myong Chol were also present at the event.
South Korean Vice-Minister of Unification Chun Hae-sung and vice-chairman of the CPRC Jon Jong Su have been appointed directors of the office.
Jon Jong Su (left) and Chun Hae-sung (right) will serve as directors of the new office | Photo: Ministry of Unification
The two will hold weekly meetings, the inter-Korean agreement said, with additional talks possible if needed.
Wednesday saw the unification ministry say the directors would be able to convey messages between South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un "if necessary."
In accordance with the agreement signed Friday, both sides will deploy a group of 15 to 20 staff to the office, which will be open between 0900 and 1700 local time.
Meanwhile, the two Koreas kicked off working-level talks at the truce village of Panmunjom Friday morning to discuss protocol, security, communications, and media coverage of next week's summit.
South Korean director of presidential National Security Office (NSO) Chung Eui-yong early this week announced the talks would be held, following a visit to Pyongyang by a presidential special delegation.
The talks were initially postponed, however.
The four-member delegation to Friday's meeting is composed of four officials: second deputy director of the National Intelligence Service (NIS) Kim Sang-gyun, Director of the Government Situation room at the Blue House Youn Kun-young, director of presidential press center Kwun Hyun-li, and director of presidential security service Choi Byeong-il.
Edited by Oliver Hotham
Featured Image: Joint Press Corps
Seoul and Pyongyang on Friday began operation of a joint liaison office at the DPRK's now-shuttered Kaesong Industrial Complex (KIC). At an opening ceremony, ROK Minister of Unification Cho Myoung-gyon said the liaison office, which will house resident representatives from Seoul and Pyongyang, would serve as a "cradle for the co-prosperity" of the two Koreas. "I
Dagyum Ji is a senior NK News correspondent based in Seoul. She previously worked for Reuters TV.
Dagyum Ji,


If I didn't mention Dracula in the same breath as Romania, it would be like disregarding a pink elephant in the room, so I'll say it ... Dracula! Vlad Tepes, otherwise known as Vlad the Impaler, otherwise known as the legendary Dracula, hails from the center of Romania, the infamous Transylvania. He has a castle that people may visit and an up-and-coming amusement park, and his face is plastered onto every kitschy souvenir that exists. Dracula is more than just a legend in Romania; he is an industry. My students grow weary at the mention of his name. They complain, "That's the only thing in the world anyone knows about Romania, a stupid myth."
Respectful of my students' complaints, I will leave Dracula to the movies and share a new Romanian legend. I was told this story one afternoon over a cup of strong Romanian coffee by my host-country counterpart and friend, Vanda.
She led me back long ago into the days of castles and knights, when there lived an old Romanian king and queen. They didn't live happily ever after, Vanda informed me sadly, for the queen desperately wanted a child but was unable to conceive. She consulted magicians and wizards, she tried herbs and even black magic, but the queen grew wrinkled and gray and still no baby came. At long last she gave up, convinced she was too old, but miraculously, that spring, she became pregnant. The king and queen were ecstatic and the queen's belly grew large and round. Royal subjects from all around the kingdom came to admire the old, pregnant queen and her gigantic belly.
The day finally came for the baby to be born, but the queen, in much pain, could not deliver the baby. Again, she summoned the magician and the wizard, and she tried herbs and black magic, but the baby refused to be born. Instead, a tiny voice came from her belly: "I will not be born," squeaked the unborn prince, "unless you promise me 'tinerete fara batranete si viata fara de moarte'" — Youth without old age, and life without death. The queen groaned with pain; how could she guarantee youth without old age and life without death? She pleaded with her unborn son to be born; she promised him that he would never want for anything, that he would be rich and handsome and lord over their vast kingdom. But the baby continued to make the same demand.
Finally, the king took command of the situation. He promised the baby prince that, indeed, if born, he would experience youth without old age and life without death. He reassured the queen that as the child grew older he would come to understand the impossibility of such a wish. And so, finally, the prince was born and the whole kingdom rejoiced.
The prince grew up strong and handsome, as all princes do. He never wanted for anything, as the queen had promised. But when the prince reached the ripe age of 20, he once again went to his mother and father and demanded his birth wish. The king and queen, now quite old and growing older, still smiled at their beautiful son. "Son," the queen explained, "we have given you the best of everything in the world — wealth, good looks, a kingdom of your own. But youth without old age, life without death, we do not control and are not free to give."
The prince sulked and angrily reminded them of their promise. "You promised me youth without old age and life without death, and if you cannot deliver these things, I will be forced to search them out on my own."


text:
Iowa Isn't The State Presidential Candidates Pretend It Is
By Daniel Lathrop
Published Dec. 14, 2015
Marco Cibola
My fellow Iowans will tell me they live in a farm state, that agriculture is Iowa's life blood. So will the presidential candidates, who trek to the Iowa State Fair1 and other farm settings and put on checked shirts and dust off whatever farming bona fides they can muster.
"This is not a new cause for me," Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton said while standing in front of a John Deere tractor on an Iowa campaign stop.
"Now a lot of people, and probably a number of you here today, don't realize this, but New York — where I was elected to the Senate twice — is actually a major farm state," she said.
"One day," she recalled, "I brought a picture of a New York dairy cow down to the Senate to give a speech about, 'We do have cows in New York.' And when I finished, one of my friends from a Midwestern state that will remain nameless came up to me and said, 'OK, so you've got one cow.'"
In February, Iowans will cast the first votes of the presidential nominating process, just as they have for 44 years. Over that time, reams of paper and pixels have been spent on the question of whether a racially homogenous and basically agricultural state should have such a prominent role.2 But the state is not exactly the bucolic land of yeoman farmers that candidates, critics and Iowans themselves think it is.
Iowa is whiter than the country but has grown more diverse. It houses multinational corporations and more people whose work revolves around spreadsheets than around tractors.
Some of that has to do with the march of time. Since 1972, Iowa has in many ways become less and less an outlier as farmers went broke, and African-Americans and Hispanics migrated to its cities.
Yet in other ways the state never quite lived up to its reputation.
Even in the early 1970s, the notion of Iowa as an agricultural bastion was dated. At that point, U.S. census data shows,3 about 13 percent of Iowans worked on and around farms and ranches. Yet at that time 20 percent of the state's population worked in manufacturing.
Then, as the population grew, changes to agriculture sent the number of farmers even further downward. Thanks to the farm bust of the 1980s and the ever-growing industrialization of crop production, just 3.8 percent of Iowa's population worked in agriculture in 2014.4
Meanwhile, nearly 40 percent of Iowans now work in finance, in real estate or for companies involved in professional services such as health care, law and accounting.
Take Cedar Rapids. As you drive into town you see cornfields and smell whatever breakfast cereal is being cooked up by the 900 employees of the 15-acre Quaker Foods and Snacks plant. It seems like a city that's all about feeding America.
It isn't. Try engineering and insurance.
Aerospace giant Rockwell Collins employs 8,700 engineers, marketers, executives and others its corporate headquarters. Transamerica, an insurance and financial services company owned by a European multinational, employs close to 4,000.
After homesteaders came pouring during the 1830s and 1840s, until around 1960, more than 99 percent of Iowans were non-Hispanic whites.
Indeed, because Iowa was a free state before the Civil War, few African-Americans were brought into the state as slaves. Other social, economic and legal barriers meant few black people or other minorities were ever granted homesteads. And — without a big city like Detroit, Milwaukee or Chicago — Iowa attracted few blacks during the Great Migration from the South.
For decades, calling Iowa "lily-white" was an understatement.
In 1970, data shows that Iowa's non-white population was still about 2 percent, making Iowa one of the states with the smallest minority populations. Blacks made up the largest non-white share, at 1.1 percent, followed by Hispanics at 0.7 percent.5
That put the state on the statistical margins; it was one-eighth as diverse as the country overall, which was 16.6 percent non-white then.6
In 2014, Iowa's minority population was 12.9 percent, about one-third the national share of 38.1 percent. That's still a large gap, but it's enough of a change to put minority residents in the category of "low" rather than "no."
Picker of presidents
Iowans and political insiders will tell you that the state's privileged place shapes the nomination and picking of presidents. So Iowa's preferred candidates win the nomination and then the presidency?
The state serves as a winnowing ground for both parties. Since Iowa has come first in the presidential nominating process, a top-three finisher in Iowa has been nominated in 14 of 16 contested primaries.7
But in the 11 presidential elections since 1972, only twice has the winner of a contested caucus gone on to become president.8
Maybe that's evidence Iowans don't have their finger on what voters want nationally. Or, maybe no state would be representative enough to go first and get it "right" all the time. Either way, it's time to drop the Iowa-is-all-cornfields caricature. Today, the state's workforce has few farmers, and its population's diversity is within the mainstream.
If the conventional wisdom on Iowa was ever true, it has become less so every year.
It's worth a trip. Even if you find the Butter Cow overrated, the fried foods are dangerously tasty.
Including at least one book, "Why Iowa?"
Unless otherwise noted, all census data is taken from the University of Minnesota's National Historical Geographic Information System.
That's about the same as Wyoming, where the shale energy boom has remade the economy.
The way race and data on Hispanics are reported by the U.S. Census Bureau has changed. Hispanic status is now broken out by race, and information on race is now broken out for people who identify as more than one race. Because the 2 percent figure assumes all Hispanics reported their race as white, the true figure for 1970 may be even lower.
U.S. Census Bureau.
It's worth noting, however, that in many of those cases there were no more than three serious candidates by caucus time.
Three times, if you count President Jimmy Carter. He came in second in 1976 behind "uncommitted."
Daniel Lathrop is a journalism professor at the University of Iowa, and a former reporter for The Dallas Morning News. @lathropd
2016 Election (1129 posts) Hillary Clinton (577) Immigration (149) Iowa Caucus (140) Race (130) Farming (3)


text:
package builder

import (

)

var dockerFileForButler = `FROM ubuntu:latest
# Let's install go just like Docker (from source).
RUN apt-get update -q
RUN DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive apt-get install -qy curl git
RUN curl -s https://storage.googleapis.com/golang/go1.3.1.linux-amd64.tar.gz | tar -C /usr/local -xz
ENV PATH /usr/local/go/bin:$PATH
RUN mkdir -p /usr/local/gpaas
ENV GOPATH /usr/local/gpaas
RUN go get github.com/ryozaki/gpaas/butlerd
`

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


In this course, we'll be learning about how to build and manage websites using the self-hosted version of Drupal 7. Here's what you'll need to get started.
For your convenience, here's a list of Drupal web hosting providers recommended by Drupal. If necessary, you can also review Drupal's Quick install for beginners instructions.


text:
package org.apache.omid.transaction;

import static org.testng.Assert.assertTrue;

import org.apache.hadoop.hbase.client.Put;
import org.apache.hadoop.hbase.client.Result;
import org.apache.hadoop.hbase.client.ResultScanner;
import org.apache.hadoop.hbase.client.Scan;
import org.apache.hadoop.hbase.util.Bytes;
import org.slf4j.Logger;
import org.slf4j.LoggerFactory;
import org.testng.ITestContext;
import org.testng.annotations.Test;

@Test(groups = "sharedHBase")
public class TestSingleColumnFamily extends OmidTestBase {

    private static final Logger LOG = LoggerFactory.getLogger(TestSingleColumnFamily.class);

    @Test(timeOut = 10_000)
    public void testSingleColumnFamily(ITestContext context) throws Exception {
        TransactionManager tm = newTransactionManager(context);
        TTable table1 = new TTable(connection, TEST_TABLE);
        int num = 10;
        Transaction t = tm.begin();
        for (int j = 0; j < num; j++) {
            byte[] data = Bytes.toBytes(j);
            Put put = new Put(data);
            put.addColumn(Bytes.toBytes(TEST_FAMILY), Bytes.toBytes("value1"), data);
            put.addColumn(Bytes.toBytes(TEST_FAMILY), Bytes.toBytes("value2"), data);
            table1.put(t, put);
        }
        //tm.tryCommit(t);
        //t=tm.beginTransaction(); //Visible if in a different transaction
        Scan s = new Scan();
        ResultScanner res = table1.getScanner(t, s);
        Result rr;
        int count = 0;
        while ((rr = res.next()) != null) {
            int tmp1 = Bytes.toInt(rr.getValue(Bytes.toBytes(TEST_FAMILY), Bytes.toBytes("value1")));
            int tmp2 = Bytes.toInt(rr.getValue(Bytes.toBytes(TEST_FAMILY), Bytes.toBytes("value2")));
            LOG.info("RES:" + tmp1 + ";" + tmp2);
            count++;
        }
        assertTrue(num == count, "Can't see puts. I should see " + num + " but I see " + count);

        tm.commit(t);
        t = tm.begin();

        for (int j = 0; j < num / 2; j++) {
            byte[] data = Bytes.toBytes(j);
            byte[] ndata = Bytes.toBytes(j * 10);
            Put put = new Put(data);
            put.addColumn(Bytes.toBytes(TEST_FAMILY), Bytes.toBytes("value2"), ndata);
            table1.put(t, put);
        }
        tm.commit(t);
        t = tm.begin();
        s = new Scan();
        res = table1.getScanner(t, s);
        count = 0;
        int modified = 0, notmodified = 0;
        while ((rr = res.next()) != null) {
            int tmp1 = Bytes.toInt(rr.getValue(Bytes.toBytes(TEST_FAMILY), Bytes.toBytes("value1")));
            int tmp2 = Bytes.toInt(rr.getValue(Bytes.toBytes(TEST_FAMILY), Bytes.toBytes("value2")));
            LOG.info("RES:" + tmp1 + ";" + tmp2);
            count++;

            if (tmp2 == Bytes.toInt(rr.getRow()) * 10) {
                modified++;
            } else {
                notmodified++;
            }
            if (count == 8) {
                LOG.debug("stop");
            }
        }
        assertTrue(num == count, "Can't see puts. I should see " + num + " but I see " + count);
        assertTrue(modified == notmodified && notmodified == (num / 2),
                   "Half of rows should equal row id, half not (" + modified + ", " + notmodified + ")");

        tm.commit(t);
        LOG.info("End commiting");
        table1.close();
    }
}


text:
FDI in business and professional services in 2021: The state of play
Business and professional services FDI grew by 26.7% in 2021, with most regions seeing project volumes return to pre-pandemic levels.
Marina Leiva
The Deloitte offices in London. Deloitte recorded more FDI projects than any other UK firm in the business and professional services sector in 2021. (Photo by Jack Taylor/Getty Images)
The Covid-19 pandemic caused overall greenfield foreign direct investment (FDI) project numbers to decline by 17.5% in 2020. However, as the world reopened in 2021, investors reacted quickly and FDI levels rose by 18.1%. Most sectors witnessed a rise in their number of projects, with companies keen to make up for lost time, yet the surge is not expected to be sustained. Investment levels will likely fall again in 2022. Russia's invasion of Ukraine has led to heightened geopolitical tensions, a global cost-of-living crisis, slow economic growth and continued supply chain disruptions. All of which will claw back the resurgence FDI experienced in 2021.
Business and professional services FDI rose in 2021
The Global FDI Annual Report 2022 shows there were 1,779 projects in business and professional services in 2021, up from 1,404 the year before. Projects recorded in this sector in 2020 were 12.3% higher than in 2019, showing the industry's resilience throughout the Covid-19 pandemic.
Of the business and professional services projects in 2021, 84% were new and 18% were expansion projects.
Where are the leading destinations for business and professional services FDI?
Western Europe was the leading region when it came to attracting FDI projects in this sector, accounting for 35.1% of all projects globally. The region saw a 4% increase in projects over the 2019-2021 period.
Asia Pacific attracted the second-highest number of projects but between 2019 and 2021 project numbers declined 10.1%.
Middle East and North Africa ranked third in 2021 with a total of 241 projects and growth of 109.6% between 2019 and 2021, with a consistent rise projects each year.
The US remained the leading destination country for business and professional services FDI in 2021, seeing a growth of 21.6% from pre-pandemic levels. It received a total of 186 business and professional services FDI projects, up from 153 in 2019 and 173 in 2020.
Germany, with 150 projects, was the second ranked country. Though its project numbers were down slightly from 156 in 2020, they were higher than the 144 projects recorded in the country in 2019.
The UK ranked third with 113 projects in 2021, an 8.7% increase from 104 in 2020, but not as high as the 128 projects in 2019. Project numbers declined 11.7% in the 2019-2021 period.
The UK was the key source market for business and professional services investments into the US, with the country being responsible for 72 out of the 186 recorded projects in 2021.
UK-based end-to-end dog service Bark and Birch was responsible for five of those projects, more than any other UK company into the US in 2021, with the company opening dog day care centres in Miami, Los Angeles, Houston, New York and Georgia.
What are the top business and professional services FDI operations?
Business and professional services continued to be the leading business operation for foreign investors in this sector in 2021. A total of 1,542 projects were created with a sales-related function, up 27.3% from 2020 and an increase of 16.6% on 2019 levels.
Headquarters, and contact centres ranked second and third, respectively, in 2021, with 82 and 57 projects.
The US was the leading destination for the business and professional services business function in 2021, with a total of 159 FDI projects, while Germany was second with 135 and the UK was third with a total of 99 projects in 2021.
What are the top subsectors for business and professional services FDI?
Advertising, marketing, PR and communications became the leading subsector in 2021, with a total of 249 projects, overtaking business and management consultancy, which ranked second with 212 projects. Business and management consultancy had been the top subsector in 2020 with 175 FDI project.
Advertising, marketing, PR and communications ranked third in 2020 with 165 projects, behind engineering activities and related technical activities, which had 167 projects in 2020 and ranked second.
The number of advertising, marketing, PR and communications FDI projects were 2% lower than in 2019, when 254 projects were recorded.
The US was the leading destination for advertising, marketing, PR and communications projects in business and professional services FDI in 2021, with a total of 37 projects, while Germany was second with 22 and the United Arab Emirates was third with 18 projects.
Where are the leading business and professional services investors located?
Investment Monitor's analysis shows that the UK became the leading source market for outbound business and professional services FDI in 2021, with the number of projects almost as high as in 2019. There were a total of 385 outbound projects in 2021 and 394 projects in 2019.
All of the top five source markets for outbound business and professional services FDI in 2021 witnessed an increase in the number of projects in 2021 in comparison to 2020. The US saw an increase of 15.6%, France of 22.4%, the Netherlands of 44.6%, and India of 15.7%.
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu was the leading business and professional services investor from the UK in 2021, with a total of 21 projects, followed by WPP Company with 12 projects.
Out of the 21 projects by Deloitte, 20 were in accountancy, audit and tax activities and one was in advertising, marketing, PR and communications.
France was the leading destination for Deloitte projects in 2021, with a total of seven recorded over the year.
Deloitte also announced projects in other countries, such as a new regional headquarters in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and plans to open a new technology development centre in Spain.
What does the future hold for FDI in business and professional services?
The recovery in the business and professional services sector has been relatively strong across all regions. Western Europe, the Middle East and North Africa, and North America even saw higher project numbers than pre-Covid-19.
Asia-Pacific is an outlier in not seeing project numbers recover to 2019 levels yet.
The compound effect of the war in Ukraine and the widespread cost-of-living crisis, will pose further challenges for FDI in this sector in 2022.
Marina Leiva is a senior reporter at Investment Monitor, where she specialises in the agribusiness sector. Previously, she reported on institutional investments in the UK, Ireland, France, Spain and Portugal for MandateWire at the Financial Times. She started her career in Spain, covering international affairs for Eldiario.es
Payments Industry Revenue Models in 2021 and Beyond
Wealth Management Scorecard, 2021 Update - Thematic Research
Offshore Wealth Management - Market Trends and Competitive Dynamics 2021
United Kingdom (UK) SME Insurance - Market Dynamics and Opportunities 2021
UK Travel Insurance: Market Dynamics and Opportunities 2021
More FDI data
Are FDI partners also trade partners?
Will China's decline boost FDI in other Asian countries?
Malaysia and Vietnam set for record-breaking years for FDI in 2022
An investor's guide to western Europe


Yesterday, CCP Fozzie announced a new set of navy electronic warfare frigates. In this article, I will break down what these stats actually mean in practical application, and do some theorycrafting on the strengths and weaknesses of each ship and how they can be flown. These ships are all designed to have some sort of offensive capability, something most other EWAR ships lack. They will all provide similar DPS to combat frigates or navy frigates while still keeping EWAR bonuses. The downside of this is that the EWAR comes with a significant reduction in range that forces them to brawl if they want to use their support capabilities. I think all of these ships will excel at 1v1 fighting, but should be replaced with electronic attack frigates once you hit even the smallest of fleet sizes.
First off, the stats. The Crucifier Navy Issue has a 100% bonus to damage on two turrets, giving it four effective turrets. On top of this you get two drones with two more spare drones in your cargo bay. It will do around 180 DPS with close range ammo and 140 with short range ammo, barring damage mods. This is actually more than a Slicer but without the range bonus of course. The next bonus is the standard 7.5% per level tracking disruptor effectiveness that the normal Crucifier also gets. This will increase the strength of your tracking disruptors by 60% (70% heated) optimal and falloff. The difference here between the Crucifier and the Navy variant is the massive negative bonus that the navy variant gets. Having a -85% range bonus will bring the range down to 10.8+5.4km. This means that you are pretty much forced to be in hard tackle range in order to use your EWAR capabilities. The cap reduction will be minimal for this ship and I don't think it will matter much. The slot layout is 3/4/3 with two turrets. Having the four mids will allow this ship to do the standard scram, web and prop mod plus a tracking disruptor. I think that the fit most people will use for this ship will be a scram-kiting one with afterburner, using the low slots for a tiny bit more tank as the tracking disruptor will help mitigate most incoming damage. Another thing worth bringing up is the base speed of this ship. 340 m/s is the same base speed that the Incursus has, and while not Caldari slow it will still be pretty slow for Amarr. Overall, I think this ship is underrated on the forums and a TD setup that scram kites should auto win most 1v1s vs. non drone ships. The DPS it will bring is nothing to laugh at, even though it will have to be at a closer range.
This ship shares the same 20% damage bonus as the Crucifier Navy Issue. It does lose one drone though, but gains an extra un-bonused rocket launcher instead. The damage it will deal is actually surprisingly high and most people will probably not expect it. Using close range ammo, you will be able to get up to around 190 DPS unheated. I think this ship will be really strong even if you ignore the dishonorable ECM bonus that, while super good, probably won't be needed for the types of fights you will see this ship in most of the time. The ECM bonus that the Griffin Navy gets is at 20% strength per level. It is the same strength as a Kitsune and like the Crucifier Navy Issue, it gets a -85% km range penalty to keep these modules within hard tackle range. Interestingly, the optimal of the ECM will actually be quite a bit lower then scram range at 6.45+7.2km This means that, theoretically, you could scram kite this ship outside of the optimal range, similar to what you can do with energy neutralizing frigates right now. It will still be able to occasionally jam targets within falloff, however. Another tiny thing to note here is that the ECM strength bonus actually applies to ECM bursts as well, and that could provide some fun tactics. Sadly, the range nerf also does and the activation cost reduction does not. For the slot layout you have 3/5/2. The first thing that instantly stands out here is obviously the five mid slots. I have long said that mid slots and range control specifically is what wins frigate 1v1s, and this ship has that. A good current example is the Heron that also has five mid slots. By using a combination of webs and (non bonused) tracking disruptors you can guarantee an auto win vs. any non drone/missile ship. For example, this fight with a Heron versus a Jaguar (warning: smugness). I think that, while more support-oriented, Griffin Navys will be popular. There will also be a second version that brawl with either max tank or using un-bonused tracking disruptors to keep a target down. As for the speed of the ship, it's nothing special really. It shares the same speed as the normal Griffin, compared to the Crucifier Navy Issue that loses 10m/s to the normal Crucifier. I think this ship will be decent. Most people might underestimate the actual damage that it does and it is really going to punch a lot of frigates down in a pure brawl. I also think that a lot of people overrate the ECM bonus on this ship and don't realize just how big of a penalty the reduction in range will be.
The Maulus Navy Issue is a bit more interesting than the previous two frigates. First off, it doesn't get any bonuses to the Gallente primary EWAR, sensor dampeners. Instead, you get a 10% bonus to warp scrambler range. This means that with Gallente Frigate V trained you will get 13.5 km (16.2 km heated) range on a T2 Warp Scrambler. Then we have the drone bonus. It's important to note here that this ship didn't get an actual damage bonus to drones. It is just tracking and hitpoints. This means that this ship will get the same DPS as a Tristan. The EFT DPS is going to be at around 180 with close range ammo, but everyone who has used drones in PvP knows that they sometimes have a will of their own and won't apply perfectly all the time. Then we have the role bonus. This is a unique bonus and the first ship we have seen with something like this. Having +1 strength on scramblers seems like a bonus that has few real uses, such as catching stabbed farmers in Factional Warfare. It could be used for gate camping with remote sensor boosters as well I guess. However, for normal PvP combat this bonus will be totally useless. Looking at the rest of the ship, you have a slot layout of 2/3/4, giving it an extra low over the Tristan. Something that I think could work really well for this ship is using it as kite platform, utilizing both a long point and a defensive scram. Similarly to a Garmur, the defensive scram will help defend against people getting too close as you are almost always guaranteed to get the scrambler on before they get within range. The speed comes in at 325 m/s – the exact same as the Tristan before the nerf. I think this ship will be really popular and work well as both a brawler and a kiter. It really should be named Tristan Navy Issue, but I understand that that wouldn't be very consistent. I like the fact that it didn't get a damage bonus as that would have put it over the top. The Scrambler bonus, while totally useless for normal PvP, is a nice bonus and a nice thing for a lot of people who want to hunt stabbed farmers.
The last of the new faction frigates is the Vigil Navy Issue. This is a missile platform, getting a 20% damage bonus to all damage types, with an extra 5% per level to explosive damage. This is similar to the Talwar that also gets an explosive damage bonus. I like how CCP have changed their mind on some of the damage locked missile ships by giving them a more general damage bonuses to all damage types with something extra for either kinetic or, as in this case, explosive. This means that you will get four and a half effective launchers shooting explosive and four shooting any other damage type. On top of these launchers you also get an extra un-bonused turret and three drones. Despite the lower damage of rockets compared to turrets, I think this ship will be a beast and output a lot of DPS. The 5% per level application bonus, while not the most useful, will still help a lot vs. a lot of targets, such as afterburning frigates and linked ships. Last is the 50% range bonus to stasis webifiers. This bonus will bring your stasis webifier up from 10 km (13 km heated) to 15 km (19.5 km heated). This is a great bonus that will either help in catching kiters or make you able to kite with no worries about your target catching you. The slot layout is 3/4/3, giving you plenty of mid slots for webs and tank. I suspect the Vigil Fleet Issue will be flown as either a light missile kiter or even as a rocket kiter. I feel it will be the strongest in a light missile configuration because of the guaranteed range control using your long range web. Further enhancing this ship as a kiter is the high base speed, clocking in at 400 m/s base. This is higher than all the other Navy EWAR frigates and even borders on interceptor speed. Don't expect to run away from this ship. I think this will definitely be one of the strongest of the four, while not looking as scary as the others at first glance.
Overall, these frigates are very niche. Fozzie has done a great job making sure these are good ships on the solo and small gang scale of PvP while not replacing EAFs and keeping their own niche. I like how they all are capable of bringing decent amounts of damage while also sporting some support. One of the major problems these ships have is their engageability. Fighting EWAR can often be very frustrating and these ships will be no exception to that rule. The Crucifier and Griffin will keep you down with EWAR and the Vigil and Maulus will kite you with no hope of you ever catching them. I feel like there are very few ships in the game that can take a 1v1 versus these ships without being specialized and counter-fit. Similar to how the Sentinel is today. The Griffin and Crucifier feel superior in brawl situations and I think they will have a big impact in FW space where you can dictate the starting range of a engagement inside a plex. I wonder what plex sizes CCP decides these can go in. I am leaning towards these being too strong for novices, but then again, you have pirate frigs in those already. It will be interesting to see the price for them. I assume they will be available in the FW LP store at similar price points to the existing faction frigates. This will mean that the Vigil Fleet Issue will hit its baseline price very fast and might be way too cheap for the power provided. I hope CCP continues this trend of support frigates being able to do DPS with their new T2 frigate logi lineup, and I think that could create some awesome RR ships.


text:
Arcwave Ion: The new sex toy promising 'female orgasms for men'
Around 70% of men said they experienced a more intense climax after using the pulsating hey experienced a more intense climax after using the pulsating Pleasure Air Technology.
In the age of lockdowns and social distancing, showing yourself a bit of self-love and self-care is more important than ever.
Now, one sex toy company is ensuring guys won't be in a rush to leave the house again even after the pandemic's over with the release of a new product that promises 'female orgasms for men'.
Billed as the world's first 'Pleasure Air Stroker' for men, the Arcwave Ion utilises pulsating air waves, a patented technology and typically seen in the products of the female sex toy brand Womanizer to stimulate nerve endings on the tip of the penis.
Creators say the result is a more intense orgasm, and that given "nerve endings have no gender identity" men have long been missing out compared to the ladies due to comparatively limited sex toy ranges aimed at genital stimulation.
There's science behind the greater sexual pleasure: nerve-endings called 'Pacini receptors' that are found in the clitoris are also found in the frenulum which connects the head of the penis to the shaft, but these are not generally well-stimulated by heavy skin-to-skin pressure.
The pulsating air waves emitted by the Arcwave Ion rapidly and lightly stimulate these receptors, often resulting in an orgasm for guys unlike any other.
Survey research for Arcwave shows that around 70% of men said they experienced a more intense climax after using the pulsating air wave - known as Pleasure Air Technology - with almost three-quarters (74%) using the word "explosive" to describe the experience and more than two-thirds (68%) using the word "overwhelming".
High praise indeed...
Arcwave say they hope the Ion can help open men's minds when it comes to sex toys and genital stimulation, after a recent survey of 7000 people in 14 countries found that a third still believe that it's much more acceptable for women to use a sex toy.
The rechargeable, ergonomically-designed Arcwave Ion has eight intensity levels and is made of smart CleanTech silicone, ensuring it's smooth supple, durable, and (importantly) easy to clean.
It's also water-resistant to 1m depth for 30 minutes, meaning the Arcwave Ion's use doesn't have to be limited just to the bedroom...
Arcwave Ion retails at £169 and can be purchased at Arcwave.
Team GB's Tom Bosworth reflects on coming out as gay: 'I wanted to do it on my own terms'
Stay Glowing and Stay Ready with Pure for Men's new face collection
The best Black Friday deals on sex toys


just a quick question: is it possible for you to make that your website also shows an article date in its respective page?. In the main site, it shows the (I assume) correct date of the articles, but when I go to the full version of an article, the date doesn't seem to be in any place.
Just look at the date of the first comment, it'll get you close enough.
Thank you, but there are articles with no comments. Anyway, it's not like it's a "live-or-die" issue.
My site is not a typical blog were the posts are meant to be chronologically ordered. Dates aren't relevant since they aren't meant to be read in a specific order.
Yeah, that's ok. I'm not trying to convince you, but I thought the date may help a bit with "context", so to speak. But now that I think it, it's not like human physiology could have change over the last years, rendering useless any article, for example, like "The Baseline Diet", or, "Comparing the diets" (which are pretty good by the way).
Yeah, I understand what you said. Sorry if that wasn't clear with my previous post (English is not my primary language). Thanks again.